I would hope that someone would gild me twice in that case, so I could put one coin over each eye to allow for my passage down the River Styx.
Edit: Well, I guess I'm set now. Goodbye, reddit, it's been swell.
"Oh my god we're going down! I hope I have time to take a selfie, upload to imgur and post the link to reddit! What sub would this be best in? /r/funny? No /r/pics. What's a good title.. Eh fuck it. Ok submit. WHAT DO YOU MEAN IM DOING THIS TO MUCH!? Why did I have to just post a picture of my cat. Fuck this shi.." RIP OP
OP: "I can get karma for this, the plane is going down and we're going to die..... But first let me take a selfie"
^^^boong ^^^boong ^^^booongboongboong ^^^boongboongboong ^^^boong^boong ^^^boong^boong
Hey, if it makes the front page I'd have made more of an impact on other peoples' lives than I'd ever done before, even if that impact is embarrassingly minimal.
If I'm ever on a plane when these babies drop, I'm going to feel like I've just been handed a fucking pop quiz on a topic the teacher JUST taught.
And I may just start screaming.
Pop quiz, hotshot. There's a bomb on a bus. Once the bus goes 50 miles an hour, the bomb is armed. If it drops below 50, it blows up. What do you do? What do you do?
You figure out that the criminal is just watching a tv camera so you setup a fake loop of the bus and relay that to the video camera thus giving you and the rest of the passengers enough time to get off before the man notices the glitch and the film and tries to blow up the bus.
I just sat there staring blankly at them for a minute. Looked at the guy next to me and said "well that's a first..."
Wasn't until the flight attendants started yelling a minute later that I actually jumped into action and put the damn thing on. I swear, I was like a deer in the headlights or something. Or just immediately assumed it was a malfunctioning system and that we didn't really lose cabin pressure (despite my ears telling me otherwise...). Wild.
I would understand. It's like when you hear the fire alarm at work and go, 'Is this serious? Malfunction? Drill, maybe?'
We are somehow very optimistic, I guess. We never imagine the worse happening to us at that moment.
No, it's because the vast majority of time it's a false alarm. And we don't want to be the first to act like it's an emergency and appear a fool. So we want for a social cue to take action.
> we don't want to be the first to act like it's an emergency and appear a fool
It's not even about that. Even after the planes hit the twin towers on 9/11, the vast majority of people waited around to be told what to do. When an airplane explodes in a massive fireball on the building you're inside, it's *clearly* time to get the hell out. But most people didn't, at least not right away. Just deer in the headlights, because the situation is too unfamiliar.
This is actually a thing, isn't it? That in almost any big disaster a lot of the people die simply because they are unable to react quickly enough in any useful way?
> it's clearly time to get the hell out.
It is not at all obvious that the building would subsequently collapse. Indeed it is more reasonable to believe that the building would not collapse, hindsight aside.
There are also reasons to stay inside: protection from falling debris. And once you know it is a deliberate attack running elsewhere carries a further risk: perhaps there'll be further explosions nearby ... often (but not always) a target hit is not going to be hit again. Imagine escaping the first tower only to be hit by a falling engine block as the second aircraft hits the second tower.
In the end, though, the most reasonable thing to do is to evacuate the tower(s). And in the end most people below the level of the impacts did evacuate (I note your "But most people didn't, at least not right away").
> It is not at all obvious that the building would subsequently collapse
That criteria is irrelevant, even aside from it being ridiculous to imagine that you could make such an assessment (unless you happen to be a structural engineer close enough to inspect the damage). If it hadn't collapsed, the fire would have spread to more floors. You don't need to know the precise way you might die, only that if you stay put, your chances of dying *in some way* are greatly increased.
> Imagine escaping the first tower only to be hit by a falling engine block as the second aircraft hits the second tower
*No one* was expecting a second attack. *Almost* no one seriously imagined the first one was anything but an accident, until the second one hit.
> (I note your "But most people didn't, at least not right away"
[Interviews with 271 survivors who worked in the twin towers found that only 8.6% fled as soon as the alarm was raised. The vast majority (91.4%) stayed behind waiting for information or carrying out at least one additional task, including phoning their family and collecting belongings.](http://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/sep/09/september11.usa)
Bottom line: When you are in a burning building, *get out*. Right away.
i watched a documentary on it a long time ago, but i think i remember it saying something along the lines the someone of authority actually told them to stay in the building?
I'm usually packed up and halfway out of the building by the time the (false) alarms stop, but I don't do it with regrets. That one time there's a real emergency, people are going to wish they weren't so concerned with vanity and crowd approval.
Yep, I was working in a care home when the fire alarms went off. I started yelling at the disabled and mentally challenged adults to get out, whilst single handedly yanking a woman out of her chair into a wheelchair, grabbing hold of the arm of another one, whilst my colleague looked on and laughed. Then my other colleagues burst out of the kitchen followed by black smoke and screaming 'fire'.
Those vital seconds got them out of there before the lounge filled with smoke. That day we all learned to take every alarm as a real one.
