Busting Myths About Risks To Aircraft In Flight

Movies depict all kinds of scary scenes, such as plane doors opening mid-air or cargo flying all around. But how real are the threats? Ashwini Phadnis checks out

- Ashwini Phadnis

Can an aircraft’s door open midflight, sucking out passengers and bags? If it’s a Hollywood movie, then, yes, it can. But not in real life. Does an aircraft have secret crawl places? Again, if it’s a Hollywood film, then, yes, it can. But not in real life.

Propagated largely by the extremely slick and tech-driven Hollywood movies, such myths have become a part of today’s flying experience.

Remember Air Force One where Harrison Ford moves around freely all over the aircraft, even finding a mobile phone in someone’s bag in the cargo hold? And Ford dangles mid-air after throwing out the villain till he is pulled to safety by a helicopter?

Talk to pilots and they laugh at most of these myths. They are unanimous that flying is the safest mode of transport. However, though extremely rare, accidents do happen because primarily there are three factors involved in the safe operations of an aircraft — human, technical and environmental. “Any of them on that day could be large enough to disturb, damage or crash the most modern or the strongest aircraft,” says a private sector airline pilot.

Here we look at some popular myths and tell you why they are not true.

Myth: If one engine fails, the plane will crash

Not so.