Tagged With "Safety"
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Re: Driving in Spain: better be a hands-on experience!
Tooooo much of Big Brother in all this for my liking.
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The Safest Cities in the World
I'm not sure if people pay much attention to such listings anymore, but Yahoo just released a listing of the 20 safest cities to visit in 2015. (Tokyo. Photo: Loic Lagarde, Flickr) Topping the list is Tokyo, followed very closely...
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New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
In the wake of the Germanwings crash that killed 150 in an apparent suicide-by-pilot, Lufthansa and many others are quickly adopting rules requiring at least two crew members be present inside the cockpit at all times. Lufthansa's announcement covers...
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Crowded planes a safety hazard? Witnesses say so...
Flight attendants, at a Federal hearing, pointed to "legroom wars" and increased air rage. A safety expert pointed out that the FAA's evacuation tests use planes with more legroom than you're likely to get, and Charlie Leocha of Consumer Traveler...
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easyJet's new idea: drone inspects planes
easyJet's inspection drone in flight Photo: easyJet Drones are all the thing these days, and not just the military bomb-carrying ones. Amazon wants to use them to deliver packages, pilots are afraid of encountering...
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When the safety video becomes inflight entertainment
Be honest: How many of you keep on reading while the flight attendants give you the required safety briefing and show the video? (in the interests of honest disclosure, I plead guilty). But in recent years, there have been a number of attempts...
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Driving in Spain: better be a hands-on experience!
If you're driving in Spain anytime soon, keep your hands on the wheel. Spanish police are taking a very literal view of "keep your hands on the wheel and your eye on the road." In two recent cases in the Salamanca area, drivers were fined for...
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French road signs: "I'm supposed to do WHAT?"
Half the population of France, apparently, is confused by common road signs—perhaps because there have come to be so many—according to a recent survey. And if it's that hard for the locals, imagine the effect on tourists, especially...
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How safe is that Hotel Room Safe?
Many of us assume the safe stashed in the closet of our hotel room offers security for our valuables. Well, it's certainly better than nothing but far from completely secure. Take a look at this video, a demonstration...
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Mandatory Seat Belts for Children traveling by Plane?
Canada's Transportation Safety Board (TSB) wants airlines to implement specially designed seat belts for infants and small children, to be mandatory for all commercial air travel. The idea is to prevent them from becoming "projectiles"...
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'Faites Attention!' France tells drivers: no headphones
If you're traveling to France this year and plan on driving, leave your headphones, earpieces, Bluetooth headsets and the like behind, or in your bag. As of July 1st they're banned on the road in France, whether you're driving a car or riding a bike....
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Americans still love road trips: 71% will take one this summer
A new Harris Poll tells us what we must have known. Beyond cruises and flights, the classic road trip is still the popularity winner for U.S. vacationers, with 71% planning some sort of road trip this summer. The poll, based on 2215 U.S....
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World Cup News:Who is benefiting?
It seems Brazil's Pacification program has has had mixed results.Read about it below. http://www.smh.com.au/world/se...-20131230-hv75d.html
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Safer When Stormy: Distracted Drivers
A recent study by driver training operator Lytx of available data indicates that the number of near-collisions as a result of distracted driving (texting, talking, involved in something else) nearly doubles in good weather compared to dark and stormy....
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Florence's Uffizi closes a gallery that wasn't open
Fire safety concerns have closed a centuries-old gallery connecting two of Florence's top museums, just as plans were underway to open it to the public.
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Air New Zealand does it to Hollywood
Air New Zealand's mini-movies draw on Hollywood cliches to present the required safety info.
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Benefits of Self-Drive Cars on Rentals over Taxis & Cabs
With the rising awareness among average Indians, the demand for improved services is on the rise these days than in the past. Nothing exemplifies this phenomenon or the new trend in a better way than the choice of rental cars among people in India. Though the cab culture in India has undergone some changes in recent years, it is still quite a distance away from accepting the idea of self-driven cars. That said, the joys of self-driven cars far exceed the experience of sitting in a passenger...
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How to Ensure the Safety of the Airlines?
Traveling via the air is becoming more often for the explorers to explore the horizons of any part of the earth, then the reason or purpose of the visit does not matter. For the ones who think a lot about money before traveling to other shores, the headache is lowered down to some extent by the wide span of the airline network. The widespread of airlines have eventually affected the airfares, if not much, but yes to some extent. The lowering down of the air tickets arise other questions too...
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Ensure the Safety of the Airlines?
Travelling via the air is becoming more often for the explorers to explore the horizons of any part of the earth, then the reason or purpose of the visit does not matter. For the ones who think a lot about money before travelling to other shores, the headache is lowered down to some extent by the wide span of the airline network. The widespread of airlines have eventually affected the airfares, if not much, but yes to some extent. The lowering down of the air tickets arise other questions...
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TSA's Blog: Hidden guns, human skull and an exploding suitcase
The Transportation Safety Administration publishes a year-end list of what it's found in screening—helps justify the budget, yes? This year's list includes 1813 handguns, endless lists of black powder canisters, explosive "initiators," swords...
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It had to happen: BA flight struck by Heathrow drone
What airlines, officials and passengers have feared has happened, though fortunately this time without serious consequences: An inbound British Airways flight was struck by a drone during its approach to Heathrow Airport Sunday night (Apr 17). The flight from Geneva, ironically an A320 on Flight 727, landed safely and was permitted to continue flying after an inspection. The growing popularity of drones as toys and camera platforms has made such incidents inevitable, despite rules that...
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How safe is your airline? The best and worst lists
Qantas tops the list in a year that saw fewer accidents and fatalities than the 10-year average.
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FAA funding bill: battleground of amendments
As Congress begins work on the FAA funding bill, consumer advocates and industry lobbyists go to work to get their favorite amendments included.
