What I don't get is why people are not using seatbelts. The only time I'm not using it is when I'm on the way to and from the bathroom. If I'm seated I'm using the seatbelt.
Not turbulence related. Plane (Boeing 787-9) lost instrumentation according to the captain, followed by rapid loss of altitude. When instrumentation came back, flight continued to a safe landing. 12 people were sent to hospital. S always, see avherald.com for the most reliable, non-speculative info.
For anyone else wondering, the plane was a<p>> Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner<p>(Boeing, but not the 737 Max that has been in the headlines the past few years)<p>Source: <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2024/3/11/50-people-injured-by-strong-movement-on-boeing-787-9-dreamliner" rel="nofollow">https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2024/3/11/50-people-injur...</a>
This seems to be attributed to a technical problem and not turbulence so far. Probably should be a bit skeptical about any explanation this early, but I'm wondering which systems would be powerful enough to cause something like this.<p>For example, would a pilot be able to manually fly the airplane and cause this kind of incident? Or would the control surfaces of the plane be able to cause this assuming that any safety limits that restrict movement were not working?
Reminds me of this Air Canada flight years ago where the pilot confused Venus with an oncoming plane.<p><a href="https://www.cnn.com/2012/04/17/travel/canada-disoriented-pilot/index.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.cnn.com/2012/04/17/travel/canada-disoriented-pil...</a>
I don't understand why so many people refuse to wear seatbelts unless demanded. Had everyone been buckled in I doubt anyone would have been injured. You are in a metal tube doing almost the speed of sound tens of thousands of feet in the air. Keep the belt on.<p>If you have to get up, keep a hand on something. An airliner cannot pull serious negative gs. You aren't going to be "pinned" to the ceiling. But you should hold to something solid just in case things get a little floaty for a few seconds. Most longtime fliers have witnessed their drinks lift of their trays. The floating doesn't hurt. The issue is when things stop floating and come crashing down.
We had the same incident around 2007-2008 with China Airlines. The scary point that it happened almost the same place, from Taiwan to Bali about 1 hour before the landing.
Reminds me of that time a japanese flight had a steep turbulence, a passenger hit the ceiling and died.<p>12 injured into the ceiling in this flight, kind of looks like a check of who was and wasn't wearing the belt
Interestingly, this flight (Sydney-Santiago, via Auckland) is one of a few that many flat-earthers insist does not exist, since it contradicts a theory they have. They'd plot the paths of long-distance flights on a polar azimuthal equidistant projection of earth[0], and note that some one-stop flights look like a straight line on this projection. But those which <i>don't</i> look like a straight line (i.e. that suggest they're wrong) are dismissed as nonexistant, and part of the greater globe earth conspiracy.<p>[0] - <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azimuthal_equidistant_projection" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Azimuthal_equidistant_projecti...</a>
The plane transited from an air stream (of whatever velocity/vector) into one descending vertically at high speed = instant down elevator = passengers in free fall as plane descends = impact roof hard/soft. Soon exit the stream and get used to it = fall down hard from 7-8 feet in random attitude.
Down is the worst, a vertical up = pressed into seat and already standing.
Pilot might have had a warning or inkling = faster seat belts/sit. In a down acceleration like this all loose objects are affected = missiles, a laptop can hit you hard.
Back in the old days, they called these 'air pockets' - lacking velocity they were less dangerous than these occurrences at modern speeds where planes are going at 500-600 miles/hour and the transition is virtually instantaneous.
It's remarkable how almost every serious incident due to equipment errors in the past few months involves a Boeing aircraft rather than an Airbus.