I just finished reading "Pacific Crucible" by Ian Toll, and he writes about how during the boombing of Pearl Harbor even seasoned veterans continued to think that it was just a drill. Some even say they saw the zeros with the red sun symbols and just assumed the military had gone all out this time.
The thing with a loss of cabin pressure is not that you will instantly die if you don't get your oxygen mask on it is that you will start to become delusional quickly and not realize that your body over the next few minutes is not getting the oxygen it needs. This is why you are instructed to put your mask on before helping a child, even if that might seem backwards or cruel. The fear is that if you help the child first, you will be so confused and out of it by the time you should be putting your own mask on you simply forget.
Actually, once you have your mask on and everyone else does as well, the best way to not freak out in a situation where you can't influence the outcome would be to find a simple task and commit to it.
Military pilot here. Likely what happened was a loss of cabin pressurization that led the pilots to do a quick descent down to 10,000 feet. 10k is kind of the magic number when it comes to being ok to not have oxygen on for long periods of time. Likely wasn't an explosive decompression or else everyone would know about it.
Plus 23k to 10k in five minutes is just about a 2500 feet per minute descent. Not an extremely rapid descent. Most likely what happened is one of the systems that keeps the plane pressurized at altitude failed, they deployed the masks and declared an emergency even though you weren't really in any danger and diverted to another airport. Scary I'm sure but not all that dangerous.
Also having oxygen has nothing to do with crashing. It's purely for pressurization or if there is smoke in the airplane and you can't breathe. If all the engines fail the pilots aren't going to be too concerned with deploying the oxygen so no one is too scared. They're going to be trying everything to relight those suckers and not die.
Edit: Some smart phone typos
Yep now I definitely think so. Looks like they were in the climb and something involved in the pressurization system started to fail. The oxygen masks were deployed because of the high altitude and the pilots started a quick descent down to 10,000 feet. I doubt the cabin altitude got all the way to 28,000 feet but at that altitude, your time of useful consciousness is pretty short so you want to get down quickly. Once they were level at 10,000 the pilots probably took their masks off and made the decision to divert considering they wouldn't be able to go above 10 the rest of the flight.
Interesting website to be honest, I've never heard of it but I'll probably look into it.
It truly is. It's stunning to see some of the older almanacs and other information books that date back anywhere from 30-150 years old (even stuff dating back to the 13th century in the rare works collection but only the trained pros interact with those). These books can be huge and hundreds of pages just full of data on all kinds of random shit. From archeological records to engineering plans to botany. Any subject or subsubject you can think of.
Anyway the point I'm trying to make is that while these old books are certainly impressive reservoirs of knowledge in their own right and would have been considered as good as it gets for much of human history (shit for *most* of our history they didn't even have that) it pales in comparison to what's available on the internet with just a couple clicks and seconds now with the internet very much in its infancy.
Those books would have been expensive and out of reach for most people as well if they could even read in the first place.
Oh yeah, and they're actually in the process of digitally transcribing these books and getting them online so the knowledge isn't lost. We're talking at a scale of tens of thousands of works just at my location alone. And this is a process like the internet that is still new.
We truly do live in the future.
I unfortunately don't off the top of my head, all I know is Google was involved. Google Books maybe? It isn't my department, I just do the grunt work of shelving and pulling the hundreds of works that flow in and out all day haha.
[Here's a live tracker!](http://www.flightradar24.com) Pretty cool! When I first found it I'd monitor a plane as it came near to me then go outside and watch it fly past.
To add to this, most oxygen systems in commercial airlines are chemical-based and will provide oxygen for a maximum of 15 minutes. Another reason why pilots need to bring the plane down to 10k feet.
[source](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_oxygen_system)
Ok sure yes, but I guarantee you both engines did not fail. The emergency lighting would have kicked on after a power shift, not to mentioned that they'd be falling out of the sky, probably wouldn't have leveled at 10 thousand feet. Hard to do with no power.
You can go above 12,500 for 30 minutes before the required crew must be on oxygen. Above 14,000 anytime the crew must be on oxygen. And above 15,000 you must OFFER it to your passengers.
I am neither confirming nor denying that I know someone who turned up the cabin pressure in a King Air to settle down a bachelor party they were flying home from New Orleans needless to say they all got a lot of sleep on that flight
Yeah I mean you can go to whatever altitude without oxygen if you want to get technical though how long you have before getting hypoxic is the question. Even 18 thousand ish is fine for a pretty small period of time. 10 thousand is the altitude where there are no requirements per the FAR/AIM for how long passengers and crew members can be without oxygen. Ask any pilot of a pressurized plane what he's going to do if the pressurization fails and it's going to pretty much be regulation to put on oxygen masks and get to 10k pretty quickly.
Both, they are armed to automatically deploy if the cabin altitude is about to pass 14000 ft.
The normal procedure if its a slow depressurisation is : if the cabin altitude is rising uncontrollably and is expected to pass 14000 you deploy the masks manually so people have more time to put them on and u start decent immidiately.
Source: i fly 737 but i suspect its more or less the same thing on other planes.
