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Comment by OliverJones | Hacker News Reader

Years ago I had a conversation with a Pan Am flight attendant who worked a Teheran evacuation flight after the Pahlavi "dynasty" was deposed and the US nationals had to clear out of Iran quickly. She told me they filled their Boeing 747's aisles with people sitting on the floor.

She told me it's a calculated risk to put passengers in the aisles.

But, the captain of the flight knew exactly what was going on and made the decision to proceed. It sounds like this PIA flight crew concealed their overloading from the captain. THAT is a very serious infraction indeed.

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In 1991, Israel evacuated 14325 Ethiopian Jews in 36 hours using 35 aircraft, with up to 1122 passengers on a plane [1]. It's such an impressive feat, those must have been some of the best pilots, to be able to fly such an overcrowded plane (even though they stripped the seats from the planes it was probably still overloaded)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Solomon

Not to knock the accomplishment but to be fair, the passengers were really light (confirmed according to article).

This comment sent me on a journey to find obesity data on Ethiopia and I found this ranked list that tied back to the CIA factbook as source and places them next to last (currently): http://www.indexmundi.com/g/r.aspx?c=et&v=2228

Yeah, people are about the density of water but even an isle full of people isn't enough to be too meaningful to an airliner. The only times it may be a problem would be a short runway with a full fuel load at altitude. Airliner are typically flown well within it's performance limits. No airline would allow a flight plan that's close to the maximum performance of the aircraft since it would be a recipe for disaster in addition to hard on equipment.

Keeping the cargo secure and the wrench that extra passengers throws into emergency procedures is the real issue here.

I've heard that Boeing 747 airplanes have enough lift to fly properly (if not land properly) with their fuselages full of water. They are in service as fuel tankers.

Still, it's a bad idea to prang an airplane with a few hundred people in the aisles, so pilot skill is important.

Aside from the other concerns raised that I see here, weight/balance would be off if the passenger count was off.

The pilots use weight/balance to calculate things like range, takeoff speed, altitude ceiling, stall characteristics, and so forth. If the plane is heavier than they think, that's not good.

Three quarters of a ton isn't all that significant a weight bump or CG change for an aircraft that size - the latter could as easily happen just from people moving normally around the cabin, maybe queuing at a lav, and the former might fractionally increase Vr but otherwise wouldn't make any difference.

Filling the aisles with people would be a more significant concern, but as another commenter noted, it's a calculated risk - better a long takeoff and rollout than leaving probably one or two hundred people to the tender mercies of the revolutionary and explicitly anti-Western new regime.

In either case, severe turbulence is a much more critical problem. If it happens, some people are certainly going to be badly, maybe lethally, injured.

It isn't the most important thing thing no. Keep in mind though, that the pax count doesn't drive just body weight, there's luggage as well. And I don't know that the count was off by just 7 or 8 pax.

In evacuations, generally luggage beyond whatever people are carrying in their hands is not accommodated. So that lack of luggage gives a margin of error on weight.

The PIA stunt was especially dangerous due to it being a normal flight

> If it happens, some people are certainly going to be badly, maybe lethally, injured.

"Billy Mays here!!..."

(granted that was a freak accident but if you're in a vehicle with a seatbelt you should wear it)

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