Qantas Makes Emergency Landing with 10-foot Hole in Plane

By Anastacia Mott Austin

What is remarkable is how calm everyone was. Cell phone camera footage from inside Qantas flight QF 30, where an explosion caused a large hole in the plane, shows passengers sitting calmly with their oxygen masks on and flight attendants walking the aisles reassuring people.

Granted, the footage was taken after the plane had already made its rapid descent from 29,000 feet to 10,000 feet.

"The first few moments were very anxious," said a passenger, while another agreed, saying that after a "resounding crack," the plane made a steep descent as oxygen masks fell from the ceiling. Cold moist air and bits of debris rushed through the cabin.

Some guessed a door had accidentally opened during the flight, while others sitting nearer to the site of the explosion could see through the floor to the luggage compartment.

The pilot made no announcements to the passengers during the descent other than the plane was making an emergency landing, but after the plane landed he explained that there was a hole in the side of the plane.

Investigators will be examining the nearly 20-foot long hole in the side of the plane, through which luggage can clearly be seen from the outside, to determine the cause.

One theory is that tanks of oxygen or fire extinguishers, which are stored near where the hole was located, could have exploded during flight. Or something in a passenger’s luggage could have caused the explosion, though terrorism has been preliminarily ruled out.

Another possible cause of the explosion is that if the seals on the sections of the plane’s "skin" are weakened by corrosion or metal fatigue, even small cracks can give way and cause large rips at high altitude wind speeds.

A report from March of this year did note some corrosion on the plane’s seals, though no data is available as to whether that was repaired.

The dangers with an "explosive decompression" are several. One, if the hole is big enough, passengers can literally be sucked out of the plane. A similar explosive decompression occurred in 1988 on Aloha Airlines flight 243, and a flight attendant was killed while being sucked out of the cabin. During that flight, the entire top of the front section of the plane immediately behind the cockpit was ripped away, leaving rows of passengers exposed in their seats at 24,000 feet. Fortunately, no other fatalities occurred, though the passengers endured over 12 minutes of complete terror as the pilot attempted to descend and safely land the aircraft.

Qantas Airlines boasts a strong safety record. As famously noted in the movie "Rain Man," the airline has never had a fatal crash.

Passengers exiting flight QF-30 were shocked to discover the size of the hole, and expressed gratitude for their safe return to land. "None of us realized how lucky we were until we got off the plane here and saw the size of the hole," said passenger Phil Rescall, who lives in London. "We just stood and stared in amazement. We knew then that we had been very lucky."