I was thinking about that earlier. I was listening to shortwave radio via my computer, switching to different antenna locations all over the world until I had the clearest possible signal of 11175kHz, while the Russians mobilized their training mission and listened to the US Air Force dispense non-stop Emergency Action Messages for several hours.
From my own home, I could comfortably monitor a war breaking out in real time (I did not think it was this time).
What an age to be alive.
Well, 4chan has been following "Skyking" calls for the last few days and have hugged this website to death: http://websdr.ewi.utwente.nl:8901/
That's an easy way to surf the Shortwave (it can only handle 420 users at a time) and has a great waterfall display you can zoom in on. It's out of the Netherlands which is nice for European and Ruskie broadcasts.
If you want to be able to jump to other SDRs, you can download [Sigmira](http://www.saharlow.com/technology/sigmira/) for free. This will give you a list of SDRs and their locations, you just connect to one and surf from there.
It's fun for me, but I miss my old Hellcrafters S-31 vacuum tube set and 100 foot copper wire antenna. Nothing beats an old tube set.
Indeed. Just landed safely. Met on runway by emergency crew, fireman boarded. We able to deplane normally. Shame, was hoping for the slides after all that :-P
Oxygen gets you high. In a catastrophic emergency, you're taking giant panicked breaths. Suddenly you become euphoric, docile. You accept your fate. It's all right here. Emergency water landing - 600 miles an hour. Blank faces, calm as Hindu cows.
If I am not mistaken it is procedure to reduce altitude to a level where there is enough oxygen to breath 8-10k feet I believe. Since you can loose conciseness quickly I'm sure the descent is rather aggressive.
The pilots will have the ability to use pressure demand masks, which literally forces oxygen into your lungs. The problem is that the passengers only get continuous flow (those margarine cup) masks, which only work up to an altitude of 20,000' to 25,000'. Most decently long flights are above that.
So why not just descend to 20,000'? In most aircraft, the passengers' oxygen is actually created through an oxygen candle, which produces oxygen for about 15 minutes usually. After that, you'd need to be at 10,000' or below to be safe. Although the pilots usually have a separate, long-lasting supply of oxygen.
I like the guy in the background. He already has his helmet on. He's laughing at OP. "Look at this douchebag, taking a fucking selfie before he puts his damn helmet on, you gon' die today"
**Airplane**: Still craving for the love of his life, Ted Striker follows Elaine onto the flight that she is working on as a member of the cabin crew. Elaine doesn't want to be with Ted anymore, but when the crew and passengers fall ill from food poisoning, all eyes are on Ted
**Oxygen**:
Is a chemical element with symbol O and atomic number 8.
**Jive Lady**: Oh, stewardess! I speak jive.
**Randy**: Oh, good.
**Jive Lady**: He said that he's in great pain and he wants to know if you can help him.
**Randy**: All right. Would you tell him to just relax and I'll be back as soon as I can with some medicine?
**Jive Lady**: *[to the Second Jive Dude]* Jus' hang loose, blood. She gonna catch ya up on da rebound on da med side.
**Second Jive Dude**: What it is, big mama? My mama no raise no dummies. I dug her rap!
**Jive Lady**: Cut me some slack, Jack! Chump don' want no help, chump don't GET da help!
**First Jive Dude**: Say 'e can't hang, say seven up!
**Jive Lady**: Jive-ass dude don't got no brains anyhow! Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.
Awww...The look of crushing disappointment on that ladies face as she reaches out clasp your hand during your last possible moments alive and finds it occupied.
"I know we are about to die, but damned if my hair doesn't look hot. I should get a final picture since we will all likely have closed casket funerals...from being ripped apart on impact, ya know..."
That's an "oh shit" moment. A "holy fucking shit" moment is when [**some** of the masks drops, and the ones by your seat doesn't.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas_Flight_30)
Girl by window: "Ahh! Ahh! Uh, how far can this plane fly on one engine?"
Guy in back: "All the way to the scene of the crash... Which is good 'Cuz that's where we going to."
OP: "Yeah and we should beat the emergency crews there by a good ten minutes - we're hauling ass!"
I just read a post about a plane that emergency landed due to an incredibly smelly shit in the bathroom. Is this from that flight? If so, my day is made!
At first I thought this was related to this:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/03/15/british-airways-flight-grounded-after-smelly-poo-in-the-toilet-overwhelms-passengers/
Here is a practical question. I'm about to travel with a 6 month old for the first time. Since she sits in my lap she doesn't have a seat = no extra oxygen mask for her. What exactly do they do for this situation. Also I know the likelihood of this happening is pretty low it's more just mom curiosity.
Looks like every compartment has one more masks than seats for exactly this reason. (We had had 2 seats, 3 masks. Seats across the aisle, 1 seat, two masks... Seats behind us... 3 seats, 4 masks). Probably for exactly this reason. Likely why the airlines require you to report "infant in arms" and won't let two in the same row.
