Miracle

If you've ever watched "Air Crash Investigations" on the National Geographic Channel, it's sometimes horrifying how the smallest of things would cause the most terrible of accidents. How the lives of the passengers and crew of an aircraft are in the hands of a bolt, a hinge, a window, grease, the computer, a bird striking the engine, rubber hoses. Small things. Some due to bad weather, while some, poor maintenance and pilot error. Even the best designs eventually have an Achilles heel. A flaw that time, fate or luck will eventually exploit and do harm.

Which is why the safe landing recently made by a Qantas flight to Manila because of an explosion, that led to a hole on the fuselage the size of a small car is nothing short of a miracle. An explosion caused a rapid decompression of the passenger cabin, forcing the aircraft to drop several thousand feet. Oxygen masks popped out from their locations in the ceilings. Suddenly all those lectures and demonstrations of flight crews on numerous flights taken suddenly mean something. And as the plane gainfully made its way to the nearest airport, which happened to be here in Manila, only then did everyone realize how close to disaster they really were. In fact, it was the only time that some of the passengers wept, dropped to their knees and even threw up, upon seeing the gaping hole on their airplane. The crew is to be commended for not showing any signs of panic, and acted professionally. Panic and fear are contagious. And inside a disabled plane, it's murder.

Qantas has one of the best safety records of any airline in the world. And the crew of this flight showed why. The pilots and flight engineer put their excellent training into high gear when the accident occurred. Decompression is always bad on an airplane, no matter what the cause. So they went by the book, and it got them down safely to terra firma.

Enter the investigators. And the focus is now on one of the oxygen bottles that supply the life-saving gas to the plane. Since it is obvious that an outward explosion occurred, one of the bottles may have actually exploded. It may take time before an official statement is made, based on the findings of the investigators. And whatever the cause is, hopefully, just like all the accidents that have happened, it will help prevent future situations and occurrences of the same problem, and still make flying the safest form of travel available. We may get to see this incident become an episode on the informative but disconcerting documentary shown on NGC.