NASA 2011 budget and Ares-1

Fevric J. Glandules wrote:

Rick Jones wrote:

In sci.space.history Derek Lyons wrote:
"Fevric J. Glandules" wrote:
Derek Lyons wrote:

It's worth pointing out that the emergency oxygen masks have yet to
save anyone inflight - but has killed 110 people. So far.

That's a new one on me - how?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ValuJet_Flight_592

The oxygen system on that flight didn't kill anybody.
It was (illegal) hazardous materials in the hold.
Which happened to be chemical oxygen generators.

Are you asserting then that those times when the emergency oxygen
masks have deployed they were unnecessary?

More to the point, not of any particular use.
On aircraft with emergency oxygen systems like drop-down masks, the
procedure is to immediately descend to an altitude where the masks are not
required. The descent will take at most 3-4 minutes. Not enough of anoxia
to kill, except in the most extreme cases. The "dixie cup" masks in an
airliner's system are poor delivery systems. It's impossible to obtain a
good fit with them. (One size/shape fits nobody)
You can't point to an incident where the actual use of the system saved
lives.

There's a list he

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncontr..._and_incidents

Which on examination, is worthless to proving your point.
In all but one of the cases listed, (The exception being Helios Airways
Flight 522) the loss of life was associated with the structural damage
that caused the decompression, not the decompression itself.
drop-down masks would have made no difference.
In the case of Helios 552, the masks dropped, due to aircrew failure to
operate the aircraft systems properly, but that had no influence on the
eventual outcome - the still went Flying Dutchman and the airplane impacted
the mountain after fuel exhaustion flamed out both engines.
Autopsy results showed that the crew and passengers were breathing but
unconscious (by and large - there was some movement in the cabin) at the
time of impact. (Peak altitude was between 30,000 and 35,000'. If they'd
spent much time over 40,000', it would have been a planeload of corpses
that hit the mountain.)

--
Pete Stickney
Failure is not an option
It comes bundled with the system.

Fred J. McCall wrote:


But 4 minutes of anoxia is getting into brain damage country.

This explains a lot....when I was a kid, I used to put on my swim
goggles and stick my head underwater in the bathtub, seeing how long I
could hold my breath for... ;-)

Pat

Peter Stickney wrote:

The "dixie cup" masks in an
airliner's system are poor delivery systems. It's impossible to obtain a
good fit with them. (One size/shape fits nobody)

But you are still going to get more oxygen out of them than breathing
the cabin air as the mask will be injecting pure oxygen into your face
in the area where you inhale.
And there's still the cabin smoke argument to take into consideration;
although they've gotten better in this regard, many materials in
aircraft cabins used to release highly irritating or even toxic smoke
when burned, debilitating the passengers and causing them to panic when
they most needed to be thinking clearly to evacuate the aircraft after
it got on the ground.

Pat

Peter Stickney wrote:

Fevric J. Glandules wrote:

Are you asserting then that those times when the emergency oxygen
masks have deployed they were unnecessary?

More to the point, not of any particular use.
On aircraft with emergency oxygen systems like drop-down masks, the
procedure is to immediately descend to an altitude where the masks are not
required. The descent will take at most 3-4 minutes. Not enough of anoxia
to kill, except in the most extreme cases. The "dixie cup" masks in an

It's the extreme cases that are the point. Who's to say that the masks
have *not* saved the life of someone with a dodgy ticker?

There's a list he

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncontr..._and_incidents

Which on examination, is worthless to proving your point.

It was informational, that is all.