> > James, I don't disgaree with you here. The problem is that > some people seem > to have decided exactly why it is unsafe and what should be > done to fix this > without actually checking the facts. Still, why lets the > facts get in the > way of a good policy eh? > > Mike > Very true. I guess that is what I would be happiest with: If people would stop worrying about rules and start looking at effect (this is the dead=dead thing) and then also stop making policy without doing serious clinical research as to the cause of the problem. I have a hero worship thing for the people who investigate accidents for the NTSB and other agencies like that. Also CSI's. Finding out why something actually happened is SO important and is often very... Perhaps not suppressed exactly, but sort of swept off and ignored. Does anyone remember flight 800? The one that they suspected was shot down with a missile? The NTSB found that a long list of combined causes resulted in an effect previously thought impossible. The center fuel tank got so hot while the bird was sitting on over 100 degree (F) tarmac with the A/C running (the A/C unit is in the same area) that the resulting vapor DID in fact have the explosive potential to rip out the sections of the hull around the fuel blast vent. That caused the next sections to fail because of the stress of the climb and the entire thing sort of unzipped around that cross section of the fuselage and split the plane in half. The explosion was caused by a wire insulation failure which was also thought to be impossible. 1. jet fuel can't explode with enough force to damage the edges of the vent 2. the hull can't fail under climb stress 3. this insulation can't fail in a fuel tank environment 4. temperature in this nacelle can never exceed safe levels 5.. Etc... All that was NEVER reported as far as I know. The public just sort of forgot about it, but I was at a "mandatory" company party and the presidents daughters idiot husband was telling me that flight 800 was known to have been shot down by Islamic extremists and their home country (Iran he said) was paying 10 million to each family of the passengers so that we wouldn't invade them. He was combining the Lockerby Scotland flight with reparations paid by Libya with the flight 800 "missile" scare and with the current Islam bashing. He drives a huge Chevy truck to his desk job every day. Perfect paint, never used to haul anything as far as I can see. Gets about 10mpg probably. Makes him feel safe and compensates for his lack of height and ... Other things most likely. So, we can: A) really crack down on the boarder patrol and/or go kill us some rag heads, sue the heck out of the airline and Boeing, et. all because dead /= dead and we need to find someone to blame. B) avoid setting in an air-conditioned plane on a hot day for better than 4 hours (passengers WERE given the option to deplane and reschedule) because dead = dead and even if the airline is very safe, and no one is out to get me, accidents like this HAVE happened. C) redouble our efforts to make sure that more than sufficient venting is available in anything we design. Because dead = dead, we can learn from the past, and make it better. Without worry about whose fault it was. Michael Crichton "Airframe" is an excellent read on this sort of thing. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/asin/0345402871 --- James Newton, massmind.org Knowledge Archiver james@massmind.org 1-619-652-0593 fax:1-208-279-8767 All the engineering secrets worth knowing: http://techref.massmind.org What do YOU know? _______________________________________________ http://www.piclist.com View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist