VOA新闻杂志2024--Disaster in the Air Narrowly Avoided

Disaster in the Air Narrowly Avoided

Passengers are describing what happened when part of a passenger jet came off at the start of a flight from Portland, Oregon last Friday.

The incident resulted in no serious injuries, and the plane returned to Portland Airport soon after the dangerous incident. But had a few details been different, the flight could have ended in disaster.

Kelly Bartlett was one of the passengers on Alaska Airlines flight 1282 from Portland. She told The Associated Press (AP) that, at first, passengers did not know what was happening. "We didn't know if it meant we were going to crash," she said.

The incident happened six minutes into the flight from Portland to Southern California's Ontario International Airport. The jet, a Boeing 737 MAX 9, was traveling at about 640 kilometers an hour. It had reached an altitude of 4.8 kilometers. That detail is important. The plane was still far below its cruising altitude.

Flight attendants had just told the 171 passengers that they could again use their electronic devices. Then, a piece of the airplane body 61 centimeters by 122 centimeters behind the left wing blew out.

The piece called a door plug, was meant to be a cover over an emergency exit that was not used on that MAX 9 version of the airplane. The cover permits extra seats to be put where an emergency exit would be. Air safety rules require airliners² to have enough exits to permit all passengers and crew to get out of the aircraft in 90 seconds.

The AP noted³, as fate would have it, nobody was sitting in the two seats next to the blown-out hole.

Emergency oxygen masks dropped immediately. At the same time, wind rushed into the cabin making it difficult for the flight attendants to walk or hear. But they moved toward the hole and began moving passengers away from the dangerous area. The sound made communication difficult.

The force from the loss of pressure in the cabin was strong enough to tear the shirt off the body of a teenager sitting nearby.

His seatbelt "kept him in his seat and saved his life," Bartlett said. Flight attendants moved the young person next to Bartlett. She asked him if he was hurt. He said he was OK and thanked her for her kindness.

The pilots and the flight attendants have not made public statements and their names have not been released. However, they spoke⁴ to National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigators⁵. They said they followed their training. The pilots' goal was to get the plane back to Portland quickly. The flight attendants worked to keep the passengers safe and calm.

NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy said the actions of the flight crew were "incredible." Bartlett also praised the crew. She said she felt like the situation was under control.

The pilots used an emergency handbook next to the captain's seat. The co-pilot contacted air traffic controllers declaring an emergency and the need to descend⁶ to 3,000 meters. The lower altitude would give passengers more oxygen to breathe.

Homendy said the attention of the flight attendants immediately turned to five children who were traveling without adult supervision⁷ and two babies being carried by their parents.

Evan Granger was sitting close to the hole in the plane. He told NBC News, "There were so many things that had to go right in order for all of us to survive."

Homendy said that if the blowout had happened just a few minutes later when the plane would have reached its cruising height, the incident might have been a tragedy.

NTSB agents recovered the door plug that blew out, finding it completely intact. Many other things that flew out of the airplane were also recovered including a cellphone that was still working.

Now the agency will investigate why the cover over the unused exit hole came off.

The incident happened days after a Japan Airlines Airbus 350 struck a coast guard plane on a runway at Tokyo's Haneda Airport and caught fire on January 3.

In that incident, four on the coast guard plane died. But 379 passengers and the crew of the airliner¹ safely got out of the passenger plane before it burned up. However, reports say getting everyone out of the plane took about 18 minutes.

Words in This Story

altitude -n. the height of something above sea level

exit -n. a doorway⁸ out of a building or vehicle

as fate would have it -idiom meant to express that something happened that is beyond human explanation

oxygen mask -(industry) an emergency device on large airplanes that deploys⁹ if air pressure inside gets too low

cabin -n. (in aviation) the inside of an airplane

seatbelt -n. a thin piece of material that is meant to protect against injury in a crash

intact -adj. whole and in one piece, not broken or damaged

1 airliner   

n.客机，班机

参考例句：

• The pilot landed the airliner safely.驾驶员使客机安全着陆。
• The passengers were shepherded across the tarmac to the airliner.旅客们被引导走过跑道去上飞机。

2 airliners   

n.客机，班机( airliner的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The fog grounded the airliners. 大雾迫使班机停飞。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• They placed very stable and accurate atomic clocks on regularly scheduled jet airliners. 他们将非常稳定、准确的原子钟装在定期飞行的喷气式班机上。 来自辞典例句

3 noted   

adj.著名的，知名的

参考例句：

• The local hotel is noted for its good table.当地的那家酒店以餐食精美而著称。
• Jim is noted for arriving late for work.吉姆上班迟到出了名。

4 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

5 investigators   

n.调查者，审查者( investigator的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• This memo could be the smoking gun that investigators have been looking for. 这份备忘录可能是调查人员一直在寻找的证据。
• The team consisted of six investigators and two secretaries. 这个团队由六个调查人员和两个秘书组成。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 descend   

vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降

参考例句：

• I hope the grace of God would descend on me.我期望上帝的恩惠。
• We're not going to descend to such methods.我们不会沦落到使用这种手段。

7 supervision   

n.监督，管理

参考例句：

• The work was done under my supervision.这项工作是在我的监督之下完成的。
• The old man's will was executed under the personal supervision of the lawyer.老人的遗嘱是在律师的亲自监督下执行的。

8 doorway   

n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径

参考例句：

• They huddled in the shop doorway to shelter from the rain.他们挤在商店门口躲雨。
• Mary suddenly appeared in the doorway.玛丽突然出现在门口。

9 deploys   

（尤指军事行动）使展开( deploy的第三人称单数 )； 施展； 部署； 有效地利用

参考例句：

• It then deploys "decoy" programs designed to attract the virus. 然后，它释放“诱饵”去吸引病毒。
• But when that doesn't work, he deploys his secret defense mechanism. 但没有效果，它要施展绝密自卫武器了。