they would be forced by regulators to activate another emergency exit to comply with regulations. so it s a sidewall panel that houses an emergency exit that alaska airlines does not use because it doesn t have a high density cabin. so from the outside, it looks like a door, but from the inside, its just a normal sidewall panel. it s that panel that at 16,000 feet ultimately triggered, or was part of, a decompression where it had blown out. and that separation of the panel leaving the aircraft, of course, triggers a decompression scenario that crew have to jump into place and into action to ensure that not only are passengers seated with their seatbelts fastened, but they are able to withstand the vacuum that then occurs. because we have had scenarios decades ago in aviation where this has happened and passengers have quite literally been sucked out of the aircraft cabin, removed from the cabin because of that pressure. so it s incredibly dangerous. it s not something that
it s just a normal sidewall panel. it s that panel that at 16,000 feet ultimately triggered, or was part of, a decompression where it had blown out. and that separation of the panel leaving the aircraft, of course, triggers a decompression scenario that crew have to jump into place and into action to ensure that not only are passengers seated with their seatbelts fastened, but they are able to withstand the vacuum that then occurs. because we have had scenarios decades ago in aviation where this has happened and passengers have quite literally been sucked out of the aircraft cabin, removed from the cabin because of that pressure. so it s incredibly dangerous. it s not something that investigators will be downplaying. and it s a testament to the crew, of course, and the flight crew that they were able to return safely. and, of course, they were quite lucky that nobody was sat in that initial window seat right next to the panel, where it becomes separated
more seats into that cabin for example, as many seats as ryanair manage to squeeze in they would be forced by regulators to activate another emergency exit to comply with regulations. so it s a sidewall panel that houses an emergency exit that alaska airlines does not use because it doesn t have a high density cabin. so from the outside, it looks like a door, but from the inside, it s just a normal sidewall panel. it s that panel that at 16,000 feet ultimately triggered, or was part of, a decompression where it had blown out. and that separation of the panel leaving the aircraft, of course, triggers a decompression scenario that crew have to jump into place and into action to ensure that not only are passengers seated with their seatbelts fastened, but they are able to withstand the vacuum that then occurs. because we have had scenarios decades ago in aviation where this has happened and passengers have quite literally been sucked out of the aircraft cabin, removed from the cabin
but back about 40 years ago, we had the same thing happen on a wide body and the person was sucked out. when i worked for the air force, we lost an airman who was sucked through an overhead window on a tanker airplane, an air force tanker. so, yeah, keep your seatbelts fastened is the one thing you can do. but i really don t think your viewers should panic over this. i believe that this is a very strange and rare occurrence, and i think both the faa, the ntsb, alaska and the rest of the airlines, are going to deal with this in a very prompt and efficient manner. i just don t think this is something we need to worry about a lot. but we need to find out why this happened, and that s clearly the role of the ntsb and the manufacturer. as they try to figure out why this happened, i mean, give us an idea of how they will look at
mentioned, with this emergency landing, descending very carefully and slowly 16,000 feet, or at least to the 10,000 foot threshold because of the decom decompression and making a safe landing. what are the lessons learned here in your view? first of all, we need to look at the manufacturing process and the design, as you pointed out, fredricka. but clearly, for the passengers, keep your seatbelts fastened. we all know we had virtually a perfect record last year in the jet airline safety with no fatalities worldwide in the jet field. so this is a rare event. but, yes, keep your seat belts fastened, and in the past, in 2018, we lost somebody. they weren t completely sucked out. that was when an engine failure caused a window to be destroyed,