Hominid

Robert99, I studied your response. Remember, I only answered the thing about years a nerd. I'll e-mail you about some of the info later. When I turned on my laptop this morning, it had a virus from hell. I think Farflung dunit;-) For now.... I gather you would agree that it would be impossible to come up with an accurate estimate of 305's wt when it got to Reno? Fuel and passengers would be easy enough, but we have no data re. cargo or the passengers' baggage weights. I think that the standard turn wouldn't have dropped lift enough to cause a problem even if the plane was at maximum allowed landing weight. Could you calc for that condition? And anything you might think of besides the lift/stall as a reason needed to make a wide turn at the end. If you don't have the speeds I could post or email them (at least, what I think you'd need). At 22:28pst, 305 said "On this kinda config we make pretty shallow turns cause it kills off our speed pretty much if we make a standard ..." It was interrupted by a controller saying "I understand you need a long final into Reno." Anyway, I would think the concern about losing speed was in effect saying they didn't want to add throttle, which shouldn't have been a problem when they were on final and still had considerable fuel. As they were getting into Reno, 305 said they would need 35K-40K. And the NWA rpt Carr faxed to Sluggo (I think) said (at 10:17 or 10:37) 305 had 17,300 lb. I assume that you've noted that lack of B hydraulics would have left 305 w/o the UPPER rudder and the inboard flight spoilers.

I don't know of one. Do you know of someone who said it happened? Gotta learn to actually pay attention when you do that thing we call "reading."

Source? Source? Sure, pump up that seive. When it gets up to 20 admospheres it'll finally rip the latches or uplock rollers off. The stair will fly out and the cabin will near instantly be back to .7atm. Someone who dropped stairs multiple times daily--someone who designed the stair system--could easily have had a hellofa time dropping those stairs, much less doing it in a way that was safe for the crew. Stair background is irrelevant to who Coop may have been Souce? You sure make it hard to be nice to you.

There was no nitrogen tank. The gas was totally contained within the two actuators, tubing, valves, etc. It started off being on one side of the actuators. The valves let it move to the other. The pistons moved out because the surface areas on one side of the pistons was bigger than on the other. This is all in the pneumatic sys diagram in 377's manual.

You mean that manual pump he has to get outside the aircraft to get to so he can open the stair so he can get outside to get to the pump? That one?

Thanks skyjack. I've got the most basics. I'll be 70 (years) if I make thru Dec. And someone will havta wak me real hard to keep me from it.

I'd have to check, but I think that is the full extent of what I've seen. Note the speed of 150KIAS rather than 170. Blevins note the crew didn't feel anything when the stairs were dropped. My upcoming posts will relate to this info re. the test. Back in '09, Sluggo posted a bit about the test and included reference to "Document SE164-81 CEF:k1b." For those unfamiliar with such, this is govt kind of reference to things like letters. I don't think anyone asked him what the document was. Could ya chime in Sluggo?

Hi back pek771 & thanks for the nice words re. the earlier post 377 put up. I have no info about the test other than that little we've all seen. I'm sure you can count on it as fact that a great deal that is known by a few about the case has not gotten outside a small circle. The FBI (and its different parts) have info we don't. NWA corporate had some. Who knows where that's gone? Some of the Air Force likely has info the FBI and NWA doesn't. Feel good about yourself. The case is not out in the open. We can try to find bits that haven't been found. And we can apply microscopes to the little bits we have in hopes of seeing something "they" overlooked when releasing info. BTW: I think probably some people have info that would be useful and don't even know it. From how the stairs probably worked, I think they either had not completely repaired when they did the sled drop test, or they made some kind of modification to allow them to let the stairs freefall without hydraulic applied. Knowing what they needed to do, it would have been easy for them to make a temporary mod. They might have just held the stairs up with a rope or cable until after they had done the test.

Gimme a while to digest the info. About how long I've been a nerd.... First let me say that I did NOT claim to be one of the first. I am sure I was one before the word was invented. I hope I wasn't the first. I think there musta been some before me. I'm really old, and I've never bothered trying to remember things that just didn't matter to me. And I'm pretty sure it didn't just happen one day. But I'd estimate about 57 years ago. Sorry. I couldn't calculate it any better.

