JC5280

Safety... period. This was very unsafe for him to do. He put himself at risk here. The cement is very unforgiving, and he likely had dress shoes on. I doubt anyone could find a published rule that said "no crawling out of aircraft doors without a jetbridge", but there also isnt a rule that says dont beat your head against a brick wall. Because it is not in the rule books, does not mean it was safe, or okay to do.

ClueByFour

Great. Assuming the break was set and the engines were run down, please post the FAR that was violated. I'm waiting with bated breath.

Fly

Off the top of my head.....the 2 man in the cockpit rule! Unless that flight attendant left the doors and went up to the cockpit, the FAR was violated. From the OP I highly doubt he went up into the cockpit. They are so picky about this that even when one of the pilots needs to use the lav, the f/a needs to be in the cockpit before he can step out the door.

SFOChump

It is my belief that this rules only applies when in flight, not when the plane is parked at the gate with engines shut down. When deplaning, at least one person has usually left the cockpit and is thanking passengers as they depart.

VPescado

I believe that only applies to flight - when the engines are stopped (e.g. before pushback) you will often see one of the flight deck crew leave the deck (or even the plane) leaving just one crew member in the cockpit.

What I don't understand is how the plane got to the gate. A ramp worker must have been present to guide the plane in. Can't they also operate the jetway?

Fly

My understanding is that a plane is considered 'in flight' from push back until it is at the gate. The flight attendants are not allowed to disarm the doors until they see the jetway moving towards the aircraft because they are considered still 'in flight' until that time. I would guess the same applies to the pilots. I guess it depends upon how the FAA determines when they consider the plane 'at the gate'. Now United isn't one to look kindly to them breaking their rules either, so they won't have much room to wiggle out of this one. Splitting hairs here but regardless, those 2 pilots are in a heap of trouble.

I'm very happy to see that the OP covered the flight attendant well and he won't be getting in trouble. He did exactly what United wanted him to do.

JS

"Fly" must be a flight attendant, because he/she is regurgitating the same drivel that comes from flight attendants.

We may as well replace flight attendants with 'Hal' from UA res, since they both use the same amount of logic -- zero.

Fly

Thanks for making me feel so welcome. Sorry that you don't appreciate what I posted. Makes no difference what you, I or anyone on this board thinks anyway.

Curious though, what part of what I posted showed "zero logic"? Do you think jumping out of a plane is logical? Wouldn't calling the gate agent from inside the cockpit make more sense? You're amazing.

ajax

LMAO

Bear96

Even assuming for the moment that no actual FARs were violated, certainly UA safety procedures were.

Here's one: the door was unarmed* when it was not at the gate. Big no-no. The door is supposed to be armed* until the jetway is pulled up to the plane. That way in case there needs to be an evacuation, the slide will deploy automatically when the door is opened. In this case, that door was effectively useless in an evacuation (F/As are trained to not let passengers evacuate through a door where the slide did not deploy).

God forbid if a F/A does not follow correct "procedure" with taking meal orders. We must have a new multi-page thread started every other day on that topic. (Or how about if a GA does not follow proper procedure processing upgrades! Get their names and file numbers! Write Glen Tilton! Off with their heads! Call out the National Guard!) But, hey, an improperly unarmed door leading to a problem should there need to be an evacuation, and crew leaping from a plane onto an active part of the tarmac where ground crew is going about their business not suspecting someone to drop out on them, etc., is no big deal.



* I know the OP said the door was armed when it was opened, but I think it is clear by this point that it most likely was not, because the slide did not deploy.

Skiff

Fair enough, but in this case there must have been two fools: the Captain and the F/O. That concerns me. It's not that this particular case is so bad, but bad decision making by both members of the flight deck crew concerns me greatly. It's incidents like these, where both crew members agree on bad decisions, that lead to accidents.

ClueByFour

How does that play at SJC? You know, where there are no jetways?

cur

IIRC, you can deploy the slide with the door open, by removing a velcro-overlay, and pulling 2-3 pins.

Bear96

Insert "or airstairs" after "jetway," if you really couldn't figure that out for yourself.

Bear96

Maybe I am missing something, but I am not sure what that has to do with UA's safety procedure (which appears to be people's hang-up here) which very clearly states the door shall not be disarmed until the jetway (or airstairs) is being put into place.

In any case, you are not correct (if I am understanding what you are saying). Slides are actually attached to the door itself, so once the door has swung open, the slide goes with the door and cannot be deployed in any useful way I can think of. Maybe it can be "deployed" in the sense that it can somehow inflate and be uselessly hanging off the door away from the plane, but that is not much help to people on board trying to use it since it is not attached to the actual body of the plane anymore.

"Arming" actually refers to physically attaching the slide to the body of the plan so the actual separation of the door from the body of the plane when the door is opened triggers the slide deployment. This is especially evident on the 737, where arming the door involves actually taking a piece of the end of the slide which is sticking out from the bottom of the slide compartment attached to the door, and physically attaching the slide to the floor of the aircraft. An "unarmed" door means the slide is competely folded up inside the compartment attached to the door with no part of the slide attached to the body of the plane so opening the door does nothing to the slide.