Air traffic control versus pilots.
Kalitta 66, declaring an emergency.
Coming up!
Hey 74 crew! Welcome back!
If you don't know me, my name is Kelsey.
I'm a 747 pilot.
My channel 74 gear is all about aviation.
In this video, a pilot declares an emergency but
he sounds drunk on the radio.
So I'm going to see how long it takes for you to figure out exactly what's going on.
Let's get into it!
Kalitta 66, how do you hear?
Kalitta 66 5 by 5.
Kalitta 66, Roger. You are keying your mic and it's staying on there frequently.
So please, be careful.
Kalitta 66, declaring an emergency.
Sir, he's declaring an emergency with this flight controls.
Affirmative.
Yes, sir. He said affirmative on that.
All right, Kalitta 66, Roger. What are your intentions?
To clear up a term you may not be familiar with,
there is some terminology that pilots use and I believe it's slang.
I don't think it's actually official terminology that we're supposed to use
but it's a terminology that gets used a lot
and that is when you heard them say 5 by 5.
What that means is basically it's loud and clear.
So there's one by five, two by five three by five, four by five and five by five.
The two most common that I typically hear is three by five
which means like I can kind of hear you, it's somewhat clear but it's not very clear.
And then one by five would be like I can't make out anything that you're saying at all.
He's saying five by five which means he understands exactly everything that
the controller is saying is loud and clear.
Listen again when he says that.
Kalitta 66 5 by 5.
This all starts because the controller made a call
to the pilot saying you're keying your mic.
Keying your mic basically means that you're hitting the button
to trigger or to transmit
so when you hit that button, you're keying it.
And if you hold it down and you don't transmit everything
then it's typically an air.
Listen here where he says he's keying the mic.
Kalitta 66, roger. You're keying your mic and it's staying on there.
Now what's interesting here is the pilot is transmitting
and you can hear the alarms going off in the background.
That should have raised a flag or a red flag for the controller
because while we do have a lot of different noises that are going on while we're flying
and there's lots of bells and whistles, typically something like that
that you hear that alarm. That's repetitive like that,
that's not normal.
So that should have been a red flag when the controller talked to him the first time.
Obviously, there was some chatter before the audio which I eventually got.
There was some chatter that went on ahead of this
where he was keying the mic which I don't have.
But that part right there where the alarm is going off and the pilot is transmitting
that should have been a flag.
And I think that's what grabbed the attention of this other pilot
which is why he wanted to relay the message of saying:
"Hey! He's declaring an emergency" like that's an affirmative.
Listen here where this other pilot jumps in.
Sir, he's declaring an emergency with his flight controls.
This other pilot wanted the controller to jump into emergency controller mode
and get this pilot in the right direction
because he is treating him as a normal plane
but there's obviously something wrong
and this pilot, I think, recognized it before anybody else
that there was an issue going on, and he wanted this controller to pay attention to him
and go into emergency mode.
And if you haven't figured out why he sounds drunk yet, I'm going to explain it
but let's see what happens next.
Request vectors for Ypsilanti.
Alright, Kalitta 66. Understand an emergency
you want a vector to Cincinnati is that correct?
Negative vectors, Ypsilanti.
Kalitta 66, are you able to maintain altitude?
What assistance can I give you other than that vector?
So this is the next thing that happens which is a little weird here.
This pilot is saying direct Ypsilanti.
I'm assuming that the pilot is closer to Cincinnati.
Ypsilanti, if you don't know, is in Michigan.
I'll put a picture of where Ypsilanti is compared to Cincinnati
if you're unfamiliar with it.
But this pilot is saying he wants to go direct to Ypsilanti.
I don't know where he is in reference at this particular time as far as distance
but typically a pilot is always going to take the closest nearest airport.
They're not going to say: "Oh! I want to go to this particular airport"
unless there's some specific reason that their plane will...
you know, that airport has the fire and rescue
and this other airport doesn't.
That might be a reason but Cincinnati is a major airport
and they're going to have all the fire and rescue that anybody would need
in the case of an emergency.
So when this pilot is saying: "No, I want to go direct to this airport"
that should be another flag for the controller thinking like
"Okay, why does this guy want to go...
He's talking weird,
alarms going off,
he's requesting directed this place,
but he's declaring an emergency. There's obviously something wrong".
So there's a lot of red flags that are going on here
and I don't think the controller has really put it all together
exactly what's happening.
If you've listened to a lot of my Air traffic control versus pilots,
you know what it sounds like when a pilot loses control of their aircraft.
