Fantasy Airliner / Survivable System

Structural integrity and design issues? costs? complexity? reliability? Can it fit everyone? Ejection criteria, mechanism and weight? Performance as in ability to clear the aircraft under which circumstances?

I'm also assuming on the ground it's preferable to get squashed by a few rows of seats than an entire aircraft?

Just throwing some initial thoughts out there

 

Risk vs reward is the key.

Better to spend the resources to minimise the likelihood of an accident than try to recovery from one. Unlike military aircraft whose big risk is airborne FOD and cars whose accident modes are relatively limited - it would be very difficult to develop a system that could anticipate all eventualities and react appropriately.

 

Because that mode of failure in an airliner is very, very unlikely. The only airliner I can think of which suffered an in-flight breakup (at least in the US) was Alaska 261, around 15 years ago. And, I'm not sure that they would have used such a system, if they had it-- they thought they would be able to land safely up until only a minute or less before they crashed.

I suppose SwissAir could have used such a system back in the 90s, as well.

Still, very very unlikely-- 2 accidents over a period of 20 years where it might have been useful, compared with how many hundreds of thousands of flights in that time period? And this system would add weight and fuel cost to every flight.

 

There are pods - a company called "Life Armor" makes something like the Air Force One Escape Pod from Escape from New York.

As to whether they could be used on a plane, unsure. But perhaps they have chutes on them and when the plane has an issue, you get into the pod and it's released.

Sounds easy...but of course reality is it's not so simple, hence why it's not really been built or perfected...at least not from my pea-brain.

 

This.
And it has been tens of millions of flights in 20 years. We are now at more than 10 million per year! You will more likely win the lottery (by a wide margin) than endure an in flight catastrophic failure in a passenger plane.

 

Yes, the center tube should be "blasted" away by exploding bolts, retro rockets will fire, as though in one big ejection seat, and an armada of parachutes will deploy with a large flotation device for water landings or to soften an earth landing for the passengers." This system will be made obsolete by the transporter and brainiac system that will allow us to experience being there without physically going anywhere, all in the comfort of your home. Travel will become obsolete, and the carbon footprint of aviation will be forever eradicated, making the greenies, our overseers and lords truly satisfied. Yes, this was done in Brainstorm..one of my favorite cult classics Brainstorm (1983) - IMDb. But who doesn't like Walken, and it was Natale Woods last movie, and a very cool device. It will happen, I just don't if it will be in my lifetime.

 

scale it up and add multiple units

Cirrus annual convention
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Lolz!

 

The pyro required to separate capsules from an airliner would be a real headache and need to be changed at regular intervals, requiring depot level maintenance and ripping the entire aircraft apart. F-111s used a 30,000 lbst solid rocket motor for a 3000 lb capsule. Would require something much larger for an airliner. Large chute for the F-111, huge ones for airliners.

It would probably double the cost and close to that on weight to build an airliner with that kind of capability.

 

Don't you mean the movie Air Force One? I don't remember that in Escape from NY.

 

Escape From NY had an escape pod thingy as well. That's how the President ended up in New York and needed to be rescued.

 

Tom Swift would be very proud of this thread. He would now be engineering them into the Flying Lab with the nuclear jet lifters.

 

You can see it in this trailer if it will play-so hit trailer. Eerie to watch this, and to be reminded how mega the World Trade Centers really were and what was to come. The glider scene is cool as well.

Note: the pods are disaster pods someone is marketing and not the escape pod for Air Force One. The real one is I think from a B-58 Hustler.

Escape from New York (1981) - IMDb

Here is a video on the Convair B-58 HUSTLER Escape Module Development . (Again, I seem to have trouble with getting the video box to show. Sometimes it does, most times it does not).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=lGX0l_p6OqE
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Yup - one of my all time favorite movies!

"Get me to the pod!!!" (so says the English-born President played by Donald Pleasence - RIP!)