With the number of people who fly every day, some people do (tragically) pass away in the skies. However, one death yesterday was particularly noteworthy, as it was the captain of a flight.
Continue reading: Turkish Airlines Flight Diverts After Captain Passes Away
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
How many hours would it have been to London from the spot where they turned towards New York? Assuming that's also a big station for them and would leave them quite a bit closer to Istanbul.
@ DL -- The challenge there would've been that I imagine a lot of passengers on the flight wouldn't have been eligible to enter the UK, so that could've complicated logistics.
A physician colleague of mine who had to respond to a death on a domestic flight was told that a person cannot be declared dead on a flight and that emergency resuscitation must be rendered until landed.
Anyone in the aviation industry who can clarify? Perhaps rules are different for international flights and carriers, and different decisions can be made.
I just Googled this so am not an expert, but per the IATA:
"The person is presumed dead: if CPR has been continued for 30 minutes or longer with no signs of life within this period, and no shocks advised by an on board Automated External Defibrillator (AED), the person may be
PRESUMED DEAD, and resuscitation ceased."
"Passes away"? Ugh. The man died. There's no need to be squeamish about saying it, we all finish up there eventually.
I for one am good for non-baity titles that instead evokes emotions that correspond to the nature of the article.
R.i.p.
on an unrelated flight a pax in Y was just left on seat with a blanket covering when he died from a heart attack
Wow I've been on this flight several times. So sad to hear.
I wonder do they retire the flight number in these cases?
I believe UK has transit status area (as opposed to the US) so this wouldn’t be an issue. Please confirm
I live in NYC which is in the USA. Mayor Adams is presumed innocent unless he is proven guilty.
All I now know is that I will think twice before accepting any upgrades while travelling.
Based on the communications in the posted video, I think the remaining pilots handled the situation very well. They remained calm and did what they thought was best for everyone involved, without panicking. I guess it must have been a very stressful situation on board there when the events occurred.
Furthermore, I think this once again underlines that jets fully loaded with hundreds of people and just one pilot on board are a very, very bad idea. We're already taking risks with flying on Boeings, no need to play Russian roulette in addition by scrapping safety though redundancy on the flight deck.
They started in the US, so (in theory) everyone on board had US clearance. That basically leaves either the US or Turkey as the preferred landing spots in case of a serious deviation from routines. And since the pilot would be equally dead whether they landed in Quebec City, London, Istanbul or New York, I think New York makes most sense in this case.
You can be pretty sure that there was a doctor on board, most likely several. You can be very sure that they did all they could, up to the point where they just had to let go. And in the unlikely situation of not having a doctor on board, at least a few members of the crew should have been trained to try CPR at least.
Three things here:
Americans have an obsession with 'international flights and airlines', thinking everything is different and they enter some surrealistic Wonderland if they're on it. It's not. The only thing that's consistently different is the quality of your flight, and that's not to the advantage of American carriers. Otherwise, a seat on a plane is a seat on a plane, a pilot is a pilot and cabin crew is cabin crew.
There are some universal rules and practices which are sort of universally accepted: IATA has them on print here: https://www.iata.org/contentassets/ccbdc54681c24574bebf2db2b18197a5/death-on-board-guidelines.pdf . I think you should distinguish here between being presumed dead and being declared dead. Every doctor can tell you that it's no use anymore trying to do any life saving exercises after about half an hour if the patients shows no signs of life and doesn't respond to the aid being given. That rule doesn't change for international people and it's no different in decimal hours compared to imperial ones. However, according to the general standards, only a physician can officially declare someone dead. This person is then responsible for some paperwork, like declaring someone deceased, the time of death, filing a death certificate, etc. So then we're back to the question whether or not a doctor was on board this flight and if this doctor was in a (legal) position to declare someone dead and issue said death certificate. I guess that's most likely what this is about: some doctor on the ground, in function and close to his station, can actually do that job much easier. Hence I'd expect that, in most cases, someone is 'presumed dead' until after landing.
There initially were three qualified pilots onboard; once the "captain" passed away there were still two pilots, a "commander" and a "first officer." As Ben mentioned, they likely did not want to fly all the way to Turkey with only two pilots - the third was to allow for necessary crew rest on such a long flight. There was no safety risk to the passengers.
I am a physician who has responded to medical emergencies, including for a pilot.
It seems the difference here is the time according to the helpful post above. 30 minutes of resuscitation is enough to divert a domestic flight, so in my colleague’s case, had to be continued until landing. 30 minutes would not be an option for all international flights.
Weird you made it into an “obsession” thing.
Politicians proven guilty?
It's a rigged system with settlements and plea bargain.
And the secret weapon, presidential pardon.
Even Nixon got away.
You should never be a politician.
You think twice before accept upgrades. Good politicians already though twice of how to get away with murder.
An unfortunate and disturbing incident. Any idea of how the passengers reacted and the arrangments done for them as this can disrupt the travel plans considerably for many on board.
Emergencies really should be an exception to fight duty hour rules. I would imagine everyone would prefer to flight just continue to Istanbul
-There were still two pilots. I don't see how flying a new route and landing at an airport that is unfamiliar to the remaining crew would be any safer than working the known route for an extra few hours.
-This now causes a conundrum on repatriating the body to Istanbul for the family and the airline. instead the passed captain took have been taken directly to Turkey
-All the passengers would be grateful as well.