AirTran emergency lndg.

[LearLove]

with changes in TSA rules, and how it affects operations, shouldn't a check airman throw this in on reucrrent check rides? the management should decide what is sound judgment for Airtran and pass this wisdom to the check airmen who pass it on to captains.
It could be the kind of thing you do on a loft or getting vectors after the airwork etc. Not on the single engine ILS.

"management should decide what is sound judgment"

Too many sarcastic comments - head is going to explode........

 

[Longhorn]

32 & TY....Please stop it. Keep it to the PM side of things. No more name calling, flamebait (scab comments). I am not asking again.

thanks

 

[FN FAL]

It's the illegal beverage you brought on board. If you refused to drink it...

You can make all the assumptions you want, it's your children's future estate that will be buying me a new car and a down payment on a house.

 

[Coool Hand Luke]

Appeasement - that will surely work. Are going to convert to Islam too? What about the rest of your infidel family?

Now that is funny!

 

[Gorilla]

One. An airline employee isn't making me drink anything.

You have that option. We also have the option of diverting and dropping you off in Amarillo or Boise.

Two. There are some chemicals that if you smell them, you'll lose organ function...don't open strange bottles with unknown contents and smell or drink anything.

Really? Unless there's hydrogen cyanide under pressure or an organophosphate nerve agent in there, there's not much a little whiff is going to do to you. I'm not talking about snorting a dollop... just a wave of the hand over the bottle.

 

[Skyboy722]

You can make all the assumptions you want, it's your children's future estate that will be buying me a new car and a down payment on a house.

Being the successful aviation attorney that you obviously are, how do you manage to find the time for almost 8,500 posts?!

 

[GogglesPisano]

Careful guys. 32LT10 might add your screennames to his "list."

 

[Crossky]

Who would have ever thought an airliner would make an emergency landing on account of a bottle of water? I hate to question the captain's judgement but why not just confiscate the bottle of water? Once it's on the plane it's on the plane. I guess it could have been operating on a timer...Are we all taking crazy pills?

I presume that under the new 'rules' airlines management have directed crews to ask passengers with liquids to give them up to the FA's when asked, and to consider a divert when pax refuse to do so. Ours has done it anyway. If and when it happens to me, that's when I writeup the FA-Flightdeck intercom. ("sorry I can't hear you, can't open the door, security you know")

Oh, I know, they fear hot starbucks bought inside the secure area can be used as a weapon? Or they're waiting to do background checks on food and drink vendors inside the secure areas. Ludicrous I tell ya.

 

[RadioClash]

None of you all were there, none of you were on board so none of you really knows what the situation was. Sure you read it in the paper, heard it on the news, so therefore all facts must have been provided. I am sure that it is that simple. Again, monday morning quarterback all you want, and get your digs in on AirTran and the crew but until you have been there or were there you don't know sh!t.

Here are two personal examples of the media screwing up stories that I have was there for.

#1. My Marine unit was deployed for the first war in Iraq, NBC interviewed a young Marine in my unit and the Marine said during the interview, "we just want to get the job done and go home." Nothing more nothing less. So on our NBC affiliate local evening news they lead off with "...a possible mutiny in a local artillery battery serving in Iraq tonight at 10."

The kid said he wanted to get the job done and go home, no mention of a mutiny there.

#2 When I was in college a history professor was walking across our campus carrying a civil war era musket for a presentation in class. On the local news, breaking news, "Sniper on the campus of the University of XXX we are there live."

Wow the media sure has some credibility. Yeah that is sarcasm.

So to read that article and then come on here and second guess a professional airline crew is really well to put it simply, stupid. It doesn't matter if its AirTran, AA, UAL, DAL, Mesa whatever. You do not have first hand knowledge.

Reminds me of the opening to Ned's Atomic Dustbin "Kill Your Television" "She said, She said, you don't know sh!t 'cause you've never been there..."

Notice I am not saying they did the right thing or the wrong thing. I wasn't there.

 

[Uppercrust]

. now, how about moving on and growing up?

I will be at the end of the month and I am sure you will miss me.:laugh: Not doing this shiiiitt anymore.

