Human Factors in Flight 5390
|Flight 5390 was a British Airways flight between Birmingham International Airport in England and Málaga, Spain. On June 10, 1990 there |
|was an improperly installed windshield and failed in mid-flight. The plane had climbed to 17,300 feet over Didcot, Oxfordshire, A few |
|minutes later there was a loud bang, and the fuselage quickly filled with condensation. The left windscreen, on the captain's side of |
|the cockpit, had failed. Lancaster, the captain, was pulled out of his seat by the air and forced head first out of the cockpit. This |
|left him with his whole upper torso out of the aircraft, and only his legs inside. The door to the flight deck was blown out, It blocked|
|the throttle control which caused the plane to continue gaining speed as they descended. |
On the flight deck at the time, flight attendant Nigel Ogden quickly latched his hands onto the captain's belt. Meanwhile, Lancaster was being battered and frozen in the 500mph slipstream, and was losing consciousness due to the lack of oxygen. Atchison ,the co pilot, began an emergency descent, and started to broadcast a distress call. Due to rushing air on the flight deck, he was unable to hear the response from air traffic control. Ogden, still latched onto Lancaster, had begun to suffer from frostbite, bruising and exhaustion. By this time Lancaster had already shifted an additional six to eight inches out the window. From the flight deck, the flight and cabin crew were able to view his head and torso through the left window.
“Atchison eventually received clearance from air traffic control to land at Southampton, while the flight attendants managed to free and hold onto Lancaster's ankles for the remainder of the flight. By 7:55 am the aircraft had landed safely at Southampton” ("British airways flight 5390," ).
Lancaster was taken to Southampton General Hospital, where he was found to be suffering from frostbite, bruising and
|was an improperly installed windshield and failed in mid-flight. The plane had climbed to 17,300 feet over Didcot, Oxfordshire, A few |
|minutes later there was a loud bang, and the fuselage quickly filled with condensation. The left windscreen, on the captain's side of |
|the cockpit, had failed. Lancaster, the captain, was pulled out of his seat by the air and forced head first out of the cockpit. This |
|left him with his whole upper torso out of the aircraft, and only his legs inside. The door to the flight deck was blown out, It blocked|
|the throttle control which caused the plane to continue gaining speed as they descended. |
On the flight deck at the time, flight attendant Nigel Ogden quickly latched his hands onto the captain's belt. Meanwhile, Lancaster was being battered and frozen in the 500mph slipstream, and was losing consciousness due to the lack of oxygen. Atchison ,the co pilot, began an emergency descent, and started to broadcast a distress call. Due to rushing air on the flight deck, he was unable to hear the response from air traffic control. Ogden, still latched onto Lancaster, had begun to suffer from frostbite, bruising and exhaustion. By this time Lancaster had already shifted an additional six to eight inches out the window. From the flight deck, the flight and cabin crew were able to view his head and torso through the left window.
“Atchison eventually received clearance from air traffic control to land at Southampton, while the flight attendants managed to free and hold onto Lancaster's ankles for the remainder of the flight. By 7:55 am the aircraft had landed safely at Southampton” ("British airways flight 5390," ).
Lancaster was taken to Southampton General Hospital, where he was found to be suffering from frostbite, bruising and