hot airplanes

[mamba20]

ALPA came out a couple of years ago saying that they would back any crew that declined an airplane because it was too hot. This was after a rash of incidents with not only passengers, but crew members suffering from heat stroke. Passengers pay us to take them from A to B, not cook them. I would say use your best judgement on this. IF you feel that the aircraft is too hot then decline to take it. Think of some little old lady sitting back with a heart condition, do you really want to have the death of someone on your conscience from heat stroke when you were kicking around the idea of not taking the airplane in the first place?

 

[mamba20]

I've actually had this happen. A super hot day with no APU. We gave it a try and while waiting for takeoff in a 20 something airplane que, one of the FA's called up and said that people were starting to feel faint. We promptly left the que and went back to the gate. We called the chief pilot first and explained the situation. Much to his shagrin we took a 2 hour delay and got an airplane with a operative APU.

 

[Rally]

I've actually had this happen. A super hot day with no APU. We gave it a try and while waiting for takeoff in a 20 something airplane que, one of the FA's called up and said that people were starting to feel faint. We promptly left the que and went back to the gate. We called the chief pilot first and explained the situation. Much to his shagrin we took a 2 hour delay and got an airplane with a operative APU.

Just curious don't most 121 aircraft even if they dont' have a APU or it is inop have A/C once you start the engines and get the bleeds going? Or is this in a smaller t-prop that is'nt pressurized?

Thanks

 

[CA1900]

Just curious don't most 121 aircraft even if they dont' have a APU or it is inop have A/C once you start the engines and get the bleeds going? Or is this in a smaller t-prop that is'nt pressurized?

The engines at idle don't produce nearly the volume of compressed air that an APU can. Effective cooling depends on moving a large volume of air through the air cycle machine. An APU provides that, but the engines don't until they're powered up much higher than idle.

 

[OnTheRocks]

flying a turboprop is like dropping a deuce in an outhouse....it works, but it aint that comfy

 

[John Pennekamp]

Just curious don't most 121 aircraft even if they dont' have a APU or it is inop have A/C once you start the engines and get the bleeds going? Or is this in a smaller t-prop that is'nt pressurized?

Thanks

This is mostly a problem with the CRJ-200. The engines don't produce enough air flow at low power settings, so you don't get any cooling until takeoff with no APU. They fixed it on the CRJ-700.

But yes, most airliners don't have this problem.