Back to the story.... if what is said in the article is true then I would hope the individual (Capt, Dispachthetic, etc...) who ultimately made this decision is given a little talk and properly trained on the economics of the price of gas. Seriously, diverting over a bottle of water?? I just can't believe it dude. There has got to be a something here that didn't make the papers. I challenge any Airtran guy to come forward and give the real scoop or if bad, the real poop. It does make for some good ribbing on you all though.:laugh:

PS: I want to thank Canoa for such an outstanding avatar. Pretty funny!:laugh:

 

[pipe]

I notice that, out of all the responses to this string, only Uppercrust decided to take the low road (big surprise) and hide in the shadows, and make his juvenile statements about the 1400+ pilots of AirTran, pilots who came from pretty much every domestic carrier in the country.

Nice, Crusty . . . . you don't have the testicular fortitude to tell us who you work for, if anyone, but you seem to exist on this board for the sole purpose of bad-mouthing AirTran . . . . you really are one pathetic and twisted individual.

Sorry that you got turned down, but it was obviously a smart decision by the interviewers . . . . now, how about moving on and growing up?


.

Somewhere along the line I missed the part where everyone on earth tried to get a job at Airtran.

PIPE

 

[Green]

I heard TSA escorted the passenger to the airport restroom and re-screened the water on its way out. Can't be too careful these days....

 

[Arkady]

<< Appeasement - that will surely work. >>

Who's to say? Appeasement might just work. Or more correctly - more appeasement might work. Afterall, "W" already has a bit of a track record appeasing Osama & the other various "evil doers" on multiple occasions already (...and in a turn of fair play when he asked all the "insurgents" in Iraq to "Bring it on!"...they appeased him right back...and they've been appeasing the h-e-double-hockey-sticks out of us ever since - with 2,613 dead US soldiers, 19,323 wounded, 348 dead contractors, 5,200+ dead Iraqi police/guardsmen, and untold numbers of civilians...although estimates of these range anywhere from 40,000 to over 100,000 dead...and as was recently reported - the number of bomb attacks have doubled this year compared to last).

Early on, GWB gave members of Osama's family a free upgrade to appeasement-class when he let them dash out of the United States on private jets just days after the 11th of September without allowing them to be detained for questioning - (you know, minor stuff like: "What is Osama's current mailing address?" & "Which falafel stand does he like to hang out at?" ...things which even the most jr. patrol officers on "Cops"...or the Reno 911 deputy sherriffs routinely ask of the relatives of the stereotypical drunk, half naked guy that knocked over the local liquor store for 200 bucks, a case of Old Swill and a carton of Menthol Cools that they are endlessly chasing...you know, real criminal masterminds). This of course, occured at the same time that they were rounding up and imprisoning over a thousand other Muslims or at least guys they thought looked dark and swarthy, detaining them for many months or years as they put them under the hot lamps.

Then a little farther down the time line: "I'm the Decider"-in-Charge pulled our military out of the House of Saud (the occupation of which, unlike the b.s./short school bus reasoning - "They-hate-us-for-our-freedom" non sequitur, is actually one of the top reasons he put us on his "enemies of Osama" list to begin with...we don't have to guess at this - this is what he has stated on numerous occasions). "They hate us for our freedoms"...seriously, how do they even keep a straight face when they say that? Do they have to Botox their whole face beforehand?

So who's Mission was really Accomplished here anyway? (In addition that is, to the executives & the stockholders of the many defense contractors and oil industry playas ...And for those of you playing the war profiteers appeasement home game, let's check the scoreboard - since the war began: Halliburton stock: has taken a nice little bump - from $11 to 33 bucks a share, Lockheed: $46 to $84, Northrup-Grumman: $44 to 65, Gen. Dynamics: $27 to 67, Raytheon: $29 to 46, Boeing: $37 to 76, Textron: $38 to 87, United Technologies: $30 to 60, L-3 Communications: $38-72 to name but a few...and in the black gold/texas tea dept. Shell Oil: shot up from $42 to 73, Chevron Oil (who has also named a tanker after their ex-employee & our current Sec. of State Condoleezza Rice...how many govt. employees can say that?): $33 to 65, BP Oil: $40 to 69, Exxon Mobil: $35 to 69. And as an aside: when you take into account the industries own reserves based on the rise in the price of gas - the value of these reserves since the war began comes out to approx. $2.3+ trillion (trillion with a T) for 5 of the top oil companies. Oil industry profits for 2005 alone totaled $113 Billion. Maybe there is something to be said about that "follow the money" thing...naw, that is crazy talk. (Anyway, have we appeased this group enough yet? Well, probably not...).

