Re: Aeroplane horror
This accident has been difficult for so many Southwest employees. After flying over 155,000,000 passengers, this was the first accident-related death in the airline's history. In comparison, people have about a 1 in 13 thousand chance of death in an automobile accident.
With Southwest Airlines captains in my immediate family, and naval aviators too, the one emergency that they practice more than any other is the loss of an engine, several of them have had actual engine shutdowns (for various reasons) and have landed the planes without incident.
One of the reasons that the captain was so calm was that she, and every pilot and co-pilot could literally an engine failure landing in their sleep. All the pilots have checklists in the cockpit and when things go south, they go to work, step by step, without much time to get emotional or overthink the situation.
All that said, the pilots and crew did an outstanding job of preventing a catastrophic event for the entire plane.
It's like the family pilots say, they are overpaid ninety-nine percent of the time and underpaid one percent of the time.
Good thoughts to the family. She was a hot air balloon enthusiast and several people took to their balloons over Albuquerque tonight out of respect.