British Airways condemned for reducing safety in 747 s Emergency exits blocked for extra seats in jumbos

Press, 30 May 1985, Page 13

British Airways condemned for reducing safety in 747 s Emergency exits blocked for extra seats in jumbos

By

TONY GERAGHTY,

for the London “Observer”

British Airways has sealed off two emergency exits in its 28 Boeing 747 jumbos in order to carry 12 more fare-paying passengers. The modification will bring in several million dollars a year in extra fares for 8.A., already one of the world’s most profitable airlines ($575 million profit last year). The alterations, which were completed earlier this month in Hong Kong, have been condemned in the United States by the National Transportation Safety Board. In a letter to the Federal Aviation Authority, the board says, "Any reduction in the number of exits could adversely affect the present level of safety of Boeing 747 passengers." In Britain, the Guild of Air Pilots has asked the Civil Aviation Authority to conduct tests to prove that, without the two sealed-off doors, passengers could still escape within the specified emergency time limit. The doors are over the wing and offer a unique chance of survival if an aircraft ditches into w’ater. British Airways is the only scheduled operator in Europe to have taken up the option offered by Boeing, the manufacturers, of re-

moving emergency exits on its 7475.

Some, like KLM Royal Dutch, and British Caledonian, have not decided whether to make the change. Air France was prevented from doing so by the threat of a strike by cabin crew. Swissair declined because “if door three is available it increases the chances of emergency escape.” Pan-Am has decided against. The only other airline to have modified is Thai International, which is putting another 18 passengers on board. A British Airways spokesman confirmed that marketing considerations had dictated the change. “With the package holidays being offered, there is certainly a greater demand for economy class seats," he said. Even so. British Airways insists that the modification preserves a safety margin well inside internationally agreed limits. "There is no way we could incorporate a modification which does not meet the requirements of the manufacturer and the regulatory authorities." a BA spokesman said. "The rules are designed for the worst possible case.” However, the "Observer" has

established that there are legitimate causes for anxiety following the changes: & The original F.A.A. evacuation tests, now more than 10 years old, have been called into question by aviation experts in America in the light of modifications; @ The changes make it more difficult for economy class passengers to escape, although the safety standards for first class passengers will be maintained; © A number of recent emergencies involving jumbos have demonstrated that escape chutes frequently malfunction, underlining the need for the maximum number of exits. The jumbo’s safety margins date back to 1969, when the plane was first declared airworthy. The F.A.A. decreed that five doors on each side would be sufficient to evacuate 550 passengers within 90 seconds. The tests presumed that all five doors on one side of the aircraft would be rendered inoperative by a crash or fire. This implied one passenger escaping the wrecked plane every eight-tenths of a second. The tests have not been up-dated since 1973. Boeing, under F.A.A. supervision, hired "extras” to simulate passen-

gers in a series of three evacuation tests. They included babes-in-arms and over-sixties. The F.A.A. pronounced itself satisfied with the tests, while in Britain the C.A.A. accepted the American findings. In practice, no scheduled airline has flown so many passengers on a 747. With a mixture of first-class at the front, executive (business) class on an upper deck, and economy class between the wing section and the tail, passengers have more elbow room and numbers have been cut. Boeing (supported by the F.A.A. and C.A.A.) argues that 440 passengers and four doors result in the same number of escaping passengers per door — 110 — as 550 passengers and five doors. And British Airways will now be carrying a maximum of 364 passengers, of whom 26 would be on the upper deck with access to at least one exit of their own. Down below, on the main deck, there are 338 passengers leaving through four doors, or 84 per door in 90 seconds, a matter of one passenger every 1.06 seconds. This timing may seem tight, yet it is, in theory, an improvement of a quarter of a second's rescue time on

what is permitted by the existing F.A.A. and C.A.A. criteria.

In practice, passengers will not always conform to the F.A.A.'s formula. They do not allocate themselves evenly to all doors. They simply rush to the nearest emergency exit. The new’ seating configuration therefore has one potentially hazardous side-effect, since fewer doors are directly accessible for the increased number of economy class passengers. As one British Airways pilot says, “Business class passengers at the front end would probably get

out but people at the back might have a hell of a job because the nearest door serves 250 people. It is no benefit to someone in row 52 to know that the door 150 seats away in the first class cabin has no-one going through it because the first class passengers got out in 15 seconds.” Such fears are echoed by Mr Matthew’ Finucane, director of air safety for the United States Association of Flight Attendants, who points out that some economy class passengers must now cover 22 metres to reach the nearest door. “The F.A.A. asserts that the distance to exit does not affect the time taken to get to the exit. We find that incredible," Mr Finucane says. Equally disquieting are recent episodes in which the existing evacuation facilities have proved inadequate, even before the seal-ing-off of Door Three. In some cases, escape chutes have failed to deploy or have collapsed as passengers leapt into them. In those circumstances, the Guild of Air Pilots in Britain is asking for new evacuation tests, and the British Airline Pilots Association is demanding another look at the evidence of real emergencies.