Egress Training www.dunkyou.com

EGRESSING AFTER A DITCHING

Most of us complete our piloting career without any ditching concerns. Others are not so lucky and unfortunately learn ditching procedures the hard way. Without any prior training or real-life lessons in ditching, it’s very difficult to understand why being inverted and underwater often leads to a traumatic experience. The physiological responses to impact followed by an immediate immersion in water, with a temperature many degrees colder than your nice warm cockpit is often totally overwhelming and lethal. Every year a number of pilots and their passengers find themselves totally unprepared and franticly searching for a door handle which was easily located only moments earlier.

Those who think swimming ability and diving experience will be sufficient to get them out of an aircraft after ditching will be amazed at how poorly they perform during the first few sessions in an egress simulator.

Here’s a quick list of things you may wish to think about when considering the possibility of ditching your aircraft.

PREPARATION

Presuming you have enough warning prepare the cabin for impact with the water by:

• Tightening your seatbelts/harness
• Unlatching the cabin doors.
• Having passengers assume the brace position.

ORIENTATION

Once the airplane comes to a stop, it may be upside down. To orient yourself, stay seated and locate your exit. Then release your seatbelt or harness.

PANIC

On average, it takes only 15 seconds for total panic to set in after a ditching once your face goes underwater in the event an exit is not immediately located.

JAMMED EXITS

If a door becomes jammed after water impact and the aircraft is completely flooded, try opening any hinged window available, last resort kick out plexiglas.

HOW MUCH TIME?

The time available before the aircraft sinks depends on the design and the damage incurred. Don’t think near-empty fuel tanks will assist your time on the surface.

FLOAT-EQUIPPED AIRCRAFT

Floatplane’s often do not sink after becoming inverted, which would allow it’s occupants to use the float bottoms for support. But don’t count on this, get into your PFD or into a life raft as soon as possible (or both). If still floating keels up, don’t even think about going back for your headset.

PILOTS’S PFD

If the pilot isn’t wearing the PFD when ditching becomes imminent, he or she must remain in control of the aircraft until it comes to a stop. Stuff the PFD in your shirt or jacket to help ensure availability afterwards.   

SURIVAL EQUIPMENT

*Avoid PFDs designed for recreational boaters. Instead carry inflatable PFD designed and approved for aviation since other types may prevent egress due to buoyancy. Don’t inflate PFD until you’re clear of the aircraft.

*Any liferaft you carry should be certified and rated for more occupants than the aircraft can accommodate. It should be the first item to leave the aircraft and tethered to any occupant.

*Consider adding and EPIRB or at least a portable ELT to your equipment even if only incidental over water flying is planned.

*These are just a few suggestions to help aid you in a successful egress if required. For complete training it is suggested you contact AES and attend our S.A.F.E. training program.

Aviation Egress Systems home base is in Victoria, BC as well we travel the country teaching Egress training to both pilots and passengers. Bryan Webster has more than 11,000 hours and is currently flies a de Havilland Beaver on the West Coat of BC.

To learn more about his egress training, visit his web-site www.dunkyou.com or contact him at 250-704-6401.

The Life you save could be your own.

If the pilot is unable to get out of an upset aircraft with ease,who is helping the passengers?

Ditching an aircraft is never high on any pilot’s agenda anywhere any time of the year.

For a large majority of Canadian flyers today our floats are already in the hangar, or neatly spaced in a row on shore beside our buddies while winter sets in.

For those of us who fly in Atlantic Canada’s water environment you are already well aware of what I speak of when cold water is mentioned, even in the summer months.

Winter water temperatures and what to think about before departing the pond should be of great interest for the remaining aviators such as pilots like myself who fly off chilly waters throughout the winter. As an example of just how many floatplanes are operational in the winter months on the BC coast alone, spend a day at Vancouver Harbor or Victoria’s busy sea port.

The same body of water we swam in and enjoyed last summer has become a lethal force to be reckoned with now, and should a person be thrust into it and unprepared for the event at to days temperature it will take your breath away literally.

The term cold shock refers to our bodies’ comfortable 98.6 degrees ferinhieght being subjected to a major change of 50 degrees or more instantly, and this is where problems such as panic and hypothermia begin.

When an aircraft hits the water surface and flips on its back often the cabin floods instantly bringing on the scenario of cold shock to life. The onset of cold water causes us to gasp just before we should be taking a large breath of air to fill our lungs with precious oxygen and keep us controlled until the egress is complete.

Being upside down with insufficient air coupled with confinement our minds automatically go into survival mode pumping adrenalin and increasing heart rates which ultimately speed up the burning desire for air. 

Our animal instincts are in full speed ahead at this point and thus we are extremely powerful, problem being we are also overwhelmed by cold and disorientation.

Just to give you an idea of how quickly Egress challenges develop in this situation imagine you’re self stuck in a room full of rattlesnakes with the only door on the far wall, and then turn the lights out.

Egress training will teach you to take the all important breath prior to water entry and how to handle a very foreign experience, plus make positive decisions to get yourself and passengers to safety.

Winter flying itself on floats or even skies is no more perilous than any other time year, we just need to think differently given the conditions.

Dressing appropriately and carrying the proper safety equipment onboard for every flight and time of year is paramount and should be all pilot’s ultimate concern.

Bryan Webster is a 10.000 hour plus pilot actively flying a Beaver on the BC coast today.

In 1977 he was a passenger involved in a water crash while the pilot attempted to avoid power lines draped over the Fraser River east of Vancouver.

Do you fly over water? Have you ever wondered what would happen if you had to ditch? Do you believe that your survival chances when ditching a light aircraft are minimal?
Improving your odds of survival in a water based aircraft incident begins with AES.
The S.A.F.E. course will give you and your flight crew the tools and confidence to have a far better chance of surviving a water impact crash. Reports from aviation publications state that 90% of people that end up in the water while flying, drowned needlessly. This indicates that they survived the impact but succumbed to drowning when they did not exit the aircraft.

S.A.F.E. is short for:
Submerged
Aircraft
Fuselage
Egress