SWA flight continues for 75 minutes after rapid depresurization!!

[furlough-boy]

Lets see.......
Taxing quickly but safely to save 20 seconds a flight turns into:

20sec x 4000 flights a day = 80,000 seconds
80,000 sec = 22 hours of fuel saved each day
That equals 8030 hours of fuel savings each year.
I'm not sure what the 737 burns/hr, but I think I am starting to see why SWA is making more money each quarter than all the other airlines combined.

TexaSWA, dont forget about the girl in her bare feet asleep on the back seat and the trunk full of Shinerboch and LoneStar.

Heck, I think you've broken the code. Think how much they could save if they just shut down an engine at the FAF.

 

[firstthird]

good idea. the 737 flies great on one engine, just select flaps 15, power up the one you're keeping, start lever to cutoff on the one you're putting to bed, and bam; 20 gallons saved.
then again, maybe not.

It is all about risk management. Every time we fly there is a risk associated with that flight, if we deem the risk too great, we don't go. I'm sure an argument could be made that any type of malfunction should require an inflight abort to the nearest suitable field. Your map light stops working? Hmm, that might be the beginnings of a major electrical shutdown, better be safe and put this bad boy on the ground. What if your #2 radio goes out? A bleed trip off that resets?

Obviously there are innumerable situations, and conveniently enough our company is kind enough to provide us with a QRH that covers the big ones. Either it says land at the nearest suitable field, and we do; or it doesn't and we use some of that judgement they pay us the big bucks for.

My point being that saying they should have landed because it is the safe thing to do is a copout. Each situation that falls outside the explicit guidance of the QRH needs to be analyzed by the pilots in the cockpit at the time.

Unless you know FOR SURE--100%, you land at the nearest suitable airport and find out. And you don't have to do an emergency evac. to do that, either.

AA717driver

I would counter that you never know FOR SURE--100%, you have a good idea and you work off of that. Generally, I agree that if you doubt the integrity of your aircraft you need to land but I don't see the need to assume that a pressurization failure automatically equals a divert. Assuming it is a cracked pressure hull seems to be the extreme when a bad press controller or blown seal on a cabin door is more likely.

Also, agree that without all the facts we can't make a determinative answer and I, for one, trust the guys that did make the decision. But I think discussing it is fine, the "never monday mornning quaterback" contingent seems to be against people learning from the mistakes of the past. And if we always wait for the NTSB report, the same thing could've happened 3 more times. Besides, in a case like this, there likely will be no report and the newspapers aren't likely to print the 'corrected' story 3 weeks from now either. We know what we think we know, and we pontificate from there.

 

[FN FAL]

Heroes???? Please!

Be nice now. The story ended with both pilots keeping their pants on AND they didn't dive into the nearst gas station, so at least they got that going for them.

 

[str8upflyrght]

linecheck-
after they are safely below 14K, where is the emergency? The pax O2 is designed to get to a safe altitude, not smoke fume or fresh air supply. Crew made a decision based on the available info. Landed safe = good job.

 

[737tanker]

Uh, excuse me, but I have a question.

Exactly what caused the depressurization?

Blown seal? Malfunctioning outflow valve? Bad Cabin Press. Controller? Cracked aft bulkhead?

Unless you know FOR SURE--100%, you land at the nearest suitable airport and find out. And you don't have to do an emergency evac. to do that, either.

They got lucky. This "save-a-dime" mania will get someone killed someday.TC

The problem was the outflow valve. At FL410 it went to full open. At 14,000 they were able to get it back under control and got the cabin pressure back under control at the normal cabin altitude of 8,000. Even if they hadn't gotten the outflow valve back under control it is safe and legal to fly unpressurized at 10,000.

 

[FN FAL]

linecheck-
after they are safely below 14K, where is the emergency? The pax O2 is designed to get to a safe altitude, not smoke fume or fresh air supply. Crew made a decision based on the available info. Landed safe = good job.

That's all well and good, if you positively, absolutely, with out a shadow of a doubt, know what the reason is behind the pressurization loss.

 

[flyingitalian]

Uh, excuse me, but I have a question.

Exactly what caused the depressurization?

Blown seal? Malfunctioning outflow valve? Bad Cabin Press. Controller? Cracked aft bulkhead?

Unless you know FOR SURE--100%, you land at the nearest suitable airport and find out. And you don't have to do an emergency evac. to do that, either.

They got lucky. This "save-a-dime" mania will get someone killed someday.TC

Its unsure at this time what caused the rapid d. Plane was being repositioned and it happened again with an empty plane at 410. All this monday morning qb stuff is making me dizzy. They didnt "get lucky," they used experience and sound judgement to complete the task with minimal discomfort to their customers, while staying safe and within regulation. The alternative to make a knee jerk reaction, divert and god knows what else is just silly if not suspected due to events immediately preceeding the rapid d.

They did a fine job.

 

[SkiFishFly]

Taz, that was cute, thanks.

But back to the subject, I will concede that the probability of having a double emergency is slim to none. But nonetheless, it can not be precluded. ie. UAL232 comes to mind.

Regardless if the crew was in an emergency situation at the bottom of descent, the crew/company elected to continue for 75 minutes after an emergency event, with the rubber jungle hanging out, and with an important piece of cabin safety equipment expired: the pax O2 system and some of the crew O2 system. (and this of course is based on the information in the article which certainly can be heavily scrutinized.)

