Memory Spawns Question

[Kip Powick]

The memory..........Back after the earth had cooled I was flying a DC-3 (Mil C-47) and was passing over the now defunct CASSELMAN beacon just east of YOW. Being rather green, and new, I decided to open the sliding cockpit window and see what it felt like to look straight down at the terra firma from 9000 feet. The window opened with ease and I started to put my head close to the opening when the slip stream unglued my sunglasses from my ears and they were quickly launched toward the open window. In a panic move I attempted to grab them but my brand new RCAF issued pilot watch struck the side of the window frame, the strap broke, and quickly followed my issued  RCAF sun glasses in their downward trajectory..............

The Question..... last night as the rain continued to plummet  the frozen ground here in Dotville I decided to "browse",with this modern technology we all seem to have, and found myself reading, with interest, that fateful flight of UPS 6 which, in September of 2010 crashed in the Dubai area. In a nutshell, lithium batteries cause an uncontrollable fire with an abundance of smoke in the cockpit. The Captain's O2 ran out and in an attempt to get another bottle from behind his seat area, he succumbed to the noxious fumes and smoke. The FO attempted to fly the aircraft  to an airport for an approach but was so blinded by the smoke and fumes, turned to a wrong heading and could not really get set-up for an approach...(too high...too fast). He lost control and the aircraft impacted the ground at high speed and sadly he too  perished..........

I remember the incident that I had with the old DC3 and was wondering..................does anyone know that if a side window is opened in the cockpit of today's  jet liners, at a reasonable speed and altitude, and, obviously  depressurized, (fire drill), would there be any slipstream affect that would draw the smoke out of the cockpit??? 

[Guest]

https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/1866/can-the-cockpit-windows-on-commercial-airliners-open-during-flight

[Kip Powick]

19 minutes ago, Malcolm said:

https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/1866/can-the-cockpit-windows-on-commercial-airliners-open-during-flight

Thanks Malcolm ...I too read that but I am interested in the newer aircraft and if there would be any slipstream suction that would assist in smoke evacuation if a window was opened. The answers in your link are not definitive because I don't think enough airline  pilots clearly answered  them with respect to smoke evacuation in newer aircraft.

[boestar]

Was that not on the smoke checklist on the 767?  I thought the windows opened for smoke clearance in an emergency.  of course when low enough and depressurized.

 

[J.O.]

It's been a couple years, but from what I recall, the A320 ECAM and QRH procedures made no mention of opening the DV windows. It was all about LAND ASAP,  isolating the problem and establishing the appropriate configuration - down to and including the emergency electrical configuration.

[Guest]

re smoke checklist for the b767.  http://rnsa.is/media/1258/m-01709-aig-12-flugatvik-n658ua-sudur-af-keflavik-lokaskyrsla.pdf

[DEFCON]

I believe 'Warning 3' was included post Swissair 111.

I'm not answering the question posed, but regardless of type, wouldn't the preferred course of action involve the use of the dump valve and pressurization system to evacuate smoke as per the checklist above?

 

  

[boestar]

for smoke clearance yes.  I would think, however, that you could also be fanning the flames.

 

[DEFCON]

Fanning the flames debates have been around as long as pressurized aircraft. Some would say you're better off remaining at fl350 unpressurized with a potential fire than descending as per the checklist to10K, or lower unpressurized and giving the fire the O2 denser air provides.

Personally, I think airborne fires place everyone involved in a really sh!tty spot and survival will come down to two things; the pilot's ability to make an informed decision and fate.

 

   

[boestar]

LAND ASAP.....

 

[Vsplat]

I guess it depends on the aircraft, but I would think opening a window on the current generation of pressurized aircraft would be a last resort, if to be considered at all.

A few thoughts:

1) We all pretty much understand now that, unless the entire fire can be visualised and extinguished, the priority has to be get on the ground at the first safe opportunity.  Executing the decision to land ASAP with a fire burning is probably one of the most intense workflows a crew will face.  The coordination required would be severely hampered by the noise of with a window open, even unpressurized and at a safe speed.

2) About that safe speed.  A lot of scenarios where smoke clearing is involved mean that the source of the smoke is still active.  Unless it is an pack failure of some kind,  or some contaminant in the bleed system, the odds are something is burning.  In that case, I can't imagine myself slowing down to get a window open until maybe on final approach.  At that point, wrestling with a window (and all of the stuff on the ledge next to it or, lately, stuck to it) might not be practical.

3) Pressurized aircraft function pretty much like a big duct with controlled airflow the whole way.  Provided you can get the outflow valves fully open, I think you would get just about complete air exchange in a jiffy, without the turbulence and eddies you might expect with a window open.

But, back to the first line, it depends on the aircraft...

