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The horror that was when Asiana Flight 214 failed to stick its landing.

The horror that was when Asiana Flight 214 failed to stick its landing.

Like many frequent flyers and San Francisco bay area residents, last Saturday’s tragic crash of Asiana Flight 214 touched home; I was one of the thousands stuck in the backlog of traffic on U.S. 101 when the San Francisco Airport was closed to incoming and departing traffic after the crash. Faced with such a horror, it is human nature to wonder how a tragedy like this can be prevented in the future. But the sad fact is that most large international airports in the U.S. are situated closely to major highways and the unfortunate loss of vehicular mobility when a plane falls out of the sky is unavoidable.

There is little we can do to prevent this type of horror from happening again, but perhaps there are lessons to be learned from the airliner’s crash instead. Since as a passenger your role is to simply board, strap in, be equally bored and abused for the duration of the flight, and then disembark, you wouldn’t think you’d need to be a rocket scientists to be part of the cattle call known as modern day air travel. But those whose profession as a talking head requires their lips to move regardless of the lack of accompanying brain activity say differently. How you can improve your chances of surviving a airplane crash has become the favorite topic of side-bar featured analysts this week when the nation’s media should have instead been focused on the payback we’ll all vicariously receive when the jury in the Trayvon Martin murder trial hands that officious little prick security guard / policeman wannabe his head on a platter.

Unfortunately that means instead of learning tips for being the sole survivor of a plane crash instead we’ve been given worthless advice such as never wear flip flops on a plane ‘cuz they “are the wrong attire for evacuation slides.” “Count the rows to the nearest exit, since you may need to find it under dark or smoky conditions,” on the other hand, isn’t bad advice. Though personally I think counting the old people between you and the nearest exit who’ll be easy to climb over is an even surer path to safety. With that in mind, here are some considerations on surviving a plane crash thanks to the lessons learned from Flight 214’s rough landing:

The odds are you are more likely to die from a grocery store’s roof collapsing on you than from flying. Happy shopping!

The odds are you are more likely to die from a grocery store’s roof collapsing on you than from flying. Happy shopping!

The Odds Are With You Even If The Force Is Not. The two teenage girls who arrived at their final destination on Flight 214 were the first two deaths on a scheduled commercial flight in the United States this year. In fact they set the record for the last 4½ years. During that period, more than 3 billion passengers flew with no fatalities in the United States or on U.S. airlines. At that risk per flight, a traveler could on average fly once a day for 4 million years before succumbing to a fatal crash. An American teenager is far more likely to grow up to be president or win the Nobel Prize in physics than he is to perish on a flight today. Think about that: as difficult as it is to believe, a U.S. teenager will actually win the Nobel Prize in physics some day.

Unless Lightening Strikes Twice. As a passenger there’s not much you can personally do to increase the odds that your plane will get you to your intended destination in one piece. But that doesn’t mean you should ignore the few things that you do have control over. You probably play the lottery, and probably have your favorite lucky numbers. But do you ever consider the lucky or unlucky numbers of your flight? No. You don’t. Or at least 307 passengers last week didn’t. Flight 214 doesn’t have a good record for staying aloft. In 1963 Pan Am’s version crashed near crashed near Elkton, Maryland, killing all 81 on board. After being hit by lightning. Just sayin.

We All Have Baggage. Unless he had jars filled with summer kimchi packed in his carry-on, the actions of Flight 214’s passenger Xu Da, who said he first grabbed his luggage, then scooped up his young child and fled the burning plane with his wife is perplexing. The instinct of many of the passengers to find their luggage before their children and fleeing for their lives has baffled airline safety experts, none of whom, obviously, have children. Amateur video shot of the aftermath of Saturday’s crash show some passengers wheeling their heavy luggage away from the plane just moments before it catches fire. You have to wonder just how attached some people are to their knock-off Gucci luggage.

This strange phenomenon just proves that Darwin had it right. Not that his theory can’t occasionally use an assist. As can your fellow passengers during your flight to safety. Feel free to offer your help to those fools in front of you struggling with their baggage. Then once in your control, toss their bags toward the back of the plane. This should clear your path to the nearest exit nicely. And if you accidently mistake a child for a piece of luggage, evidently your error will be of little concern to its parents. Though you may still have to toss a few of their bags away to get them to move.

Luggage 52 / Kids 0

Luggage 52 / Kids 0

Location, Location, Location. According to research commissioned by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) and carried out by Greenwich University in London that studied 105 airliner accidents, passengers sitting in the aisle seats near the front of an airliner and within five rows of the emergency exit are the most likely to survive a crash. Which makes sense ‘cuz those who could only afford to travel in steerage are basically nothing more than ballast anyway.

Randy Reep, a Florida attorney and professional pilot who couldn’t snag a gig offering his useless input on the Trayvon Martin murder trial and had to settle for a role as a talking head for coverage of Flight 214’s crash instead, disagrees. He says the safest place to sit is in the back of the plane, citing the not-a-fact that all the weight and momentum in an airplane is being pushed forward when it hits a stop to back up his opinion. Reep says those in the front of the plane during a crash become, basically, pancakes.

I can’t tell you whether Reep or the CAA is right, but can tell you that I am getting sick and tired of the class warfare being incited by the 99% and it has to come to a stop. I can also tell you that whether it is safer to sit in the back of the plan or not, by doing so you’d have a 93.8% greater chance of sitting next to someone like George Zimmerman. Or a Florida attorney who’s so crappy at his day job that he has to take part-time work providing inane commentary for CBS to use as filler between commercials.

Since this is how the airlines view you anyway, you should be prepared for the day your plane falls out of the sky.

Since this is how the airlines view you anyway, you should be prepared for the day your plane falls out of the sky.

Is Bigger Better? Even when it comes to aluminum tubes mocking the earth’s pull, size matters and bigger is better. Or at least more safe. Asiana Flight 214 was a Boeing 777, which holds between 314 and 451 passengers depending on how tightly an airline company packs them in. The 777’s record of fatal crashes is at 1. Ooops, make that 2. The 737, which can hold up to 215 passengers has experienced 72 fatal crashes, while the no longer in production but still in use 727 with a 189 passenger count has crashed with an accompanying body count 50 times.

Um, About Those Frequent Flyer Miles. Airlines like to boast about their on-time record, but seldom mention their Full Loss Equivalent (FLE) score, which computes their fatal event rate. In the U.S., American Airlines leads the pack with a score of 10.08 for its 13 not death defying mishaps. For the Pacific region, Taiwan’s China Airlines has a 6.44 FLE thanks to its 10 crashes, and Turkish Airlines holds the record in Europe with a 10 crash 7.56 FLE score.

Watching Survivor Could Mean You Are A Survivor. Just ‘cuz you walked away from a burning plane that made an unscheduled landing doesn’t mean your fun is all done. Juliane Koepcke, the 17-year-old sole survivor of Flight 508 that crashed and burned en route to Lima, Peru fell 10,000 feet strapped to her seat into the jungle below. 10 days later she managed to trek her way to civilization and eventual rescue.

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