Channel 4 to crash airliner

[Garry Russell]

Very much a 'Watch this space' story

Perhaps we should have a sweepstake........whoever wins buys me a beer or four

Garry

[speedbird591]

Over the years hundreds of aircraft have been crashed in hundreds of different ways, albeit unintentionally

The accidents have been minutely analysed and investigated and reported on - giving a vast wealth of data on what causes crashes and what the effects are. What additional, useful information could they possibly gain from staging another one?

On the other hand, using the latest slow-mo, hi-definition cameras it would create some spectacular footage. So it gets my vote purely for the gratuitious sensationalism!

Ian

[Garry Russell]

I think it's a study to prove how airliners can crash when the crew become incapacitated whilst watching Big Brother

Garry

[speedbird591]

I think it's a study to prove how airliners can crash when the crew become incapacitated whilst watching Big Brother Garry

In my day they became incapacitated doing the Telegraph crossword!

Ian

[SkippyBing]

What additional, useful information could they possibly gain from staging another one?

Depends, if they set it up with a load of instrumentation and telemetry you could feasibly get a lot of useful feedback on what happens during the crash, rather than trying to figure it out from the before and after shots.

[Nigel H-J]

The plane will be loaded with cameras and sensors recording the impact of the crash, which Channel 4 said would provide invaluable information about how planes react in potentially fatal accidents.

I think we all roughly know how a plane will react in a crash, the fusalage itself is not made up of re-inforced steel, so depending on the angle of attack depends very much on the type of damage equally, broken fuel pipes, fuel tanks as well as hydraulic lines are a major fire risk on impact, they would do far better looking towards ways of reducing that risk rather than flying an aircraft into the ground and showing how the aircraft breaks up when it collides with mother earth then walking around the tiny bits of debris they announce that in all probability this would have been a none survivable crash!!

Nigel.

[airboatr]

A lot can be learned from these test , if the purpose for the test is to re- engineer a construct for a better percentage of survival
in the event of a crash.

Unfortunatly , what is learned from the real world crashes - ultimately is, that some one, some-where along the line, didn't do his/her job.
or simply were not paying attention

and thats why we Have to make them "safer" "and safer" ,

what - (of course) - we learn from that is,.... it becomes very very expensive to build them.

The cheapest answer to the problem is " adequate people paying attention" while they are performing the task at hand.

the crux is:
the tasks people are asked to do are increasing due to the downsizing , because the edUmacated ones
seam to think is cheaper to clean up a mess than it is to keep it from happening

[SkippyBing]

I think we all roughly know how a plane will react in a crash

Yes, I imagine they're going for better detail than 'roughly' though, you can learn a surprising amount from actual trials. I remember one of my lecturers at uni discussing some trials they'd done torpedoing ships and finding out all kinds of stuff they didn't know happened such as parts friction welding themselves into new configurations due to the whiplash.
Having seen a number of post crash reports for helicopters there's a surprising amount that can't be figured out from looking at the wreckage.

[TobyV]

My guess would be an A300 - they are about as worthless as udders on a boar hog....


Leif

Damn, I wondered why my "Hermaphrodite Wild Boar Dairy Products" business idea was such a flop on "Dragon's Den". (Anyone seen my coat?)

More seriously though, I am starting to feel old now! One of the first aviation books I owned as a child had the likes of A300, TriStar and DC10 as typical modern aircraft and the A320 as something that had yet to enter service. Now even early example of those are being scrapped and most of the aforementioned are if not scrapped, either sold to developing world countries or used as freighters.

A300 does seem a plausible candidate. If they are going to parachute the pilots out (which, as discussed, seems dubious especially as drones have been around since probably the 1950s), then 2 would be safer than 3!