Air crash investigations.

[csb (Craig)]

I have often heard that air travel is relatively safe compared to car travel.

Some stats from a US survey (which seemed legit):

Drivers or passengers in cars or light trucks faced a fatality risk of 7.3 per billion passenger-miles.

Commercial aviation was the safest mode of travel in the United States, with 0.07 fatalities per billion passenger miles.

See more at: http://journalistsresource.org/studi....7FeLUjPw.dpuf

So spend the money where risk is highest. Our road fatalities are atrocious.

[Steffen]

Originally Posted by xelasnave

Well we just need to eliminate take offs and landings.
Alex

But then the plane would just be driving from A to B, and road traffic is demonstrably far more dangerous than flying

[xelasnave]

Originally Posted by Steffen

But then the plane would just be driving from A to B, and road traffic is demonstrably far more dangerous than flying

Yes we run into problems with such a blanket approach.
Just eliminate landings.
Alex

[xelasnave]

http://www.ibtimes.com/how-many-plan...-chart-1560554

Rather than relate the deaths to distances the charts at the above link shows number of deaths and number of crashes.
Looks nasty when served this way.
Alex

[csb (Craig)]

So why all this sudden worry, Alex? Got a holiday to Europe or somewhere coming up?

[xelasnave]

Originally Posted by csb

So why all this sudden worry, Alex? Got a holiday to Europe or somewhere coming up?

No Craig I am just a caring person.
I go to bed turn on the tv and air crash investigations is on.
Bad timing.
And I think about how lives could be saved.

I think about the folk that die not as numbers but as real people and how sad their deaths must be to their loved ones, relations and friends.

I see a problem and I can not help trying to solve it.

I see in my imagination a pod system where folk get on the pod at a central terminal and when all aboard the pod driven out and attacted to a "carrier" and they fly off. Landings the pod is taken to the terminal and folk get off.

In the event of some difficulties, not all, the pod could be cast off and float to the ground or sea where they await recovery in comfort and safety.

But in thinking about it what struck me was the curious view we accept as normal and reasonable that certain deaths are acceptable and by using stats we can sooth our conscience and not address the issue.

There are other things... Fire kills so many in plane crashes and yet that problem is not satisfactorily addressed.

As I said engineers can fix these things yet we, programed with the money money money mind set placed in our minds by accountants and stats, sigh and say its too hard... Well its not too hard it is too expensive.. Or in other words.. It is a sin to utter words that may cause profit to decline causing share prices to drop and causing certain folk to risk not cleaning up on their management share options.
We accept these preventable deaths in such a casual fashion.

That is wrong.

As I sais in the USA. 100 billion is spent annually for reasearch into better weapons.
If we can spend that to kill people why cant we spend similar to save lives.

When you step back it is strange.

If a lone sailor is lost in the middle of the Indian Ocean we spend a fortune to recover him.
Why not just say well stats tell us it is not a big deal let him drown.. No.. But why do we just accept the deaths which will come that may well be preventable.

Ships without life boats.. Unthinkable. Planes with escape pods.. Unthinkable.
As I said stand back look and ask "how do they manage this on another planet"
Alex

[Allan]

Alex, an escape pod on a passenger jet would be impossible to make. Have a look into the technology and engineering required to make ejection seats on fighters. Now everything that goes into those is to save 1 or 2 people.

We carry over 500 people on an A380, and the weight of the people alone is 40 tons. Add the weight of the pod system and cabin bags etc, and you can see there's no way you can build something that heavy that will "float" to the ground.

Most airline fatalities are from takeoff and landing accidents where a pod system couldn't be used anyway. Flying on a passenger jet is already about the safest thing you can do, so I wouldn't worry about it to much. Just avoid the Asian and African carriers and you'll be fine.

[xelasnave]

Impossible....
I acknowledge it would be expensive but I am convinced from a tech view it could be done.
Put up a billion dollar prize and guess what we would get various designs.
It would then be not can itbe done but which company gets the contract.
Once powered flight was impossible.. The first radio the size of a house... Etc...
I am surprised we even use the word impossible these days.
I am typing on a device that was once not only not conceivable but if it could have been conceived it would have been impossible.
3d printing of houses.
I had such an idea 30 years ago when it was inconceivable and now it is being done.
The only thing that makes it impossible is our determination not to do it.
Alex

[xelasnave]

Matt you are correct.
The gravitational constant needs to be changed.
OK we need a cross between a plane and an air ship.
I still like my idea to breed humans smaller each generation until they are only six inches tall.
And breed pigeons large enough to carry passengers in escape pods.
Alex