Yes, Smokin. And neither was the FBI guy in the tower who was telling the controller what to say. When the guys with the guns are there, ya do what they say. Yeah, you can't tell from the transcript just exactly when the FBI got there. It may have been well before 305 mentioned them. I would think it was within seconds after the plane stopped rolling. Imagine trying to talk to that pesky controller while a guy is shovin you around and yelling and waving a gun.

If I remember right, the comms were from flight control types. I think the FBI was probably already on the plane up through the back and was almost shoving the crew out. That is, at that point they were doing what the guys with the guns and dogs were saying to do.

Thanks gentleman 377. I figured airstairs first. And there's a bit to it. I think the pressure bump was almost certainly Dan jumping. There is a possibility, however, that it could have occured at some time after he jumped. IF he understood the dynamics he could have used something like a wrapped-up bag of bills, especially with some rope or para cord, to pull a real good jam between an upper stair strut and the stairwell wall. If he did this, the stairs would not have rebounded when he jumped. The jam could have then worked out under vibration, and fallen out down onto the stairs. It would not necessarily have left the plane right then. It could have lain on the stairs until finally getting near enough to an edge and getting blown or sucked away.

Thanks Georger. I think it best to break it into bits as small as possible so that some may be willing to pay attention long enough to absorb the most important of it. The long tech step-by-step stuff is quite tedious for people who aren't actually interested in tech stuff.

Remember school? Oooh Oooh (hand raised) "delete the post or edit it?" Was that it?

So Coop (in the attachment) musta been using a modern skydiving rig?

Thanks 377. Is there a way to automatically go directly back to the place you were in the thread after you post?