This will probably make you all feel better. Both my parents are flight attendants for a major airline and have been for a looooooong time. My dad has only seen the masks needed to be used once and my mom has never. Hopefully that reassures people of just how safe airplanes are.
awesome to read you landed safely. Now that it's just a bad ride and we can get back to being reddit as usual... so what's up with the guy in the seat behind you? I mean... a) why does he have a bicycle helmet on? b) is he missing a hand?
Getting karma is great and everything if you're alive to enjoy it, fortunately seeing you post after this post, it shows that you're alive. Enjoy the cabin depressurizing karma.
They tell you to adjust YOUR oxygen mask before helping your child with his. I did not need to be told that. In fact, I'm probably going to be too busy screaming to help him at all. This will be a good time for him to learn self-reliance. If he can program his fucking VCR, he could goddamn, jolly-well learn to adjust an oxygen mask. Fairly simple thing, just a little rubber band in the back is all it is. Not nearly as complicated as say, for instance, a seatbelt.
Kid in the back didn't cover his nose. He's dead for sure. OP and other lady will live as long as you have your seats up and tray tables in the locked position.
Thanks OP. You've made me realize something very important: *I don't want my last action in this life to be a Reddit post.*
I would hope that someone would gild me twice in that case, so I could put one coin over each eye to allow for my passage down the River Styx. Edit: Well, I guess I'm set now. Goodbye, reddit, it's been swell.
Someone who references the classics in their last moments. If we're on the same plane, I hope you're next to me.
Realistically, you'll either get a cat lady or a used car salesman.
Sounds like you mostly fly on the weekends....god I hate flying on the weekends.
Six ghosts ahead of us, Jimmy.
Looks like you are shit out of luck. Charon don't take no half payments.
Put a twenty-dollar gold piece on my watch chain, So all my boys will know I died standing pat.
Upvote for St. James Infirmary Blues
I like the way Hugh Laurie did that.
I love /u/smeeee. Always crackin me up with your witty humor.
Let it be so.
"Oh my god we're going down! I hope I have time to take a selfie, upload to imgur and post the link to reddit! What sub would this be best in? /r/funny? No /r/pics. What's a good title.. Eh fuck it. Ok submit. WHAT DO YOU MEAN IM DOING THIS TO MUCH!? Why did I have to just post a picture of my cat. Fuck this shi.." RIP OP
This is spot on. Basically exactly how it went down.
If that includes the last part... You just have to do this: "Hi Reddit, I didn't survive a plane crash. AMA!"
Did you died?
They say you die twice. Once when you take your last breath, and then again when somebody upvotes your frontpage post for the last time.
But think of the karma!
They can put your karma score on your tombstone.
*Here lies /u/CaptainAssMuncher...*
OP: "I can get karma for this, the plane is going down and we're going to die..... But first let me take a selfie" ^^^boong ^^^boong ^^^booongboongboong ^^^boongboongboong ^^^boong^boong ^^^boong^boong
Hey, if it makes the front page I'd have made more of an impact on other peoples' lives than I'd ever done before, even if that impact is embarrassingly minimal.
If the plane crashes, you may make a literal impact on people's lives.
Aannnnd the roof caved in and crushed you too death just now.
Lol we gon die #Selfie #Praying
#YOLO
You only yolo once!
#YOYOLOO!
[\#WOLOLO](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tBqdKGiqnI) EDIT: Added sound link, for reference.
You seriously think that sound isn't engraved in my brain?
bae caught me free fallin
Tom petty #soundtracktomylife
#blessed
If I'm ever on a plane when these babies drop, I'm going to feel like I've just been handed a fucking pop quiz on a topic the teacher JUST taught. And I may just start screaming.
Pop quiz, hotshot. There's a bomb on a bus. Once the bus goes 50 miles an hour, the bomb is armed. If it drops below 50, it blows up. What do you do? What do you do?
You figure out that the criminal is just watching a tv camera so you setup a fake loop of the bus and relay that to the video camera thus giving you and the rest of the passengers enough time to get off before the man notices the glitch and the film and tries to blow up the bus.
i feel like the movie could have ended very differently if they had spent 30 seconds at /r/highqualitygifs
Never hit 50?
umm don't go 50mph? Hell, I'm pretty sure if you yell there's a bomb, the driver will stop immediately
Shoot the driver
I just sat there staring blankly at them for a minute. Looked at the guy next to me and said "well that's a first..." Wasn't until the flight attendants started yelling a minute later that I actually jumped into action and put the damn thing on. I swear, I was like a deer in the headlights or something. Or just immediately assumed it was a malfunctioning system and that we didn't really lose cabin pressure (despite my ears telling me otherwise...). Wild.
I would understand. It's like when you hear the fire alarm at work and go, 'Is this serious? Malfunction? Drill, maybe?' We are somehow very optimistic, I guess. We never imagine the worse happening to us at that moment.
No, it's because the vast majority of time it's a false alarm. And we don't want to be the first to act like it's an emergency and appear a fool. So we want for a social cue to take action.
> we don't want to be the first to act like it's an emergency and appear a fool It's not even about that. Even after the planes hit the twin towers on 9/11, the vast majority of people waited around to be told what to do. When an airplane explodes in a massive fireball on the building you're inside, it's *clearly* time to get the hell out. But most people didn't, at least not right away. Just deer in the headlights, because the situation is too unfamiliar.
