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Friday, June 05, 2009

The Last Minutes of Flight 447

It's not like I'm an utter pessimist or afraid of flying--I rather like it, actually, TSA shenanigans and all. But perhaps because my family worked at Eastern Airlines and I flew a lot, I pay a lot of attention to commercial airliner crashes. I also used to knock on the side of the airplane for luck before boarding. What the heck, it never hurt, right? Now I just pray. Anyhow, on a related note, the New York Post today reports than a Brazilian news paper posted the last transmissions from Air France Flight 447, which went down in the South Atlantic. I feel only slightly better that the authorities are saying it was likely not terrorism-related because they found oil/fuel on the surface--otherwise, I presume, the fuel would have burned if it were an explosion. Maybe. Some airplanes and ships in the area reported some sort of flash, I believe. Also, JP-8 has a pretty high flash point, so there could still have been some sort of fire without all of the fuel getting caught up in it. Just sayin'.

I pay attention to these things a little more when I've got to travel by air. Just collating data, as they say. And yeah, in addition to the prayer, I might start knocking on the side of the airplanes for luck. Couldn't hoit.

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