, i guess it beats clipping one's toe nails...

Hence, the Apollo 1 tragedy.

Um, people, you realize that planes flew for decades with ashtrays in the lavs for goodness sakes, and planes weren't blowing up in the skies throughout the 50s, 60s, 70s and early 80s. With all due respect, the continued desire of our society to maintain the irrational "state of fear" is really absurd.

Lighters have been permitted on board for some time now.

Agreed. And while decompressions are rare, they do happen. Masks drop on a passenger aircraft somewhere in the world several times each year, and there is a fairly decent chance of there being pax in the lavatory at the time. It's madness.

There again, it's long been the case that you are 'safer' in many respects on certain foreign carriers as opposed to being on a US carrier, due mainly to the shortsightedness of the respective US regulatory bodies. For instance, on a European carrier's longhaul flights, the crew members will have been trained by the airline to a far greater level of aviation medical training than in the US, not too mention the equipment carried is superior and can also be accessed by the crew (doctors box etc).

Likewise for infant restraint belts - carried for years by European carriers, but the advice in an emergency from US carriers - put your baby on the floor, hold on, and hope they survive if you have to make an emergency landing.

But we digress. Thanks to the OP for the link even if article is not DL specific.

Obviously as crew members, we have known about this for some time....I'm somewhat surprised it took this long to reach the light of day.

The majority of decrompression events resulting in mask deployment are gradual events where sudden loss of consciousness is unlikely and PAX will have time to get to a seat and grab a mask. Explosive Decompression where sudden LOC might happen is very rare, but in those events, the Flight Attendants have walkaround O2 bottles and we've been briefing them to clear the lavs in a loss of pressurization event on modded aircraft. I wouldn't lose any sleep over this.


Would you care to delineate the 'superior' equipment that I've been missing all these years so I can know my deficiencies?

The pressure differential would probably lean towards making the door open, not keep it closed, unless the pressure loss was in the bathroom (leading to other potential jokes...).

That's a joke, right? The lav is not a pressure vessel and the door is pretty porous.

Anyway, without an oxygen mask you're likely to lose consciousness but given that brain damage, of the permanent-death kind, occurs at 4-6 min (depends on a lot of factors) without oxygen, and that the pilots are rapidly descending, it's unlikely that a person in a lav, without a mask, that is unaided by a FA, following an explosive decompression at 38,000', would perish in such an event.

ex., this flight (http://www.monstersandcritics.com/ne...omestic-flight) went from 36,000' to under 10,000' in less than 3 minutes. You'd have been OK unless on your way down you hit your head on the basin.

Is it more likely that a bad person would use the oxygen generator to blow a hole in the plane than someone dying from an explosive decompression? Difficult to say, but given that both probabilities are so infinitesimally small, we're really discussing pin heads and angels here.

This is not going to be a problem. The lav is not air-tight so the pressures on both sides will be the same. I thought that the oxgygen masks are locked behind a panel until they are deployed. The oxygen comes from a series of reactions with some nasty chemicals, some of which are explosive:
"The oxidizer core is sodium chlorate (NaClO3), which is mixed with less than 5 percent barium peroxide (BaO2) and less than 1 percent potassium perchlorate (KClO4). The explosives in the percussion cap are a lead styphnate and tetrazene mixture. The chemical reaction is exothermic and the exterior temperature of the canister will reach 260 �C (500 �F). It will produce oxygen for 15 to 20 minutes." Access to this collection in a lav is potentially serious.

Glad Coke works for you but that is one of the worst "hydration" liquids available.

[QUOTE=Down3Green;16010326]Obviously as crew members, we have known about this for some time....I'm somewhat surprised it took this long to reach the light of day. QUOTE]

Not all things are made public, even though they may not be secrets. Initially came out as a flight crew notification on February 10, 2011, that the oxygen generators may have been rendered inoperative and to check the lavs in case of a rapid decompression.

Now official, issued March 8, 2011, Airworthiness Directive 2011-04-09, that mandates that the lav oxygen generators were to be discharged or removed completely.

The do create a great deal of heat when activated, my guess is that someone figured out the the bad guys could do something quite nasty with them.

About the third time that mechanicals have been found, from a security aspect, and not disclosed to the general public. These are not safety issues, but security issues.

FM

In most plane lavs I've used don't the doors fold in? A higher pressure inside would push the doors closed? I know the lav isn't airtight at all, but I'd assume it would at the very least make it slightly harder to open the door, esp if the ride becomes unstable, atleast untill the presure difference was reduced. I'm mainly thinking in case there is a child in there. I may be over thinking this though

Rather than take this thread too far off topic, I sent you a PM.

I did not intimate that the crewmembers for US or Canadian carriers were deficient - but rather that in some regards, the tools and training provided to them are (compared to say JAA-ops carriers).

Actually Varig 820 went down exactly because of smoking/disposing of cigarettes in the lav...

Just for all the "what's the threat" crowd.

Its not the produced oxygen.

These things use chemical oxygen generators. I suspect anybody with a knowledge of simple chemistry, some tools, and perhaps some extra fuel could make quite an effective explosive device out of this.

As to 'why just lavs", it would be a tad obvious if somebody started dismantling the oxygen system above his seat.

One might ask why Value Jet no longer exists.