So, it would be ironic if, after the investigation, they determine that some guy who was Twittering during take off interfered with the planes systems and caused the crash.

I assume that if cell phones were even a little likely to cause plane crashes, passengers wouldn't be allowed to carry them on planes at all.

The very slim possibility of interference is one of the main reasons they disallow them during take off and landing, since that is the most critical part of the flight, the other reason is passenger distraction, they want people paying attention.

http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/news/2001/02/41273

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_phones_on_aircraft#Elect...

The reason it is unlikely is because the systems are shielded but you could for see a situation where shoddy maintenance leads to the degradation or removal of what ever is shielding the instrument.

Dude needs a blog. Microblogging seems like the wrong medium to tell a full on story...

I doubt he would have had time to sit down and write a full-fledged blog post on what was going on in a plane crash, as it was happening.

I can't believe they actually used the slides. I kinda figured those were mostly for show.

How else would you get down without stairs?

They deploy automatically when you open the doors unless you specifically disarm them.

Well, yeah, but how else (apart from the "seat flotation devices") would you float except the life vests? And yet, the life vests are mainly for show. As a letter in the 2006 Economist put it:

  SIR – The bright-yellow lifejackets are not intended to
  act as flotation devices. They are there to make it easier
  for the recovery services to spot the bodies strewn across 
  rough terrain. (I was once asked to put on a life-jacket 
  over central Germany, some 300 miles from the sea.) And the 
  advice to adopt a head-down fetal position in the event of 
  a crash landing does nothing to preserve life, given that 
  the stall speed of a modern airliner means it will connect 
  with the ground at terminal velocity. However, the position 
  does tend to preserve dental data, useful for identifying 
  dilapidated corpses.

  Roger Willis
  Peel, Isle of Man

I always thought the number of flights where you needed to get down without stairs was basically nil; turns out I was wrong.

Ah. Letter to "the economist" in which the author demonstrates no knowledge whatsoever about the meaning of the term "terminal velocity" and refers to headless corpses as "dilapidated".

Now that's what I call a primary source! I'm so glad he wrote in to clear things up for everyone.

To be fair, you didn't address any of his points.

Ok, Lets do that.

1) The anecdote about flying over Germany: Flotation might be required even if the plane were to slide into a shallow river or lake. I doesn't much matter if the water is 10 feet or 100 feet deep, drowned is drowned. I have it on good authority that Germany has rivers, even in the middle part. Flotation is always a good idea since it can sometimes be difficult to choose exactly where to have a plane crash... which brings us to:

2) The life jackets on a plane aren't stellar. They are likely barely adequate. A tradeoff was made between usefulness as a flotation device and extra weight on the plane. I hear pilots are picky about the extra weight thing. I don't care if they're ziplock bags with straws. It beats nothing at all. The fact that they're yellow and might help rescue workers see me is just an added bonus.

3) Terminal velocity is the constant maximum velocity reached by a body free-falling through the atmosphere under the attraction of gravity. Its where air resistance and acceleration from gravity are in equilibrium, producing a constant speed. This speed is much higher than the stall speed! (The stall speed being the slowest air speed above which a plane will continue flying) That's just nonsense. Why even bring it up?

4) The duck and cover isn't to protect you from the firey mother of all crashes, its to protect you from that oversized tote crammed into your overhead bin by that idiot sitting next to you during emergency maneuvers. (And, I'm told, other misc debris). I've been on a plane where we were asked to do this in preparation for what was expected to be a particularly hard landing due to a nasty crosswind and blustery conditions. In said firey mother-of-all-crashes, the final resting place of your teeth depends very little on their initial position.

Oh and, dilapidated means "run down". (Now I'll grant you, some of the folks I see hoofing it though the airport may fit this description, alive or dead...) He was likely trying for decapitated, as in "without a head". This raises the question: Is the decapitated corpse the best place to be looking for teeth for a dental match? No? Then why bother with the duck and cover?

It would be interesting to ask the guy who sent in the letter about his opinions on the grassy knoll and area 51 as well. Actually, no, on second thought, it wouldn't.

Now, if you will all excuse me, I really must go and remove my tongue from the place in my cheek where it is so firmly planted.

Interesting account. But is this what passes for a miraculous escape these days?

This isn't an action movie.

hmmm...plane off runway, down embankment, loses an engine, cracked fuselage, large fire engulfs entire right side of fuselage partially melting over head bins, making some exits on the right side unusable...yeah I think this qualifies. I'm not sure if miraculous is the right word, but I am amazed how many "news" stations are passing this off as nothing.

It's the Twitter Effect, again. They're probably upset that citizens are scooping them on "their" news story.

Pardon me? There is nothing malicious in this statement. . . why the downmods?

People disagree? I do, but didn't see fit to downmod you for it, or reply. It was a mild disagreement. No mainstream news op is going to not cover this because someone tweeted it out in my opinion.

that's what counts for "it's a miracle no one was killed" these days, I'd say.

My point exactly - sorry to sound so callous.