rumors began going around in the plane that there might be a fire in the trash can. that somebody might have put a cigarette out in the trash. the captain sends his first officer to assess the situation. so i look back and you couldn t see the back of the airplane through sort of a blue, hazy smoke, and came back and he said, i don t like what s going on back there. i think we better go down. the pilots put on their oxygen masks and prepare for an emergency landing. the closest airport, cincinnati. the crew moves passengers forward in the cabin to get away from the smoke but there is little else we can do. dropping oxygen masks to the passengers in a situation like this would do absolutely no good. the masks are designed so that they will take ambient air in and supplement it with oxygen. so even if the oxygen mask had been deployed, when you took a breath in, you re going to get
the captain sends his first officer claude wimett to assess the situation. so i looked back. he couldn t see the back of the airplane through the light blue hazy smoke. claude came back and he said, i don t like what s going on back there. i think we better go down. the pilots put on their oxygen masks and prepare for an emergency landing into the closest airport, cincinnati. the crew moves passengers forward in the cabin to get away from the smoke. but there was little else they can do. dropping oxygen masks to the passengers in a situation like this would do absolutely no good. the masks are designed so that they will take ambient air in and supplement it with oxygen. so even if the oxygen mask had been deployed, when you took a breath in, you are going to get ambient air in. a flight attendant empties a fire extinguisher trying to control the smoke but can t find the source of the fire. when they opened the lavatory door, they could see smoke, but