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Comment by ahussain | Hacker News Reader

I'm curious, on a scale of 1-10 how big of a transgression do people consider this to be?

When I was in India it was common to have people sitting in the aisles on long distance buses, trains, and theatre halls where fire evacuation plans were clearly not being followed. Agreed, planes are not theatre halls, but how severe of a breach in public safety is this? I think planes are a special case because they are such fragile systems, but it does seem like in the West we worship health and safety a little too much.

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in a post on Quora about what it's like to fly on Air Force One:

First, as we started to descend I instinctively went back to my seat and buckled up. But I noticed a lot of the other "frequent flyers" were still up and walking around. So I asked one of them, "When are we supposed to sit down?" They just kind of laughed at my "noob question" and said something to the effect of-- "You don't really have to sit down at all just watch how the pilot lands this thing." So people were still up and walking around as the plane landed. For someone who had only flown commercial it was a fascinating to me for some reason. Sure enough- the pilot put her down like a feather and came to a gentle stop.

https://www.quora.com/Whats-it-like-to-fly-on-Air-Force-One/...

CFR 14 (Federal Aviation Regulations) requires everyone on board a civil aircraft to wear seat belts during taxi, takeoff, and landing.

(Under part 91.107 [1], where part 91 are general rules for general aviation, and that rule does not hold for operations under part 121 (air carriers/airliners), 125 (planes with more than 20 pax), 135 (commuter and on-demand flights), but they all re-introduce it separately [2][3][4], so yeah.)

Either they're all criminals, or the rules on military flights are different.

At any rate, I'd think it's rather prudent to sit down and put a seatbelt on - the rule's not just for fun, but because accidents can occur. The notion that the Airforce One pilots are somehow special with special landing skills strikes me as fanciful.

[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/14/91.107

[2] https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/14/121.311

[3] https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/14/125.211

[4] https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/14/135.128

I'd be inclined to agree with you regarding the "general safety" concern, except for two things:

1. AF1 is a 747. If you've never been on a 747 (or A380), then you might not appreciate how smooth landings are in general. It's a lot of airplane with a lot of momentum (not to mention a lot of electronic assistance for the pilots).

2. You say "The notion that the Airforce One pilots are somehow special with special landing skills strikes me as fanciful." I don't consider that notion fanciful at all! In fact, I'd expect they have special landing skills. The AF1 pilots are not just some random commercial or charter pilots, they are Air Force officers, hand-picked from the best of the best. In addition, not only do they have to take-off and land the president's airplane, they also must be able to take evasive action IN A FREAKIN' 747 in the event of a hostile encounter. So "special landing skills"...I'd buy it.

EDIT: Also, reading the original Quora answer, the particular landing mentioned was on the Shuttle Landing Facility, one of the longest runways in the world! I'd wager the pilot could've practically let AF1 roll out the landing and had room to spare.

Fair enough, they're probably among the best pilots in the world, and a long runway helps (I've landed a Cessna 172 at Upington, South Africa, at 4900 meters one of the few runways in the world longer than the Shuttle Landing Facility, and yes, it's fairly straightforward to set it down smoothly in the nearly three minutes you can fly down that runway).

But are you advocating that pax in an A380 approaching big airports with nice weather just walk around as they please? And why not? Because the risk during takeoff and landing is elevated, compared to cruise flight, isn't it?

It's a tricky question, granted, but I'd still say, "principiis obsta", nip things in the bud, don't let safety standards slide, buckle up.

For commercial service I agree with you heartily. For AF1...I don't know. I'd be inclined to take a seat myself, but I can understand not, for a number of reasons. For example, even if landing is a tad rough, from the sounds of it there isn't nearly as much "stuff" in the interior (seats, overhead bins, etc.) you could potentially bang into.

The evacuation risk is only one side of the issue. People not strapped in are another. With enough turbulence, they'll fly around the cabin. In the best case it will be uncomfortable for them. In the worst, a 100kg body will suddenly hit you in the face.

I mean, this can happen on a bus: http://stream1.gifsoup.com/view3/2175405/bus-bounce-o.gif If you experienced proper turbulence in flight, you can imagine how it can go wrong on a plane. So around 8 and I will call the staff if you sit next to me and think you're too cool for the seatbelts.

Ive seen it in the US several times. Some people just refuse to use seatbelts. They look pretty funny hovering upwards then crashing down onto armrests. Luckily cabins now are so cramped that they rarely move far enough to hurt anyone else.

In commercial aviation specifically, we worship health and safety even more than usual, in large part due to the high psychological impact of aircraft incidents. Given the complexity of aviation systems and the number of catastrophic failure modes that exist, the fatality rate of (particularly Western) aviation is absolutely incredible.

I once flew a (non-indian) airline with a large group of people from india on it (to be honest could have been from some of the neighboring countries too, but looked like the average group of Bangalore engineers) - who stood up and retrieved their coats and carry on from the overhead bins while the plane touched down. A fly around or bumpy landing could really have ruined their day. I was just thinking "that makes sense if you ride on the roof of the bus from the airport home...".

