Assume The Position!

"When the flight attendant yells "brace", assume the crash position."

I'm not sure how many times that message came over the loud speaker, but the pilot must have finally told them to stop it because we never got the order.

I was flying into DFW airport on United flight 702 early Friday afternoon (February 10) when the pilot came on the intercom to explain why we were flying in circles rather than landing: our flaps wouldn't go down. This isn't exactly an emergency, and the pilot sounded quite calm and unconcerned. The flaps, when deployed, generate additional lift (and drag). The extra lift is useful when landing because it means that you can fly slower, requiring less braking and/or a shorter amount of runway.

So without flaps we were going to be going a bit faster at touchdown — 170 knots instead of 140. The biggest risk, according to the pilot, was that the brakes would overheat and catch on fire. In that case there was a small chance that we would need to evacuate the plane and so the flight attendants were going to be reviewing emergency exit procedures. In the meantime, we were circling to burn off excess fuel to lighten the load. Less weight means that you need less lift which means that you can, again, land at a lower speed.

Then the flight attendants took over and the tone of voice couldn't have been more different. They sounded TERRIFIED!

Aside #2500°F: Jet Blue was recently in the news with landing gear problems. Afterwards the passengers noted how good the flight attendants were in keeping them calm. I guess that's the difference between a top tier airline and a cut-rate one.

Aside #200USD: Another difference between the top tier airlines and the cut rate ones is that the cut rate airlines have a TV in the back of each seat so that you can watch your own (potential) disaster as it unfolds. Not that our situation rated national coverage. (And we didn't have TVs.)

We were told to take off our glasses and put them into the pouch in the seatback in front of us, along with any pens or other objects in shirt or jacket pockets. We were also instructed in the proper crash position and the flight attendants went row by row asking us to demonstrate the position and to ensure compliance with the instructions regarding glasses and such. They also reviewed exit door locations (row by row) and recruited helpers for the evacuation.

Then, of course, were the periodic and frantic sounding announcements to go into our crash positions when the flight attendants yelled "BRACE!" This all went on for between 20 and 30 minutes.

When the rubber hit the road, so to speak, it didn't seem to me like we were going particularly fast, though the braking seemed slightly lighter than normal. I suppose they were trying to avoid overheating the brakes. It was also one of the smoother landings I've experienced. The pilot did a good job.

We stopped at the end of the runway (or maybe we turned just off it) so that our brakes could be inspected by the airport fire fighters. They then followed us all the way to the terminal. Perhaps there was a chance that the brakes could still burst into flames with the additional strain of braking during taxiing and parking at the gate. To my knowledge, there was no fire.

And, thankfully, we never got the order to BRACE or to evacuate the plane.