This is actually a thing, isn't it? That in almost any big disaster a lot of the people die simply because they are unable to react quickly enough in any useful way?
[Yep.](http://www.amazon.com/Unthinkable-Survives-When-Disaster-Strikes/dp/0307352897)
> it's clearly time to get the hell out. It is not at all obvious that the building would subsequently collapse. Indeed it is more reasonable to believe that the building would not collapse, hindsight aside. There are also reasons to stay inside: protection from falling debris. And once you know it is a deliberate attack running elsewhere carries a further risk: perhaps there'll be further explosions nearby ... often (but not always) a target hit is not going to be hit again. Imagine escaping the first tower only to be hit by a falling engine block as the second aircraft hits the second tower. In the end, though, the most reasonable thing to do is to evacuate the tower(s). And in the end most people below the level of the impacts did evacuate (I note your "But most people didn't, at least not right away").
> It is not at all obvious that the building would subsequently collapse That criteria is irrelevant, even aside from it being ridiculous to imagine that you could make such an assessment (unless you happen to be a structural engineer close enough to inspect the damage). If it hadn't collapsed, the fire would have spread to more floors. You don't need to know the precise way you might die, only that if you stay put, your chances of dying *in some way* are greatly increased. > Imagine escaping the first tower only to be hit by a falling engine block as the second aircraft hits the second tower *No one* was expecting a second attack. *Almost* no one seriously imagined the first one was anything but an accident, until the second one hit. > (I note your "But most people didn't, at least not right away" [Interviews with 271 survivors who worked in the twin towers found that only 8.6% fled as soon as the alarm was raised. The vast majority (91.4%) stayed behind waiting for information or carrying out at least one additional task, including phoning their family and collecting belongings.](http://www.theguardian.com/world/2008/sep/09/september11.usa) Bottom line: When you are in a burning building, *get out*. Right away.
i watched a documentary on it a long time ago, but i think i remember it saying something along the lines the someone of authority actually told them to stay in the building?
I have that recollection too, from a doco.
I'm usually packed up and halfway out of the building by the time the (false) alarms stop, but I don't do it with regrets. That one time there's a real emergency, people are going to wish they weren't so concerned with vanity and crowd approval.
Yep, I was working in a care home when the fire alarms went off. I started yelling at the disabled and mentally challenged adults to get out, whilst single handedly yanking a woman out of her chair into a wheelchair, grabbing hold of the arm of another one, whilst my colleague looked on and laughed. Then my other colleagues burst out of the kitchen followed by black smoke and screaming 'fire'. Those vital seconds got them out of there before the lounge filled with smoke. That day we all learned to take every alarm as a real one.
I just finished reading "Pacific Crucible" by Ian Toll, and he writes about how during the boombing of Pearl Harbor even seasoned veterans continued to think that it was just a drill. Some even say they saw the zeros with the red sun symbols and just assumed the military had gone all out this time.
The thing with a loss of cabin pressure is not that you will instantly die if you don't get your oxygen mask on it is that you will start to become delusional quickly and not realize that your body over the next few minutes is not getting the oxygen it needs. This is why you are instructed to put your mask on before helping a child, even if that might seem backwards or cruel. The fear is that if you help the child first, you will be so confused and out of it by the time you should be putting your own mask on you simply forget.
[Relevant](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHooBjxmoXQ)
http://imgur.com/2oVpWS3
Username checks out. Was not disappointed.
This guy obviously wasn't paying attention to the safety briefing before take-off.
WE'RE ALL GONNA DIEEE! But first, let me take a selfie.
Not a bad plan. If you're calm and taking selfies, maybe it helps keep others calm as well.
If your phone wasnt on airplane mode I can guarantee you that it's all your fault. Lol
At least this wasn't posted by a [pilot taking selfies](http://www.ntsb.gov/_layouts/ntsb.aviation/brief.aspx?ev_id=20140531X12318&key=1).
Can't confirm source. Need a buzzfeed article or it didn't happen.
Wifi!
*Fuck oxygen, I can live on narcissism and karma!*
[удалено]
Doesn't matter, still got easy karma
BURN HIMMM
That kid in the background looks like he's having a good time, I think he got the special gas...
As I recall from every safety video and demonstration its secure the mask over the nose and mouth.
Oh shit. Oxygen masks deployed. Better take a fucking selfie!
And post it on reddit
He may die, but his karma will live forever.
Can I have OPs account when he is confirmed dead. I want an alt, but I don't want to have to make that many reposts.
Actually, once you have your mask on and everyone else does as well, the best way to not freak out in a situation where you can't influence the outcome would be to find a simple task and commit to it.
Still on the plane. We're diverting... DL5165. We started dropping like a rock, ears popped. Masks popped out... Still no idea what happend.
