It is trivial to see how someone sitting there not seat belted could have perished. You do understand that long stretches of flight allow you to be unseatbelted right?
They allow you to, but on every single flight I’ve been on in ages, the pilot makes a note that they recommend keeping your seatbelt fastened whenever you’re seated. People have been injured due to sudden and unforeseen turbulence, and it’s just a good idea in general.
That said this incident occurred during the initial climb-out where seat belt use is mandatory.
So yes, if a passenger was seated there and if their belt was unbuckled, I can see how somebody would have died. Nobody is saying that this isn’t a serious fuckup that doesn’t need to be investigated and remedied.
What I am saying is that major airlines in the U.S. have a more or less unblemished safety record for twenty two years, the likes of which has not only been unparalleled in aviation, but by any other form of transport. Literally walking is more dangerous than flying a major commercial airline in the U.S.
The MAX line of planes in particular has had their share of problems, but with the MCAS situation resolved there is no reason to believe that it in particular is any less safe than any other airframe operated by the majors. The issue with the door plug is unlikely to be related to the MAX (the same part and design have been in service without issue since well before the MAX). It will be investigated, fixed, and we will in all likelihood go back to flying gajillions of passenger miles without serious incident.
I’ll put this another way: if all of this gnashing of teeth and doom and gloom causes enough anxiety over flying that a few hundred people choose to drive instead, it will inevitably cause more injury and death than if every airline went all-in on a fleet of 737 MAXes.
I think you’re misunderstanding the comments. This was a problem, it needs to be investigated and fixed, but the overreaction to this is bordering on insanity.
Commercial aviation in the U.S. is still incomprehensibly safe. It is not getting measurably less safe. The 737 MAX line are not death traps.
Mechanics routinely forget to bolt the wheels onto cars, which has caused and continues to cause actual traffic deaths.
Nobody floods into the comment sections on HN when this happens because people dying in cars is depressingly normal but planes are so unimaginably safe that a person hypothetically getting sucked out of a plane is strange and terrifying.
I was watching a video, I believe this one (https://youtu.be/WhfK9jlZK1o?si=goQBueaF-5So3U0X) that seemed to make the case that due to the door design it is much less likely, if not impossible, for the presumed failure here to occur at cruising altitude because of the higher pressure differential.
There's a reason they tell you to always wear your seatbelt though, ranging from sudden turbulence/downdraft to sudden depressurization.
1. The seat was not destroyed.
2. The door blowing off would not be the only reason; a second reason would be that the person failed to wear the seatbelt.
We'll have to agree to disagree. I don't believe in blaming the user for manufacturing and maintenance errors. I think that makes a bad programmer too, actually.