[The_bluester (Paul)]

There is already a solution to this problem. Motion sickness however might be more of an issue.

https://youtu.be/KyktvC7w7Js?t=56

[raymo]

Alex, barring the military, passenger aircraft have to make a profit to allow
the airline to pay its multitude of running costs, and to remain a viable business in order to attract investors to its shares.A sort of closed loop.
There is no escaping this. No technology currently available would keep
airfares down to levels that would allow the general populace to fly, thus
killing off the airlines. Also, as mentioned before by myself and others, a
pod would be useless at take off and landing[where a high percentage of crashes occur], when the plane blows up, or disintegrates, or in cases of
pilot suicide, or missile strikes.
I would have thought you would be better occupied thinking about ways
to improve the chances of survival of the vastly greater number of
victims[or perpetrators] of road accidents around the world.
cheers raymo

[xelasnave]

Hi Raymo
The problem is solved.
Everyone instead of driving must fly.
Alex

[Octane (Humayun)]

I choose death.

H

Originally Posted by The_bluester

There is already a solution to this problem. Motion sickness however might be more of an issue.

https://youtu.be/KyktvC7w7Js?t=56

[pgc hunter]

Originally Posted by Exfso

The mind boggles.....

Installation of ejection pods/seats, parachutes etc in commercial airliners is not feasable, nor practical with current technology.

Let's say you have passengers in several compartments which can be jettisoned. Sounds simple enough in theory, but the reality -

how are you going to safely seperate in a 900kmh airstream without colliding with other parts, engines and fuel tanks of the plane? How are you going to seal off each compartment to keep it pressurised? Is each compartment going to be completely sealed off with its own galley, passenger loading/unloading doors, cargo doors, toilets, pressurisation systems so you can jettison quicker? Will there be enough room to store parachutes big enough to safely bring it down and how heavy will they be? Then you have the logistics of the electricals/hydraulics/ductwork etc and the list goes on. This is only just scratching the surface of the issues that would need to be solved.

Then you have a whole host of new potential failures and human factor errors that comes with any new system, you would basically be starting again from square one working out all the kinks bringing it up to the safety standard we currently enjoy. This would take millions of flying hours and potential accidents, as it has with our current method of air travel.

Ofcourse, all this will be useless if the accident occurs during takeoff and landing which is when most do, shot down by a missile, sudden structural failure etc. There is also the problem of the hardware/electrics/mechanics relating to the jettisoning of the pods getting crippled in an incident/accident.

If there was a legitimate, failsafe way of doing this, it would be done by now.

[OICURMT]

Interesting article. Descibes the costs involved and the consequences...

https://blog.finnair.com/en/2010/03/26/ejection-seats/

[michaellxv (Michael)]

The solution has existed for years. This should give you an idea of the size of parachutes required for each group of three people.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWd_mmYsEQk

Michael

[raymo]

You mean human carrying drones, Alex. I think there'd be more crashes
than we have on the roads.
raymo

[pgc hunter]

Originally Posted by Kunama

Might actually be cheaper, I just got a quote for transmission repair to my Mercedes...... $6k......might take up cycling again....

That right there is why I drive an 18 year old Falcon

[guipago (Geoff)]

Some excellent answers coming thru, another few things to solve are CofG, runway lengths for take off & land, runway surface structure to absorb the weight of touch down(need more wheels to spread the weight),noise pollution from all the engines(problems with Concord come to mind) & then there's weight(as others have said)ALL aircraft manufacturer's are barking mad over the weight problems & CofG, it's the difference between whether it actually flies or not & is stable in the air.

[xelasnave]

Originally Posted by raymo

You mean human carrying drones, Alex. I think there'd be more crashes
than we have on the roads.
raymo

Why not personalised drones capable of 1000 klms per hours with passengers packed in bubble wrap.
And computer controled what could possibly go wrong.
Computers are better at chess than humans so they will no doubt fly a drone safely.

I am disappointed all say my dream for safer planes can not be realised.
Of course I dont believe that at all.
The day will come when pods are the norm I know that but I will be long gone unless my new idea on achieving imortality can be developed before I go.
Thanks for considering the idea everyone and if you can help please let us here know.

I have been thinking about road deaths before going to sleep and conclude that the driverless car offers the greatest hope as such an approach could guarantee that control over the vehicle would be constant and all vehicles "drivers" could be in full comunication.
Traffic should flow better and accidents eliminated...
It appears to me humans and human error figure in many accidents so presumably lessening human involvement and control over potentially dangerous machines would result in fewer fatalities.
But this means more humans and less whales..
Alex