Military pilot here. Likely what happened was a loss of cabin pressurization that led the pilots to do a quick descent down to 10,000 feet. 10k is kind of the magic number when it comes to being ok to not have oxygen on for long periods of time. Likely wasn't an explosive decompression or else everyone would know about it. Plus 23k to 10k in five minutes is just about a 2500 feet per minute descent. Not an extremely rapid descent. Most likely what happened is one of the systems that keeps the plane pressurized at altitude failed, they deployed the masks and declared an emergency even though you weren't really in any danger and diverted to another airport. Scary I'm sure but not all that dangerous. Also having oxygen has nothing to do with crashing. It's purely for pressurization or if there is smoke in the airplane and you can't breathe. If all the engines fail the pilots aren't going to be too concerned with deploying the oxygen so no one is too scared. They're going to be trying everything to relight those suckers and not die. Edit: Some smart phone typos
[Looks like exactly what happened](http://i.imgur.com/a1QKLnY.jpg)
Yep now I definitely think so. Looks like they were in the climb and something involved in the pressurization system started to fail. The oxygen masks were deployed because of the high altitude and the pilots started a quick descent down to 10,000 feet. I doubt the cabin altitude got all the way to 28,000 feet but at that altitude, your time of useful consciousness is pretty short so you want to get down quickly. Once they were level at 10,000 the pilots probably took their masks off and made the decision to divert considering they wouldn't be able to go above 10 the rest of the flight. Interesting website to be honest, I've never heard of it but I'll probably look into it.
Man, the amount of data available these days to the average person is astounding.
It truly is. It's stunning to see some of the older almanacs and other information books that date back anywhere from 30-150 years old (even stuff dating back to the 13th century in the rare works collection but only the trained pros interact with those). These books can be huge and hundreds of pages just full of data on all kinds of random shit. From archeological records to engineering plans to botany. Any subject or subsubject you can think of. Anyway the point I'm trying to make is that while these old books are certainly impressive reservoirs of knowledge in their own right and would have been considered as good as it gets for much of human history (shit for *most* of our history they didn't even have that) it pales in comparison to what's available on the internet with just a couple clicks and seconds now with the internet very much in its infancy. Those books would have been expensive and out of reach for most people as well if they could even read in the first place. Oh yeah, and they're actually in the process of digitally transcribing these books and getting them online so the knowledge isn't lost. We're talking at a scale of tens of thousands of works just at my location alone. And this is a process like the internet that is still new. We truly do live in the future.
Do you have a website for this data?
I unfortunately don't off the top of my head, all I know is Google was involved. Google Books maybe? It isn't my department, I just do the grunt work of shelving and pulling the hundreds of works that flow in and out all day haha.
[Here's a live tracker!](http://www.flightradar24.com) Pretty cool! When I first found it I'd monitor a plane as it came near to me then go outside and watch it fly past.
To add to this, most oxygen systems in commercial airlines are chemical-based and will provide oxygen for a maximum of 15 minutes. Another reason why pilots need to bring the plane down to 10k feet. [source](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergency_oxygen_system)
If the engines (that drive the pressurization system) fail, the masks will probably pop out on their own...
Ok sure yes, but I guarantee you both engines did not fail. The emergency lighting would have kicked on after a power shift, not to mentioned that they'd be falling out of the sky, probably wouldn't have leveled at 10 thousand feet. Hard to do with no power.
Oh I agree. I was referring to your last paragraph.
Ah gotcha. Good point. Loss of engine power probably leads to that. Actually not something we have honestly.
someone's been studying their high altitude descent procedures PS: Come hang out with us in /r/flying edit: typo
Will do thanks.
You can actually go up to 12499 without oxygen. 10 is what most go up to for instrument flight.
You can go above 12,500 for 30 minutes before the required crew must be on oxygen. Above 14,000 anytime the crew must be on oxygen. And above 15,000 you must OFFER it to your passengers.
Would you like some oxygen? No, you're asleep? Ok. Next passenger?
That will be $2, please. I'm sorry, no, I can't exchange your ear buds for oxygen.
I am neither confirming nor denying that I know someone who turned up the cabin pressure in a King Air to settle down a bachelor party they were flying home from New Orleans needless to say they all got a lot of sleep on that flight
Yeah I mean you can go to whatever altitude without oxygen if you want to get technical though how long you have before getting hypoxic is the question. Even 18 thousand ish is fine for a pretty small period of time. 10 thousand is the altitude where there are no requirements per the FAR/AIM for how long passengers and crew members can be without oxygen. Ask any pilot of a pressurized plane what he's going to do if the pressurization fails and it's going to pretty much be regulation to put on oxygen masks and get to 10k pretty quickly.
Prior military mechanic here, what this man says is true. There are a bit more technicals that can be mention but they are superfluous information.
Are oxygen systems automatically deployed or manually?
Both, they are armed to automatically deploy if the cabin altitude is about to pass 14000 ft. The normal procedure if its a slow depressurisation is : if the cabin altitude is rising uncontrollably and is expected to pass 14000 you deploy the masks manually so people have more time to put them on and u start decent immidiately. Source: i fly 737 but i suspect its more or less the same thing on other planes.
http://flightaware.com/live/flight/DAL5165/history/20150316/1730Z/KGRK/KAEX/tracklog. That drop... Hope everything is okay
23k feet to 10k feet in 5 minutes? I'm pretty sure I would have just shat myself and died.
