A First-Hand Account of a Real-Life Aircraft Emergency

John MacCalman is a member of the CompuServe Travel Forum. Another member asked what would happen to people's carry-on luggage should the aircraft need to be evacuated in an emergency. Here is John's answer.

This actually happened to me on an international flight from AMS to Glasgow a few years ago. We had a problem with the flaps on the BAe 146 so we had to do a high speed landing at GLA.

The main concern was the danger of fire from overheating brakes. When we came to a stop the firecrews were standing by at the aircraft and after consultation with the fire chief we were instructed to leave our carry on stuff behind and evacuate the aircraft. We didn't get to use the slides as this aircraft has its own steps attached to the door. We made our way to waiting buses while the firecrews hosed down the tires and were delivered to International arrivals. We were told our carry on items would be removed from the aircraft and we would be able to reclaim them at baggage claim.

The problem was that some passengers had their passports in their carry on bags. Baggage claim is beyond immigration. They eventually got it all sorted but I understand that there was a lot of behind the scenes discussion within the airport operations about liability for the carry on stuff! Honesty ruled. People just identified their bags and all was OK.

It was a good experience for me. Everyone followed safety procedures and nobody was injured though I heard later that the whole event cost the airline around $400,000 in damage to aircraft and the consequences of it going out of service.

08/09/2003