Thanks 377 for all the courtesy. Here's some answers to questions some shoulda asked, woven into the first part of a re-creation. All please excuse the foul-ups I'll have learning how to post here. So far I'm finding it unbelievably unwieldy. Suggestions? -------------------- PART 1 About 7:40: Tina has gone forward, drawn the curtain at first class, and turned off the forward cabin lights. She saw Dan in back as she left, so there was at least some light back at the aft door. Dan doesn't have to do everything in near total darkness. There's a dim light back above the door (on the inside) that could be turned on at the aft attendant's panel, and also a brighter one if he wanted. My TWA manual with change pages up to Dec '68 indicates that TWA 727s had a couple of portable rechargeable lights. N467US likely had some as well in '71 since NWA was very safety contious. The crew is anxious for Dan to leave, and they're anxious to cooperate with him so he won't blow them all up. But Dan will have to lower the aft airstairs to bring this about. The crew are thankful that NWA management has figured out how to get it done without the crew getting killed. A few minutes before, on the ground back at Seattle, Elwood ("Al") had shouted over the radio something like "No, no. You can't do that!" when 305 had mentioned that the guy in back wanted to have the airstairs down in flight. 305 responded something to the effect that they and "Paul" thought they had a way figured out. This shut Al up except for some final sputtering. "Paul" was Paul Soderlind. As part of Paul's duties as Director of Flight Operations, Technical, for NWA, he (not "Sortum," RB) was also head flight instructor and the company's flight safety officer. He even personally wrote instructions for flight crews. Paul said his job was best described as "Technical Chief Pilot." He was "hands on." A "pilot's pilot." It was Paul's responsibility to ensure as much as possible that the whole skyjacking thing went down without harm to the crew. Mentioning Paul naturally quieted Al because Al was functionally subordinate to Paul. Al was the chief pilot for only the northwest region. Paul's boss, Nyrop, stressed two things at NWA: make money, and do it safely. Also there on the ground, 305 said to air ops something like, "We've been reading the procedure you sent us. Will the stairs drop enough for the guy to get out?" So 305 got a "procedure" from flight ops. There would be no need for a "procedure" if the procedure were just to have the guy drop the stairs the way you normally do, following the simple instructions right there at the control station. Normal dropping of the stairs was technically elementary--no procedure needed. The "procedure" existed because NWA wanted to get those stairs dropped without endangering the crew any more than could be accommodated. The procedure would be not only about what Dan was to do, but also what the CREW needed to do. Dan did not do an analysis like what I posted re. using the emergency extension system. The crew did not have to tell him equivalent info. He didn't need to know any of it. Paul and others did analysis similar to what I did, going through all the ramifications of all the possible ways. But their analysis was directed at how to get the stairs down in the safest way possible for the crew. My focus was to figure out how it must have been done to give results like what we've been told. (lower forms read the last 2 sentences carefully.) They had the advantage of having info they knew related exactly to N467US. After doing that analysis, the procedure to do the job was simple. Something like: "1. Turn off "B" hydraulics as soon as there's a bit of noise to cover it [if it was on], and don't turn it back on. Leave it off for the duration unless you're sure he's gone. (305, you're doing this so he won't be able to put the stairs all the way down where they will be stuck unless you go back against his orders to check them and retract them if necessary. If they were fully deployed, you'd guzzle fuel and tear a lot of the aft part of the plane up if you had to land that way.) "2. Ask the guy, for crew safety, not to move the normal control handle out of the UP position. (If he disregards this, he could still gravity drop the stairs and they will still be stuck down, but they won't be down as far as if he used the hydraulic power.) "3. Instruct him to use the emergency pneumatic extension system and how to do it." [They may have actually described this even though there were instructions posted at the control.] Note that only the nonexplanatory parts of (2) and (3) needed to be conveyed to Dan. 305 probably added something like, "Our tech people say the stairs will definitely drop far enough after you walk out onto them for you to get out to the end." Note that most of (1) and (2) is explanation so the crew would understand the reasons for the instructions. The procedures might have included something about flying without "B" hydraulics, which was probably in their flight manual as it is in the one I have. Item (3) might have been a cause for Dan having problems dropping the stairs, as I will explain next time. Here's a flash for Cooperites. Everyone on earth knew all they would need to know to drop the aft airstairs of "the" 727. Nobody knew before the event what it would take to do it in a way that NWA (Soderlind and the crew) figured would be safe for them. (source: Hominid) "B" hydraulics would probably have already been off at Seattle unless 305 was on external power. TWA (we don't know about NWA) had their crews turn both B pumps off if they didn't have external power or the APU running. With APU or external power, they would have only one of the B pumps on until just before engine startup. If 305 had the APU running all the time 305 was on the ground, they might have had a problem with the hydraulic pump running all that time. I haven't actually checked this out. It is possible that flight 305 could have disabled the hydraulic power to the airstair by pulling out a little circuit breaker in the cockpit. 377's manual indicates that the breaker was there at whatever the effective date of his manual would have been (pre-79). My TWA manual with pages dated as late as Dec '68 lists DC loads served by P6 breakers. It lists the airstair hydraulic shutoff valve as one of those loads, but only for their "C" (convertible) 727s. We just don't know if N467US had this breaker at hijack time. If it wasn't there, the only other way to disable hydraulic power to the airstair would have been to turn off "B" hydraulics. I'm inclined right now to think they had to turn the hydraulics off. Reason: Coming into Reno 305 said they needed to make a wide sweeping turn. I haven't checked it, but I don't believe their speed would have been low enough that the bank would have dropped lift enough to put them near stall speed (in a near empty condition). Maybe R99 will check that out. TO BE CONTINUED

I didn't even do PREVIEW. I'll try that.

I've gotten plum tuckered out pokin the refresh button. Is there a probationary period when one first signs up here? Maybe it's waitin for Quade to read it? Maybe a size limit. I tried reading FAQs when I signed up, but the link was bad (URL not even proper form). Size limit would be a good possibilty where my post is concerned.

Thanks Georger. I thought I musta choked the system. I didn't do the NEW. Another try....

Thanks Smokin. Ready, set.....

I'd rather you let me post. I've amended some & I don't know just which you're referring to. I'm ready to post but was hoping to post it under its own topic.

I think the cover's been left off the dish a lot over the years. Even if there were some good mutations, they've been swamped by more of the same wigglin in from the overall population knowing what the overall population knows about the case. Thanks for the invitation. I took the name you gave me. "Humanoid" might have been closer but I didn't want to make the lower form think I was being all "uppity." Now I discover I'll even have to treat him nice. I don't know yet how I'll manage that. If I can ever find a "POST NEW TOPIC" button or link, I'd like to do it. It can't be just me. Even though I'm really old, I'm a computery nerdy kinda guy. I was a geek and nerd before there were the words.

My apologies. Until this I took you to be a lower form hominid.