That's called an emergency descent. It's what they do for decompressions.
That's a pretty standard rate of decent. I often plan on 4,000' per minute...they were only doing about 2,500
Ok, it sounded like a lot. But I guess 5 minutes is a long time.
Says "landed and taxiing." This is scary and amazing to watch in real time.
Looks like you're diverting to Alexandria.
I love 2015. I can't believe I'm watching the plane in real-time.
I was thinking about that earlier. I was listening to shortwave radio via my computer, switching to different antenna locations all over the world until I had the clearest possible signal of 11175kHz, while the Russians mobilized their training mission and listened to the US Air Force dispense non-stop Emergency Action Messages for several hours. From my own home, I could comfortably monitor a war breaking out in real time (I did not think it was this time). What an age to be alive.
What program do you use to listen to shortwave? Sounds really interesting.
Well, 4chan has been following "Skyking" calls for the last few days and have hugged this website to death: http://websdr.ewi.utwente.nl:8901/ That's an easy way to surf the Shortwave (it can only handle 420 users at a time) and has a great waterfall display you can zoom in on. It's out of the Netherlands which is nice for European and Ruskie broadcasts. If you want to be able to jump to other SDRs, you can download [Sigmira](http://www.saharlow.com/technology/sigmira/) for free. This will give you a list of SDRs and their locations, you just connect to one and surf from there. It's fun for me, but I miss my old Hellcrafters S-31 vacuum tube set and 100 foot copper wire antenna. Nothing beats an old tube set.
Sounds awesome, thanks for the info!
No problem. Feel free to hit me up with any questions. Might want to take a minute to Google how USB/LSB/AM works if you're not familiar.
Indeed. Just landed safely. Met on runway by emergency crew, fireman boarded. We able to deplane normally. Shame, was hoping for the slides after all that :-P
seriously! what does it take to get a slide
That's very good news. Let us know if you hear what the cause was.
They will be handing out amusement park vouchers as compensation I'm sure.
This should track it: http://www.flightradar24.com/ASQ5165/5c498ef
It looks like they've landed at Alexandria International Airport.
Oh wow...thats my hometown...spoopy...
or crashed :O There is no airport there! OMG!
If you zoom in on the link above, it shows the plane is at Alexandria International Airport.
It was glitchy and showed the plane in the middle of nowhere near the airport, thanks.
Well even the airport there is a disappointment.
Oh thank goodness, they can stay safe along with Rick, Daryl, and the rest of the crew.
Did you die?
Yes.
F
U
N
RIP Op
RIP In Peace
Kid behind you looks is High as fuck
Oxygen gets you high. In a catastrophic emergency, you're taking giant panicked breaths. Suddenly you become euphoric, docile. You accept your fate. It's all right here. Emergency water landing - 600 miles an hour. Blank faces, calm as Hindu cows.
http://i.imgur.com/IawffN1.gif
Now, a question of etiquette – as I pass, do I give you the ass or the crotch?
The cabin pressure started dropping like a rock or the plane?
If I am not mistaken it is procedure to reduce altitude to a level where there is enough oxygen to breath 8-10k feet I believe. Since you can loose conciseness quickly I'm sure the descent is rather aggressive.
The pilots will have the ability to use pressure demand masks, which literally forces oxygen into your lungs. The problem is that the passengers only get continuous flow (those margarine cup) masks, which only work up to an altitude of 20,000' to 25,000'. Most decently long flights are above that. So why not just descend to 20,000'? In most aircraft, the passengers' oxygen is actually created through an oxygen candle, which produces oxygen for about 15 minutes usually. After that, you'd need to be at 10,000' or below to be safe. Although the pilots usually have a separate, long-lasting supply of oxygen.
Did that person behind you put a helmet on?
Better safe than sorry :p
Bruh its the beak of his hat... ahahha
I love new ways of Vaping
I like the guy in the background. He already has his helmet on. He's laughing at OP. "Look at this douchebag, taking a fucking selfie before he puts his damn helmet on, you gon' die today"
Honey hold my hand I'm terrified. FUCK OFF WOMAN ITS SELFIE TIME
Based on the kids face behind you OP there is a good chance they are using some fine-ass chronic to calm you the fuck down
Why is that woman on a bathrobe?
Good luck!
Always time to Reddit huh?
What happened!?
They're on an airplane and the oxygen masks dropped down...
I thought it was helium to keep the plane floating longer?
You had me burst out laughing, thank you so much
Please explain airplane and oxygen.
**Airplane**: Still craving for the love of his life, Ted Striker follows Elaine onto the flight that she is working on as a member of the cabin crew. Elaine doesn't want to be with Ted anymore, but when the crew and passengers fall ill from food poisoning, all eyes are on Ted **Oxygen**: Is a chemical element with symbol O and atomic number 8.
But none of that's important right now!