And in other news: Double-Ya' has turned Iraq into a bigger recruiting tool than Al Quesadilla could have ever dream of (appeasement?, unintended consequence?, lack of planning? perhaps, afterall he didn't even know there was a difference between the Sunnis and the Shias just 2 months prior to Operation Iraq Liberation...I mean Freedom) ...while our military has had to resort to upping the age limit on new recruits as well as issuing waivers for recruits with criminal convictions, drug use & medical and mental conditions.

All this with no end in sight. And what has our $309 Billion dollar investment gotten us so far? (although the Nobel winning economist Joseph Stiglitz & Harvard budget expert Linda Bilmes have estimated that the real cost of the war could easily be anywhere between 1 to 2 Trillion dollars when finally tallied. Remember how Paul Wolfowitz said that Iraqi oil could finance it's own reconstruction and that the cost to the US taxpayer would be negligible? And how Bush fired his economic advisor Larry Lindsey for having the gall to estimate the cost at between 100 to 200 billion?).

So now, 1,800 days since 9/11, Osama is still a free man, we are spending approx. $6.4 Billion/month in Iraq & another $1.3 Billion/month in Afghanistan while we are going through security in our barefeet & diverting airliners because of water bottles, oil costs 70+ bucks/barrel (which is a huge roundabout tip of the ol' appeasement hat to Iran as the mullahs are now raking in so much moolah that they don't even have to wait for double coupon day at the International House of Nukes. Not to mention all the huge piles of money that the Saudis and Bush's other pal Hugo Chavez are now using as down hill ski runs. Perhaps our enemies had all "misunderestimated" our ability to appease 'em before. But by now all this appeasement has got to be having them laughing their collective arses off in their various evil volcano lairs. (Or - was it our master plan all along to bump them all up into the "Totally Ludicrous/Bill Gates/mo' money-mo'-money-mo'-money" tax bracket?? And then converting them all into republicans? Check mate! GW - you sly dog you.).

On a related tangent - it is always interesting how someone can find it perfectly reasonable that we occupy prime real estate on another nations soil ( 702 various bases in 132 different countries at last count - not counting the not-so-secret ones that the men in black don't like to talk about) when that same person would never tolerate even the mere idea of another nations military operating a base on our own oil...I mean soil (sorry, Freudian Slip).

If the Canadians (much less the Pakistanis or Saudis...or god forbid...the Dutch) started pouring cement on a new 12,000' runway for their new airbase in Peoria - there would be pick-up trucks full of armed militias flooding in from all over the country (even if Nascar was on tv that day) for what these occupiers would probably refer to as...I don't know...an "insurgent war" (regardless of whether or not the new base had the blessing of our govt.).

Even if allies of ours - countries where we have large permanent bases (such as Germany where we have approx. 70,000 military personnel , S.Korea with 32,000 personnel , Japan: 35,000, Italy: 12,000 & the United Kingdom with 11,000 of our countrymen - to name but a few) - wanted to have reciprocal bases (with the requisite claims of wanting to help "bring security & to stabilize the region", blah, blah, blah) there would be an outcry like never before. The blow up over the proposed Dubai ports deal would be a drop in the ocean by comparison. The entire NRA as well as your average water bottle toting little old ladies would be stocking up their personal arsenals and lockin'-n-loading their AK's in order to kick the foreigners out.

So why the disonnect?

Why would one man (or tribe, group or nation) be expected to tolerate it while another wouldn't (especially when the base is to be permanent)? Perhaps it is because, as someone once said, it’s hard to get people to understand something when their salary (or their professional standing, or maybe just their SUV) depends on their not understanding it. Or is it because we hate their freedom (ie - freedom to control their own s-oil...see I almost did it again)? Naw. Now that would be crazy. Not 'Katherine Harris Crazy' but crazy nonetheless.

From the Oxford American dictionary:
Hegemony |həˈjemənē; ˈhejəˌmōnē| noun: leadership or dominance, esp. by one country or social group over others.

The inevitable result is that for every action there is gonna be a reaction (or a cumulative one)...the CIA often refers to the more spectacular of these reactions as "Blowback". And yet there is always such feigned & obligatory shock (& awe?) when it is, on occasion, directed back at us.