 

But Kip, I was waiting for the sequel!  Did you get back to Casselman, and what shape were your glasses in when you found them??

Vs

[Kip Powick]

2 hours ago, Vsplat said:

But Kip, I was waiting for the sequel!  Did you get back to Casselman, and what shape were your glasses in when you found them??

Vs

Thanks for the interest and comments to my question.....

 

As you know, there would be no way for me to retrieve the items and I prayed I didn't impale anyone with the wayward glasses......I worried for a couple of days as I was not sure what my questionable actions would cost me  but a few days later  I decided to come clean and went to the base  Clothing Stores...

I was brand new,  to the Service, so when I went to Clothing Stores/Supply and gave my tale of woe.

The grizzled old  Supply Sergeant looked at me rather sympathetically and simply asked me if I would do him a favour...

He asked if the next time I flew into the US if I would be so  kind as to pick him up a pair of Patent leather dress shoes, that he would pay for, so that he did not have to shine his shoes before each Military parade.

I said I would...he wrote off the watch and glasses, issued me new items  and that is when I learned that Senior NCO's should always be treated with respect because they held the "keys to so many doors "  (Insert FAs and AMEs in the airline Industry)

A ton of years later, (still DND), I was in Hawaii and when I came out of the shower I sat down on my bed in the hotel and inadvertently shattered the frames of my clear prescription glasses. I carried a prescription set of sunglasses but our next leg of the mission was to Japan and was going to be flown at night. I went to a optometrist shop in Waikiki and the fellow there shaved the lenses down and installed them in my newly purchased frames .

Upon my return to home plate I went to Accounts and put a claim in for the nearly $200.00 frames..It was bounced back to me and signed by a newbie airman that it was my fault and was not claimable.. I went back to Accounts got a hold of a Sergeant and explained my problem......he took the claim and wrote on it, "cargo shift crushed Captain's prescription glasses needed for flight...APPROVED...

About two weeks later he found a 40 oz of CC in his mail slot...................( cost me $4.00) while at the Canadian Embassy in Washington)...

During my career  I have always tried to remember .that................... "after the game, the King and the Pawn go back in the same box"  

Have a nice week

 

 

 

[Seeker]

So....the moral of the story is, "a little bribery goes a long way!"  Haha,  j/k of course.  Good stories.  Many decades ago I lived in a small northern town in Ontario.  You could get an OPP ball cap if you stopped by the detachment and made a donation to some charity (don't remember what it was).  The cap was not for wearing though - it was to be placed strategically on the back sill of your car, left side - surprising number of "warnings" vs tickets.

[Leeroy]

My FO's window slid wide open with a bang at rotation out of YUL, at night, in a snow storm. His leg, I took control while he struggled with the window, we would have been in the 150 knot range. He had a little trouble and I was thinking I was going to have to do a return while he had his head between his knees and the flight deck resembled a raging blizzard. Third try lucky.

Would smoke have been drawn out, I suppose, but it was a raging wind storm. Maybe if the flight deck door was open as well there would be more area to draw from.

[Leeroy]

Just had a look at our QRH. Smoke or Fumes Removal - At normal holding speeds open the First officers window.

[acsidestick]

A long time ago, in a small twin engine pressurized turboprop, we had a thick billowing smoke event in the flight deck.  It turned out later to be a broken bleed line burning (intensely smouldering) the pipes insulation, but we had several very intense minutes.

The smoke was so thick that we had a passenger about 6 feet behind us and could no longer see her, as our vision ended after about 3 feet.  Without going into the details of the troubleshooting and fixes applied, this airplane was equipped with cabin dump valves and a ram air inlet switches.

The less than a second after the dump and ram were opened, the air cleared like it had never happened, except of course for the smell.  

In modern large jets, the air is circulated continuously, and in order to save fuel, it is recirculated a calculated amount..  When recirculating is turned off, it is my understanding that the entire planes air gets renewed every few minutes.  It is like your inside a hurricane, you just don’t know it.

I've always kept that memory in my bag of tricks.  My aircraft no longer has these valves labled the same way, but with some investigation,  you realize you can still make the principle work, if plan A isn’t.

i also can attest to the stress of being unable to clearly see instruments in extremely low vis/smoke/fire/night/no autopilot/electrics turned off (another story for another time) and it’s not something I ever care to do again.

[Vsplat]

35 minutes ago, Leeroy said:

Just had a look at our QRH. Smoke or Fumes Removal - At normal holding speeds open the First officers window.

Clearly a checklist written by a Captain....

Vs

[Guest]

38 minutes ago, Leeroy said:

Just had a look at our QRH. Smoke or Fumes Removal - At normal holding speeds open the First officers window.

Aircraft type?

[Leeroy]

B737 NG