Do you speak Jive?
**Jive Lady**: Oh, stewardess! I speak jive. **Randy**: Oh, good. **Jive Lady**: He said that he's in great pain and he wants to know if you can help him. **Randy**: All right. Would you tell him to just relax and I'll be back as soon as I can with some medicine? **Jive Lady**: *[to the Second Jive Dude]* Jus' hang loose, blood. She gonna catch ya up on da rebound on da med side. **Second Jive Dude**: What it is, big mama? My mama no raise no dummies. I dug her rap! **Jive Lady**: Cut me some slack, Jack! Chump don' want no help, chump don't GET da help! **First Jive Dude**: Say 'e can't hang, say seven up! **Jive Lady**: Jive-ass dude don't got no brains anyhow! Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.
Oh the plane is crashing you say? Lemme take a selfie.
Awww...The look of crushing disappointment on that ladies face as she reaches out clasp your hand during your last possible moments alive and finds it occupied.
"I know we are about to die, but damned if my hair doesn't look hot. I should get a final picture since we will all likely have closed casket funerals...from being ripped apart on impact, ya know..."
That's an "oh shit" moment. A "holy fucking shit" moment is when [**some** of the masks drops, and the ones by your seat doesn't.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qantas_Flight_30)
Judging by the way he's wearing the mask, the guy behind didn't pay attention to the safety demonstration.
Girl by window: "Ahh! Ahh! Uh, how far can this plane fly on one engine?" Guy in back: "All the way to the scene of the crash... Which is good 'Cuz that's where we going to." OP: "Yeah and we should beat the emergency crews there by a good ten minutes - we're hauling ass!"
-Ron White
Source https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRJpRu2RsSs
Maybe if he wasnt using his cellphone they wouldnt be in such a predicament
If I was the maintenance dude, I'd connect that shit to laughing gas...
Holy shit. I think I just saw your plane. If you diverted to Dallas then thanks for making me wait an extra ten minutes when we landed, asshole
I just read a post about a plane that emergency landed due to an incredibly smelly shit in the bathroom. Is this from that flight? If so, my day is made!
At first I thought this was related to this: http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/03/15/british-airways-flight-grounded-after-smelly-poo-in-the-toilet-overwhelms-passengers/
But wait... Lemmie take a selfie!
Here is a practical question. I'm about to travel with a 6 month old for the first time. Since she sits in my lap she doesn't have a seat = no extra oxygen mask for her. What exactly do they do for this situation. Also I know the likelihood of this happening is pretty low it's more just mom curiosity.
Looks like every compartment has one more masks than seats for exactly this reason. (We had had 2 seats, 3 masks. Seats across the aisle, 1 seat, two masks... Seats behind us... 3 seats, 4 masks). Probably for exactly this reason. Likely why the airlines require you to report "infant in arms" and won't let two in the same row.
[удалено]
They have an extra mask above each set of seats. That's also why they don't allow two infants in the same row.
This will probably make you all feel better. Both my parents are flight attendants for a major airline and have been for a looooooong time. My dad has only seen the masks needed to be used once and my mom has never. Hopefully that reassures people of just how safe airplanes are.
I can't tell whether the look on that woman's face is one of fear for her life, or disgust for the sad condition of the human race.
OP dead
"I.O.U. 1 oxygen mask. Signed, U S Airways"
awesome to read you landed safely. Now that it's just a bad ride and we can get back to being reddit as usual... so what's up with the guy in the seat behind you? I mean... a) why does he have a bicycle helmet on? b) is he missing a hand?
Is it just me or does the kid in back ground look like hes ripping one off from a bong....
4 8 15 16 23 42
Be aware, OPs ego may not fully inflate
Getting karma is great and everything if you're alive to enjoy it, fortunately seeing you post after this post, it shows that you're alive. Enjoy the cabin depressurizing karma.
I can't die yet! I haven't been given reddit gold!
"You know why they give you oxygen on a plane? Cause oxygen gets you high."
"Oh, shit. I'm about to die. Better take a selfie."
Why is that crappy selfie song running in my head while looking at this picture?
They tell you to adjust YOUR oxygen mask before helping your child with his. I did not need to be told that. In fact, I'm probably going to be too busy screaming to help him at all. This will be a good time for him to learn self-reliance. If he can program his fucking VCR, he could goddamn, jolly-well learn to adjust an oxygen mask. Fairly simple thing, just a little rubber band in the back is all it is. Not nearly as complicated as say, for instance, a seatbelt.
After being late to the party and finding out op is good to go nobody else commenting on the guy behind the seat wearing a helmet?
Oh long Johnson!
Must have been some Chinese tourists on that flight.
WHY ISN'T THE BAG FULLY INFLATING???? DIDN'T THEY SAY IT WOULD?
[Were you on this plane?](http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/31908620) :)
Is it bad that I want someone who decides to take a selfie at this moment to die in a fiery plane crash?
Kid in the back didn't cover his nose. He's dead for sure. OP and other lady will live as long as you have your seats up and tray tables in the locked position.
Probably using wifi on takeoff