Leaving them alone?...Hmmmm, what a novel concept. I think you are on to something there. Afterall, when it comes to the middle east, we haven't tried that one yet - It's just might be crazy enough to work - seeing how this course upon which we have been forever staying (following this precessing gyro of a clue...I mean fearless leader) is spiraling ever closer to the rising terrain.

"Whoop whoop...pull up!".

 

[Arkady]

<< Baby bomb..No more babies on board. >>

Ok, you've lost me on this....is that supposed to be a bad thing?

 

[Wildmanny]

xxxxxx

 

[Wildmanny]

xxxxx

 

[Wildmanny]

Guys,
Don't you know the water in question was Heavy water? Ha ha! Another Al Queda plot foiled by a wily flight attendant. Riiiiiiight.

 

[atafan]

I've read the news report and most the stupid and mean responses on this board and I have formed my own opinion.

I believe that the captain made the right decision. When I first heard about this incident I thought the crew was crazy but then I read the news article and put myself in the captains shoes. The captain has at least one flight attendant ringing the cockpit telling him/her that there is a suspicious odor coming from the area that the "water" was dumped. The captain probably had the flight attendants freaking out and of course the flight deck crew can't come out to see for themselves. They really have no other choice but to divert.

This situation would never had gotten to this point if the flight attendants were properly trained about "liquid" bombs. The passenger could have taken a drink of it before giving it to the flight attendant and for goodness sake if you thought this could possibly be a flammable liquid you don't just pour it down the drain or in the trash - HELLO.

I am sure with all this hype and uninformed hysteria about "liquid bombs" the flight attendants were going crazy with the captain on the interphone. The captain really only had to divert. The blame falls squarely on AirTran and the government for not better training all flight crews regarding this new "threat".

I'm not singling AirTran out, I don't know of an airline that has incorporated this training yet.

 

[RDG]

Do we know if the stinky water was purchased before or after the evil-doer cleared security?

 

[Lear70]

Maybe there is more to the story...

http://www.wcnc.com/news/topstories/stories/wcnc-ad-8_22_06-plane.26c7f460.html

I'm certain there's a LOT more to the story.

So all you people condemning the crew's actions: what are YOU going to do? Seriously, with your VAST command experience, your cabin crew comes to you after a suspicious incident with a banned cabin item they suddenly start smelling some unidentified fumes that make them either tear up, nauseous, or hard to breathe. They ALL get on the intercom and tell you about it, what are YOU going to do? You're telling me you're going to IGNORE them? PRETEND you can't hear them? How old are you anyway, 12?

The CORRECT and PROPER response between cockpit and cabin crew will ALWAYS BEGIN AND END WITH RESPECT. I don't care if it's a crew of 19-year olds fresh out of training, you simply CANNOT dismiss their concerns. That is the ENTIRE basis of CRM... the one time you do, you either destroy your own future authority (they don't respect you and fail to act during an emergency), OR you miss the REAL emergency because you don't respect or believe them, and/OR they decide to take matters into their own hands (they start an evacuation on the runway without your command). Yes, that's happened before, genius.

Just for the sake of discussion, what if the F/A's had said they smelled smoke shortly after the incident? What if it was unrelated to the fluid in the bottle, but you were already predisposed to think since it's a "rule" we believe to be stupid from the TSA, we'll just ignore it?

I wonder how many extra minutes could be saved if a brand new F/A in the aft seat smelled smoke before it was visible and the crew IMMEDIATELY ACTED rather than thinking "Oh, they're brand new and just being alarmist about that guy's water; it's probably nothing" until the smoke started seeping up from the aft cargo through the flooring, meaning the fire is already RAGING below?

I wonder how many lives that would cost because of YOUR ego, believing you know better than everyone else and don't believe it unless you see it with your own eyes. You gonna go door to door and apologize to the familes of the people YOU KILLED with your arrogance? Assuming you live to do so?

Incidentally, Crusty, I have FAMs on a LOT of our flights to all the normal hot spots. Funny though, I've never seen one get on a turboprop. Doesn't your regional fly those?

p.s. Yes, I know why they don't fly TP's, that was tongue-in-cheek humor. Just want to make sure you didn't miss it.