Surviving a plane crash - The 'brace' position.

[Paul_B]

The cheese eating/dying in bedsheets correlation. Kinda makes sense. Cheese late at night supposedly gives you bad dreams. In bad dreams you probably move around in the bed a lot. That could result in strangling yourself with the sheets from your restlessness. Just one theory to explain the correlation!!!

 

[santaman2000]

I must be missing something here. Most of the comments have been geared towards flying commercial airlines. But those airlines never mention the crash position (I've flown commercial at least 100 flights) Although I have seen it on the placard that nobody reads in the seatbacks.

The only time I've ever heard it actually briefed was on military flights where they don't mind scaring the passengers by talking about "crashing."

 

[santaman2000]

Sorry I think we crossed in conversation, I agreed the neck snap thieory is bunkum, my point was I don't fancy my chances regardless of how I'm sitting

Like someone previously mentioned, there are two types of crashes:
1) A full crash from altitude (about 36,000 for a commercial jetliner) after catastrophic failure. That has a 0% chance of survivability.

OR

2) A crash during takeoff or landing. That's essentially the same as a traffic accident at a much higher speed (unless it's a small aircraft, in which case the speed will be fairly close to an auto) These are very survivable as they're usually more controlled that a traffic crash.

 

[santaman2000]

Question. Why does being told by some military unit make it right? Sorry if it sounds disrespectful but does "knowledge" handed down within one section of society guarantee accuracy? That could have been originated by some joker who told enough people for it to get passed on as fact.....QUOTE]

Most of the sayings passed in military circles such as the one Hill Bill referenced re the crash position being to "snap your neck for a quick death" or Sandbender's quote from the Royal Marines re paras "crossing their legs so they screw into the earth to save the cost of a funeral" are nothing more than dark humor. We had a similar saying in the Air Force:
Question = "Why do fighter pilots wear crash helmets?"
Answer = "To be conscious to enjoy the flames."

They were never meant to be taken seriously.

 

[santaman2000]

.....I've got two engineering degrees and as part of them did statistics as well as engineering mathematics. Even without that statistics training engineering is a numerical discipline in that you need maths skills and knowledge to be an engineer / get the degree.....

Yep. I never finished my engineering degree (my original major) I dropped out to enlist after the first two years (of a four year degree) and I'd already had to complete through Calculus II. I still needed Calc III and Calc IV as well as Differential Equations if I'd stayed to complete the degree.

 

[brambles]

One of my cousins was an RAF C130 pilot in Desert Storm - he and his crew used to see who could scare the most squaddies with stories or tricks. He used to come out of the cockpit with a piece of cord over each shoulder, trailing them behind him as he walked the length of the aircraft to the loo bucket in the tail. The aircraft lurched to the right, he hauled on the left cord and it straightened up, it lurched to the right he hauled on the left, it went into a dive he pulled both etc. He gets to the end, hands both cords to a green looking squaddie at the back and says "Hang onto these while I take a dump, mate!"

 

[mrcharly]

I'm with you on the flying. One of the joys of living in Mainland Europe is the incredibly well organised, reliable, comfortable and cheap rail system. I used to fly back and forth from Edinburgh to London for work and it was a terrible experience, especially on the London side.

I'm guessing that you know that Britain is 'Great' because it is the bigger of the two islands? Ireland was 'Little' Britain in Roman times.

My recent ancestors are from Orkney, an interesting place, not enough trees though.

I thought Brittany was 'less britain', or 'Brittany minor'.