As anecdotal as it gets but still eye opening.

happens on every single indian flight. Indians have the fear of being 'left behind' from decades of conditioning where only first few birds get the worm. I have this instinct too form standing in ration lines with my ration card for wheat/sugar and palm oil .

As an an Indian, I completely agree and it annoys me every time I fly home. I just don't understand what's the rush? I mean, the plane hasn't even touched the runway yet and people are scrambling for overhead luggage, some of them are turning on their mobiles on and are on call, heck I even saw even once the toddler taken out of the belt. All for what? To go and wait in aisle or bus or in front of the airline staff or the luggage belt. It grinds my gears every time.

But indigo can land a plane, get all the passengers and bags off, new passengers and bags on, and be moving in 45 minutes. Keeps the tickets cheap!

Also frequently on flights in/out of China, though the cabin crew are quite happy to shout "Qing zuo" (please sit) during taxi when necessary.

I hate that. Of course, most likely nothing is going to happen, but it could, and then their stupid suitcase could also fall on my head.

When the plane arrives at the gate, there's still plenty of time to get your stuff... :-/

I'm from the UK and I'd put it at 4 or 5. Basically completely unacceptable but when it comes to health and safety there is almost no limit to how dangerous you can make a situation. 10 would be depressurising the cabin and giving passengers warm clothes and oxygen masks and hoping enough of them survive that you still make a profit.

If it was documented policy that the captain could authorise extra passengers and so on, 3/10. But if they just ignored their own rules it's a 9/10, because adherence to procedure is critical to avoiding death. If they can't do that bit right, what other (expensive) corners are they cutting? Engine maintenance? Crew training? Rest time log fabrication? Nepotism?

Think you have that the wrong way around! Taking on more passengers than there are seats is not safe. If it's an isolated incident, then that's 3/10. If it's an actual policy of the airline then holy shit! 11/10

Well, we can disagree. If you understand the risk and are willing to accept it that is one thing; if things are happening without controls that is far worse. There are no 'isolated incidents' in aviation.

http://www.vanallen.com/index.php/an-isolated-incident-risk-...

Around 4. A bit like taking a selfie on a train track, or walking along the edge of a sky scraper - most likely nothing is going to happen, but if, the consequences could be severe.

Turbulences injure people all the time, see [1].

Also, commercial aviation is as incredibly safe as it is because everyone follows the rules. If you start neglecting them because everything is happy and dandy nearly always, you are contributing to the next accident.

It is this creeping "normalisation of deviance" that has to be fought.

Note that generally I agree with the notion that we might exaggerate with safety - I'm all for letting children play, for example. But here we are dealing with potentially deadly consequences, and not only for yourself, but for others.

Let me conclude with a great quote:

> "Aviation in itself is not inherently dangerous. But to an even greater degree than the sea, it is terribly unforgiving of any carelessness, incapacity or neglect."

— Captain A. G. Lamplugh, British Aviation Insurance Group, London. 1930's

[1] http://avherald.com/h?search_term=turbulence+injures&opt=0&d...

The other comments don't really take into consideration the possibility of turbulence.

Imagine people trying not to fling around the cabin when hitting a rough patch. This isn't something that happens on a bus, but it is routine in aircraft.

If you take flying lessons weight and balance is a big part of the training.

The moment arm ("virtual" fulcrum) is an imaginary point where the balance of the plane is and it moves depending on the shape of the aircraft and where the weight is located.

Imagine a long lever with the fulcrum in the middle now imagine that lever is flying in three dimensions. Any weight near or far from the fulcrum makes it difficult to control the lever (aircraft) if the weight is moving or in the wrong spot.

My flying lessons were 25 years ago and I didn't continue but that's the gist of it.

As others have pointed out, this case was almost surely well within the normal range (imagine people going to the toilets), but yes.

Maybe I'm paranoid thinking back to my flying my instructor was strict about weight and balance not that I carried anything as a student. But always being aware of it is a big part of flying or at least when learning to fly.

My instructor even made me secure my pen when I was flying nothing loose in the cabin.

For a small plane, the limits are smaller, naturally. But half a ton here and there is something an airliner can deal with.

For the pen, there might be other reasons - a dropped pen might slide under the rudder pedal and block it, or interfere with other things in the cabin.

The flight in question went from Karachi to Medina carrying a total of 416 passengers, on a Boeing 777 with a total seating capacity of 409, including staff seats.

IMHO the weight difference will be negligible, and in an emergency evacuation those in the aisle would be the first to leave. The biggest risks are probably turbulence and availability of oxygen.

When you consider that planes have crashed killing all on board due to overloading, it's actually a pretty big deal.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/18/us/crash-that-killed-21-ap... http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2015/11... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-32732607 https://sputniknews.com/latam/201612261049016624-plane-brazi... https://generalaviationnews.com/2011/07/18/overweight-airpla... http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Lebanon-News/2004/Mar-29/29...

Google tells me that the average person weighs 80.7kg, let's conservatively round up to 100kg to take into account clothes, and luggage (It's probably higher). From this we can estimate that the PIA flight had an extra 700kg (It's probably closer to 1 tonne) of weight on board, and extra 700kg that wasn't properly secured or distributed.