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Are Security Cameras an Invasion of Privacy
In public surveillance cameras good or bad debate, the first question is whether the surveillance cameras an invasion of privacy. 37% say yes and 67% say no, according to the debeate.org in the security cameras and privacy discussion. When you are walking down the street, driving in your car, or hanging out with boyfriends and girlfriends, you will be monitored with cameras placed in public. This creates a complete picture of the private life of an individual. We all have private life, which...
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10 Safety Tips for Solo Female Travelers
Since I am a travel blogger and a woman, I have been traveling to many countries around the globe. My solo trips have taught and trained me in keeping myself safe and secure. And after years of globetrotting experiences, I believe now I am capable of giving some good piece of advice to others. Especially to the solo woman travelers. The choice of traveling alone especially for a woman is not easy. Only those with the wildest adventurous streak can make it. But, when you will look back,...
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Re: The Safest Cities in the World
Interesting...looking at the methodology, it might better have been titled 20 Safest Cities to Live In, since most of the factors considered impact residents far more than they do tourists/travelers—and no emphasis was given to the sorts of crimes that travelers are most likely to encounter. And the hospital figures/digital security teams also seem off on the "visit" scale!
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
I certainly can't see any harm in it. I've been told that airline staff have a "back" way into a locked cockpit to be used only in an emergency(a contingency). Not sure why that wasn't used this time -- perhaps it never dawned on the flight crew what was actually happening until it was too late.
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
The back door is the second, emergency, code. It was used, but it can be overridden for 5 minutes from within.
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
Originally Posted by PHeymont: The back door is the second, emergency, code. It was used, but it can be overridden for 5 minutes from within. Looks like that 5 minute policy will need to be revisited.
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
It's very difficult to see exactly what to do, and I doubt that every contingency can be provided. The 5-minute lock is intended to deal with the situation of a crewmember, knife at throat, giving up the second code. If a second staff member were in the cockpit...that's about the only way to deal with a maniac like the Germanwings co-pilot. No guarantee...but a much better shot.
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
There was mention in the news coverage that planes can be controlled from the ground. It seems to me that the 2 person rule, combined with planes equipped so that settings from the cockpit can be overridden from the ground, would go a long way in the right direction.
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
I do think the security doors have been good because its prevented hijackings. I just don't see any answer though to a pilot or copilot wanting to crash the plane . It's a horrible tragedy but flying on a commercial airplanes is so safe compared to other forms of transportation. For some reason ,we don't worry about taking buses or vans or driving our own cars even though the risk is far greater.
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
I actually thought a bit about this today, and I'm going to go at this from a different approach. While we seem to think that a locked cockpit door makes flying safer, we have no evidence of that. There have been no (published) attempts of terrorists wanting to hijack a cockpit since 9-11. A shoe and underwear bomber, yes, but that didn't directly involve taking control of the plane. I would agree that it SEEMS to be a deterrent, but so is all the rest of the TSA song and dance. We have now...
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
I think I have to differ sharply with you on aspects of this issue. When you say that "whoever established that 5 minute rule is somewhat complicit in this," I think you are pointing the finger in the wrong direction. That system was the product of careful thought and consensus. You are right: there are no published reports hijacking a cockpit (and yes, there ARE a number of reports of attempts). That is because the cockpit security rules have succeeded in their aim. Where the finger of...
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
I don't know if there were two people or not in the cockpit the time the Egypt Air Pilot allegedly crashed that plane ,but I can't imagine it would stop a pilot bent on doing that. And we don't require two bus drivers with controls when going on mountainous journeys. I looked at a list of hijackings and attempts and after 2001 the attempts haven't been successful I think in part because of the doors and the fact that crew and passengers don't remain passive anymore. ...
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
Good points, Rob...although I think a second pilot, not a flight attendant, could have grabbed the controls and/or during those 8-10 minutes have opened the door and gotten help. Remember also that the original purpose of multiples in the cockpit was to deal with strokes, heart attacks, etc. Far more likely a passenger could stop the bus than fly the plane.
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
You do raise some good points with medical conditions, but those occur while driving too .I do it think it would be almost impossible to get to the bus driver in time if he drove off a cliff or bridge and also some bus drivers are driving children. We seem to accept those small risks in other forms of transportation and life.
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
I think we can all accept accidents happening. We do not accept a murderer using public transportation to kill large numbers of people. Planes are high profile because of the tremendous data we can retrieve when it crashes, which usually allows us to understand what happened to make it crash. Also because of the large number of passengers involved and lastly the tremendous cost of the planes. And yes, flying is still the safest way to travel. Going through Rob's link, there are hijack...
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
The reason the danger appears to be on the inside of the cockpit is that there are effective mechanisms for keeping intruders out. Remove those, and you remove that. Now, as I pointed out above, comes the need to reduce the risk from within by both requiring more than one person in the cockpit, and by more effective mental and physical screening of pilots. We have enough passenger screening...now we need the rest.
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
I saw a good article that points out just how safe flying really is. He was talking about 2013 but 2014 was even safer. As far as murderous pilots ,I'm sure statistically that's extremely low too. It's a horrible tragedy and we openly see it on the news ,but safety is one thing we have to give the airline industry some credit. The outsourcing of maintenance is what would be my biggest concern on the industry A couple of quotes. "Around 3 billion people boarded some 35 million flights, each...
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
I saw a Delta ad for the first time this morning, not apparently a new slogan, but given new meaning by recent event..."Keep climbing".
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Re: New safety rules after crash: No solo pilots
Lufthansa has been in dispute with its pilots for over a year. "Lufthansa’s industrial relations problems hit services for a tenth time in 2014 with pilots again taking action" Perhaps the last straw for the angry young man.