i don’t normally make these topics but i couldn’t resist
We all expected this from Ryanair, but Southwest?! Pilot how u even do that 💀
A Southwest 737 flying from Oakland to Orange County reportedly had to reduce the floating of the aircraft due to the short runway at SNA. Do what you gotta do. Fine, I guess. But then this dude proceeds to just forget how to land a plane and brick the plane harder on the ground than Russell Westbrook bricks his shots.
Still, we have seen hard landings before… should be fine, right? No, the landing caused a fracture to a flight attendant’s T3 Vertebra and the paramedics had to evacuate her. Like if you are flying a 717 in IF I understand, but bro you’re flying a real 737 😭 she was evacuated while the pilot was probs staring out the window questioning their life choices…
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Therefore before you fly Southwest the next time I recommend you check out these products:
What an interesting situation… however, I wouldn’t blame it purely on the pilots, for a few reasons.
I think we all are aware that KSNA has a notoriously short runway that requires a precision touchdown in order to not overrun… there are a multitude of videos on the internet displaying hard landings into KSNA. It’s pretty normal. However blaming the pilots for the injury of a flight attendant isn’t really fair for one reason: if the landing were hard enough to physically injure a flight attendant, then the aircraft likely would have seen damage.
For example, watch this video of an ANA B763 making a hard landing into Narita. Yes, the landing was hard. However, no injuries were sustained during the incident, implying that the proper safety precautions were taken, and all flight crew were where they were supposed to be.
However, as seen in the WN2029 incident, the airframe did not take any damage, while the flight attendant did. It can be inferred from this that there was some sort of anomaly in the way the flight attendant was sitting, perhaps, that caused this injury.
I would also like to add that although humor is acceptable at times, a spine fracture is no joke. The article linked states that “…immediately upon touching down, the flight attendant in question felt pain in her back and neck and was unable to move, and she had to be evacuated by paramedics”. Certainly a terrifying incident for the attendant, and I think I speak on behalf of all of us when I say that we wish her a speedy recovery.
You definitely have a valid point, however, a landing should still be safe (and not break someones spine) because no one can control the hundreds of anomalies that occur inside the plane (including passengers etc).
Keep in mind, the 737 is an aircraft made for firm landings rather than smooth. It’s in most if not all 737 SOP’s to not aim for a smooth landing rather one that will bring the aircraft safely off the runway without overrunning. With that in mind, landings at SNA are not supposed be smooth, but you’d be surprised how much not wearing a seatbelt would do on a -250FPS landing. I do speculate it was the flight attendant not being prepared for landing.
I don’t draw any conclusion or have any intent to diminish the hardship suffered by the flight attendant. But beyond possible factors of excessively heavy forces during the landing, and speculating on how the flight attendant was positioned at the time, there’s the medical question.
What causes compression fractures? “Other causes” are given as force injury (collisions) and tumors on the spine. But the most common cause given is osteoporosis.
It’s entirely possible that several such factors as mentioned, but maybe also medical, could come together at the same time by chance, and the dramatic headline resulted from over simplifying before sufficient investigation revealed the interplay of all the relevant factors.
Dude, I wonder how in the world a hard landing would cause a spine fracture to a flight attendant and not just the flight attendant, but to anybody? It would never do that. That should be the feeling of the main gears touching the ground extremely hard especially when sitting on an airplane cabin seat.
Im speculating the flight attendant wasn’t ready or something not sure. Cause why was it only one person. If it was that hard why not others people experiencing the injury? And not really fair to compare Ryan air 1. It’s an old joke 2. SNA is short as heck. I flown in and out very frequently precovid and I never felt anything of a normal landing. It seems like the pilots slam and stop.
Same question I asked myself. The ANA case appeared to bounce back into the air off the main gear. Then the nose got forced down causing the nose gear to hit first on the second time contacting the runway.
The torsion failure of the airframe was the weak link rather than the nose gear??
Of course in the SW case there’s no info that anything but the main gear was involved.