Depending on the plane, the effects could range from using up more fuel (planes carry extra fuel for emergencies and so they can circle their destination while they wait to land, it would eat into this reserve making flight incidents more deadly), to failing to take off the runway; The pilot wasn't informed until he was in the air.

While the plane in question is certainly larger and more powerful than the majority of the links I provided, the fact of the matter is an overloaded bus or train may refuse to move if overloaded, a plane can fall from the sky killing people both on-board and on the ground. Planes fail deadly.

You now have 7 extra, fragile humans standing in the aisle who have nowhere to belt down in case of emergency. If the plane crashes, needs to make an emergency landing, or even encounters incredibly rough turbulence they could be thrown around the cabin hurting both themselves and others.

As for a 1 to 10 scale of transgression, it's hard to place because of the nature of such a simplistic scale. Assuming your scale is confined to aeronautics (lest we invoke Godwin's Law) what counts as a 1, and what counts as a 10? If your 1 to 10 scale is truly inclusive of every possible aeronautical incident then 1 has to be a passenger with a typo on their ticket, and 10 has to be 911. I don't know about you, but I have no idea where to place this overloading incident on such a scale.

Weight is not the problem here.

While the plane in question is certainly larger and more powerful than the majority of the links I provided

At least an order of magnitude more.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_airliners_by_maximum_t...

The smallest 777 can take off weighing over 200t. An extra 0.7t is basically nothing, considering even the smallest variant holds nearly 100t of fuel and consumes over 6t/h of it. In other words, 0.7t is the weight of the fuel consumed in less than 7 minutes of flight.

https://www.quora.com/How-much-fuel-does-a-Boeing-747-or-777...

I don't think it's a big deal.

I would give this incident 1/10. It's mind boggling to me why people think this is a big deal.

Speaking of theatres and other venues, overcrowding them is way worse. For once, they actually do catch on fire much more often then planes fall from the sky. I consider overcrowding a theatre criminal negligence, while I couldn't care less about (minimally!!) overcrowding a plane.

As it says in the article:

    Such an over-crowded flight would have caused
    problems in an emergency evacuation, aviation
    experts said, and passengers would not have
    had access to oxygen if it was suddenly required.

Additionally, you don't wear a seatbelt on a plane to save you from a crash, you wear it to stop yourself being injured during turbulence, or from injuring someone else by being thrown onto them. Obviously these people did not have seatbelts.

I don't know if this is actually true, but I read recently that in the case of a crash the seatbelt isn't there to stop you dying, its to keep your body attached to your assigned seat so that you can be identified afterwards.

Sounds like the old "brace position is to kill you rather than injure you" myth to me. Struggling for a better source, but:

> And the seat belts that flight attendants urge you to wear during most of the flight also helped to keep head and neck injuries to a minimum, says Dr. David King, a trauma surgeon at Massachusetts General Hospital and an assistant professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School. “Clearly for the vertical deceleration [typical] of an airplane crash, the lap belt seems to be the most important restraint,” he says.

http://healthland.time.com/2013/07/09/lessons-from-flight-21...

Haven't heard that before, but even if true people often move seats, so it wouldn't be very accurate.

A myth. Sure, there are accidents where everyone perishes with or without seatbelt (and those make the headlines), but there are surprisingly many accidents where some or many people survive.

> "between 1983 and 2000, more than 95 percent of people involved in U.S. plane crashes survived."

http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/story?id=2619382&page=1

I agree that it is a myth, but that statistic is misleading, the definition used for "plane crash" is not one most people would agree with.

Fair enough, but bottom line is that lots can happen on a flight that might injure you, without necessarily being a prototypical plane crash. So better wear your seat belts.

Similarly, I take off my shoes during long flights, but make sure to have them on for take-off and landing, in case of evacuation.

Don't need to fall from the sky to cause damage. Bad turbulence can break bones, doubly so if you're stranded in the aisle with nothing to hold you down. Airplanes have seatbelts for a reason.

It takes one sky-bump to throw every single one of those people against the ceiling head-first. This happens once in a while.

An Air Canada flight in 2015 had 21 people injured, including a broken pelvis.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/tsb-investigation-air-...

Not to excuse this in any way, but that sort of sky bump is a rare event, which is why you can find a news story about it. And, also per that story, people can end up getting hurt in those circumstances even though they're seated.

Again, we don't have standing room planes for very good reasons. And breakdowns in safety protocols should be worrying. But as a one-off event, the incremental danger is actually pretty slight.

Not that rare: Here's just some, mostly from 2016 and 2015:

http://avherald.com/h?search_term=turbulence+injures&opt=0&d...

Otherwise, totally agree: compared to total number of flights (there's maybe 1000 B737 and A320 in the air at any moment), rare (though potential consequences could be grave.)

And, as you say, it's the negligence of basic safety protocol that's worrying.

If they break this rule and get away with it what other rules are they breaking? How many others will start breaking rules?

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