Now, that will change based off of the pilot's experience
and everything that's going on in the environment there
but typically, when a pilot has lost control of his aircraft,
they're going to be having a much higher anxiety level
and they're going to be talking a little bit different than this guy is talking here.
So it should be another red flag for this controller of like
"What's going on here?"
And if you haven't figured out what's going on yet
it's going to make a lot more sense in this next clip.
Unable to control altitude.
Unable to control airspeed.
Unable to control heading.
Kalitta 66 other than that, everything A-Ok.
Okay, Kalitta 66. Understand you are not able to control the aircraft is that correct?
That is correct.
Now if you haven't figured out what it is that's creating this situation,
this pilot has gone hypoxic.
And what that means is they're getting not enough oxygen into their body.
So if you're at a higher altitude where the plane is depressurized,
you can't get enough oxygen because at higher altitudes the oxygen is thinner.
You've heard of stories of people climbing mount Everest
and they pass out or they can't make it
or they use oxygen tanks and things like that
because at that altitude, the air is very thin.
There's not a lot of oxygen up there.
And that's what's going on here.
The pilot has gone hypoxic.
And the clue to me if I was listening to this
is I think where the controller got it as well,
is when he says he's a-okay right here.
Unable to control heading.
Kalitta 66 other than that everything A-OK.
So this pilot is saying he can't control his altitude
meaning going up or down.
He can't control going left or right and he can't control his air speed.
That's kind of the main things about flying are those three points of access there.
So he can't control any of them, yet he's like everything's a-okay.
Other than those minor details.
It's kind of what it sounds like.
And one of the things about being hypoxic is that you can be euphoric.
Which means you feel like everything's gonna be fine
and everything's okay.
And kind of like when you're drunk
and you know, maybe you're like "That's all gonna work out",
that's kind of the similar symptom having up hypoxia.
You can have this symptom of euphoria.
And so when the pilot is saying all those things,
I think that's where it clicks for the controller like
"Oh! This guy has lost all control,
there's an alarm going off,
he's talking like he's drunk and slow slurred speech,
which is another symptom of hypoxia
and he's being euphoric".
So I think right there, the pilot... the controller, I mean,
has realized what's going on with this pilot.
So if you remember how this guy acted in the movie Flight being euphoric,
would be the exact opposite of him.
Now the thing is that's really interesting about hypoxia,
is every pilot reacts differently.
Now, there is a place that you can go if you're a US pilot, you have a medical.
You can go to Oklahoma City to the headquarters of the FAA
and you can go into a pressurization chamber.
And in that chamber, they can do things to you and simulate hypoxia.
It's safe, you're in this place. There's doctors and people around.
And you can simulate and see how you react in the case of being hypoxic.
Which I think is really something that's very important for every pilot to do
and I know this sounds hypocritical because I have not done it
but it's definitely something that I want to do.
When I got this clip and I started listening to it,
I started thinking about it
because it's something that I've been planning to do for a while
and I actually had called the FAA earlier today.
I called them to actually make an appointment to go in there
because it's a one day course you can do, it's completely free.
And you can go and do it.
I called them but apparently because of Covid,
I don't know, they're not doing it right now.
But it's definitely once, I don't know, Covid has whatever happens, happens
where you're able to kind of go back to living your normal life.
This is definitely one of the first things on my list that I want to do.
Because it's good to know what is your symptoms so that way in the event
that you have a situation where you are becoming hypoxic,
you can go "Oh my gosh" and you can see it in yourself.
If you don't know those symptoms for yourself,
you may miss your signs and you could do like something and pass out
which has happened.
There have been cases where planes have actually crashed because
everybody in the plane passed out
because the plane depressurized.
In this case, the pilot is hand flying the aircraft
and so that's making him focus enough
to stay aware, even though he sounds drunk and alarms are going off.
He's so focused on what he's doing,
he's able to stay awake which is crazy.
Now, listen to what the controller does here next.
Kalitta 66, if able, descend and maintain flight level 260.
Descending now to flight level 260, Kalitta 66.
Kalitta 66, if able, fly heading of 330.
330.
Kalitta 66, area precipitation 11 o'clock,
15 miles extends approximately 30 miles along the route of flight.
Okay, we see that. Looks like right of course would be best.
Roger at 11000, Kalitta 66.
Kalitta 66, roger. Say intentions.
Yeah, Kalitta 66. Destination Ypsilanti.
Kalitta 66, roger. Cleared to Ypsilanti via direct. Maintain 11000.
