Sep 7, 2010

Flight Attendants Constantly Prepare For Crash

(AFALAX.org note: F/A Carl Alessi is the LEC Vice President for AFA-CWA UAL Council 9 in Denver)

[12.23.08] -- DENVER -- NBC9 News Colorado -- While passengers are getting settled into their seats and start turning the pages of the book that they plan to read during the flight, experts say flight attendants are mentally preparing for a disaster.

"They're preparing in their mind what they're going to do, how they're going to do it. There's a silent review process that takes place," said Association of Flight Attendants Denver Vice President Carl Alessi.

Alessi says Saturday's crash of Continental Flight 1404 is likely to make passengers, who may have otherwise been complacent, pay close attention to crew member instructions.

"After an accident, you'll see attention focused back on the flight attendant, as it should be," he said.

The Association of Flight Attendants is the largest flight attendant union in the world, with more than 50,000 members and 26 air carriers participating. Although Continental Airlines is not a part of the association - they're a part of the International Association of Machinists - Alessi says he paid close attention to the accident.

"They may have been in their jump seats. They may have been evacuating people from the aircraft, it's hard to tell," Alessi said. "That's their role onboard. And they helped save lives."

All 115 people onboard the plane survived.

Flight attendants, Alessi says, are required to have seven weeks of initial training and yearly tests and refresher courses. Individual airlines could require even more safety training. And that training runs the gamut.

"Everything from defibrillating a heart, to fighting a fire, to evacuating an aircraft," Alessi said. "Essentially, flight attendants evacuate aircraft in 90 seconds or less with 50 percent of the doors blocked."

Lead National Transportation Safety Board Investigator Bill English says firefighters opened the doors on the right side of the plane, which had caught fire, and it's not known exactly what role the flight attendants on Flight 1404 played in the evacuation of the plane.

Alessi said it's required for 737s, the type of plane that crashed, to be staffed with three flight attendants. His organization has been pushing the Federal Aviation Administration to increase that number to four flight attendants.

"You have four doors on an aircraft and you'd have four flight attendants," he said. Alessi says flight attendants are tested under rigorous circumstances, to prepare them for the worst. "They're tested with fire, jammed doors, smoke in the cabin. So they're completely being inoculated," he said.

All of that training, he believes, has helped flight attendants save lives. "They're the best in the world," he said.

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