So why do we as "risk managers" want to take that risk? Why do pilots feel they need to place passenger/company needs above safety? This isn't directed specifically towards SWA, but I think the answer to this can be found within the company's culture.

To me its interesting comparing various company cultures and correlating that information to safety data as well as profitibility.

Risk Management - Identify the Hazard and then assess the risk posed by that hazard. Part of that assessment includes the likelihood of the hazard actually occuring.

In this case I think the risk posed by the hazard scenario you created is extremely low. So low as to be neglibile - unless you are in the simulator and it is your check ride. Then I would say the risk of your scenario is much higher.

If the risk is low enough or can be adequately managed - the answer is continue.

 

[NAA Pilot]

Uh, excuse me, but I have a question.

Exactly what caused the depressurization?

Blown seal? Malfunctioning outflow valve? Bad Cabin Press. Controller? Cracked aft bulkhead?

Unless you know FOR SURE--100%, you land at the nearest suitable airport and find out. And you don't have to do an emergency evac. to do that, either.

They got lucky. This "save-a-dime" mania will get someone killed someday.TC

BINGO!!!!

 

[SWA/FO]

What we playing bingo, now?

 

[V1Cutt]

Zzzzzzzzzz ............

 

[canyonblue737]

So you're putzing along at 10,000 to 14,000 feet and did everything that your QRH and dispatch told you to do. You think to yourself, "wow, I'm an awesome SWA pilot now; my chief pilot is gonna be proud of me."

Then twenty minutes from destination, you begin to smell something. Smells like smoke and not the mexican burito that you had for lunch. Something is definetly burning, but what? Smells electrical. Then you begin to see smoke.

You look up and see how much oxygen you have left. Its significantly depleted from your emergency descent, not to mention that you had a jumpseater on board who used a lot of your O2 as well. It doesn't look like there's enough O2 for 20 more minutes of flying. Suddenly you realize that the 130 passengers you have on board have no oxygen because all of their O2 generators have been depleted.

Still want to fly for another 20 minutes so you don't have to inconvenience passengers and make SWA look bad? Ever hear of the accident chain?

You mean that with a smoke/fire issue you think passenger masks are appropriate? Nice PIC work there, think again! Wow, just wow.

The O2 for the pilots can be read off a cockpit guage, they could see if they depleted to much for themselves after the initial descent (which is VERY unlikely considering how much you have... HOURS.)

Also it says in your profile you have flow the FLUF so you should know the Boeing QRH is specific as to which situations are "land at nearest suitable" and which aren't. This is an "aren't."

 

[canyonblue737]

Regardless if the crew was in an emergency situation at the bottom of descent, the crew/company elected to continue for 75 minutes after an emergency event, with the rubber jungle hanging out, and with an important piece of cabin safety equipment expired: the pax O2 system and some of the crew O2 system. (and this of course is based on the information in the article which certainly can be heavily scrutinized.)

The pax O2 system is used for ONLY ONE PURPOSE... providing passengers oxygen at altitudes needing it in the event of a depressurization. Since they descended to a lower altitude and remained there for the remainder of the flight the system has ZERO USE.

Also as a 737 pilot you should know that there are dispatch requirments for cockpit O2. It is HIGHLY unlikely in a 10 minute emergency descent that O2 levels dropped below a normal daily dispatch O2 required level which CAN BE READ ON A COCKPIT GUAGE. I bet they didn't even need to service the cockpit O2 at landing.

Really have no idea where your thoughts are coming from on this issue.

PS: I would have to look but I bet pax O2 is an MEL item in the 37 so that shoots down your "important cabin safety equipment" issue (obviously needing to fly at an appropriate altitude.)

 

[waverunner]

Linecheck you obviously have no idea what you are talking about. Now go play Check Airman and give a line check so you won't clutter the boards here with your monday morning quarterbacking nonsense!

 

[Prog 2/2]

The problem was the outflow valve. At FL410 it went to full open. At 14,000 they were able to get it back under control and got the cabin pressure back under control at the normal cabin altitude of 8,000. Even if they hadn't gotten the outflow valve back under control it is safe and legal to fly unpressurized at 10,000.

Okay, fair enough.

Now how about the fuel?

How far into the resv + alt, or just resv, did they burn? All that tooling around at 140 wasn't accounted for in the original dispatch fuel, and MHT sure isn't an ETP destination, right? I don't think you guys carry that much extra around to begin with (I don't think anybody does anymore), so what did they land with?

And, yeah, I know all about burning the resv, that it's a dispatch requirement only, etc.,etc........

But did they consider that MHT (IIRC) is a single suitable runway airport, that someone else's blown tire might have shut down the only game in town, and that BOS and the rest of the airports around aren't as easy to get into as DAL?

Or did the decision to continue on commit them to land at MHT, without enough to go elsewhere?

I'll hold judgment till the facts are out there, but if I were one of the guys in the head shed I'd sure have some questions about this one.

 

[SWA/FO]

Probably the 80 - 100 K tailwind from LAS provided plenty extra of fuel.....

 

[GuppyWN]

What about fuel? I thought even though the FMC shows 300 lbs. on arrival that we'd "give 'er a shot" cause we're WN.

Gup

 

[waverunner]

What if ..... what if ...... what if.??? what if.... what if??? what if.... what if... what if.... what if???? what if.... what if ... what if the crew just lands at an airport that is familiar to them while having plenty of fuel remaining with a cabin that is controllable at a lower altitude.

 

[AA717driver]

Difference in corporate culture, I guess. Carry on.TC

 

[waverunner]

guess so.