Okay, proceed direct Ypsilanti, Kalitta 66.
Now, obviously I sped this up
because ain't nobody got time to listen to the full descent
and stuff like that and I cut out some clips just to make this video not extremely long
because I wanted to show and just kind of highlight the difference of
what this pilot sounded like when they were hypoxic
until towards the end of the audio when he was no longer hypoxic
and they were headed down to 11,000 feet.
Listen here at the very beginning of this audio where he's hypoxic.
That is correct.
And now listen to what he sounds like at the end of this audio.
Okay, proceed direct Ypsilanti, Kalitta 66.
Now, Air traffic control realized that these pilots were probably hypoxic
and from my understanding, the controller was talking with another controller
or another controller that listened in
and said "Oh, I think this guy's hypoxic".
And they started descending them quickly.
Now, what I don't know and I couldn't find any full report
of what happened here
but they descended them just initially to 23,000 feet, I think it was,
and I don't understand why they wouldn't just say go directly to 10,000.
And then clear out all the other planes.
Because on a lot of aircraft,
now this guy was hand flying, right?
And they didn't know that.
But in a lot of aircraft, you can actually dial in 10,000 feet,
hit one button and the plane will just go down to 10,000 feet and level off.
Which means that if the body had shut down
because it just said:
"Okay, I've been struggling trying to hang on with the lack of oxygen
but I'm done now"
If the brain had just said I quit because we don't have enough,
the guy could have just passed out.
And in the case we're right now where he's hand flying it,
who knows what would happen.
But they were able to get down and as they got lower and lower,
they were able to breathe more and more oxygen,
and then you heard the first officer wake up and he started to jump in
and make some radio calls.
This guy right here is the first officer
who was unconscious in the beginning part of this audio.
He wasn't talking because he was totally passed out
but this is him talking right here.
Yeah, Kalitta 66. Destination Ypsilanti.
Now look, at the end of the day everything worked out okay for these pilots
and I don't know what airspace they were over
or what was going on there
but just in my thought, my personal opinion here,
the thing I would have said when I realized those pilots were hypoxic,
would be get to 10 000, or 15 000 or whatever is a safe altitude
but just go straight down there.
And then once they started going down
and you'd be able to see that, as an air traffic controller,
once you could see them start descending
then maybe you want to give them a different heading.
But you would absolutely want to get them down to a safe altitude
where they can breathe as quickly as possible.
So at that point, once they start going down,
you can just be moving other planes out of the way.
They have the priority.
Now again, I don't know and I'm not being critical of these controllers,
again, everything worked out okay.
But that would be my thought if I was a controller
is get these guys to 10 or 15,000 as quickly as possible.
The other thing that's really interesting here is that
in the event that you're in an explosive decompression
so like a door flew off the plane for some reason
and the cabin just depressurized immediately,
your oxygen mask would fall down
but if you panicked for whatever reason,
and you didn't get your oxygen mask on and start breathing
and you passed out,
it's really not that big of a deal.
You've seen in videos or in movies where people are freaking out and panicking
trying to get the mask on and I get it.
Because you only have a few seconds really.
So you don't want to just like take a couple selfies before you put it on
even if you are a Youtuber
but you do want to get your oxygen mask on as quickly as possible
and that is going to last for 12 to 15 minutes, that oxygen that's coming in there.
But you're going to want to get that on quickly.
But if you don't, for whatever reason, you freak out and you pass out
you're going to be fine as soon as you get to a lower altitude.
Now, I've never heard of something like this where the guys passed out
and was at 32,000 feet
and they were able to get down,
the other guy wakes. It's kind of one of those crazy scenarios
and this is something that I've listened to.
I think in both airlines that I've worked at,
they've gone over this and talked about the risk of hypoxia
and the risk of losing the pressurization of your aircraft
and not getting your oxygen mask on.
And they talk about that because they want you to understand
just how important it is in the event
that you lose pressurization of your aircraft
before anything else, get your mask on.
Don't worry about transmitting to Air traffic control,
don't worry about anything else, start breathing
and then you can make your decisions of what to do.
Now you know something about aviation that most people don't know
and that's during an explosive decompression.
Assuming your plane gets lower, you're going to be fine one way or another.
Now, if you want to hear some people that don't know anything about aviation,
but make videos like they know everything about aviation,
check out this video here.
And if you want to hear a pilot have a temper tantrum with Air traffic control,
check out this video up here.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Until then,
keep the blue side up.