If a commercial passenger plane stalls, would the passengers know?

CatFromHue

Just wondering, after watching a few Aircraft Investigation episodes, that if a common use commercial passenger jet were to stall would the passengers notice anything other than some turbulence?

Say if it was at night or bad visibility.

shedweller

CatFromHue wrote: »

Just wondering, after watching a few Aircraft Investigation episodes, that if a common use commercial passenger jet were to stall would the passengers notice anything other than some turbulence?

Say if it was at night or bad visibility.

My guess is that passengers would suddenly feel lighter as the plane fell. This also being the sensation of falling would mean chaos in the cabin.

Irish Steve

Some would, especially those who are regular travellers, some would just think it was poor weather or similar, depending on the aircraft's attitude. If it was night, so likely the blinds closed, or in cloud, then a good few people would not be aware of a problem. as long as it was "just" a stall.

shedweller

Somebody else has asked this exact question!
http://www.quora.com/Aircraft/What-does-it-feel-like-when-you-are-in-a-stalling-plane

CatFromHue

The AF447 is one of the reasons I was wondering as the aircraft had stalled before the Captain had entered the cabin from his sleep. I'm guessing he would have had been on his feet or walking when the plane was in stall for a good number of seconds so would have he been able to sense the plane had stalled.

Wikipedia has it that at 02:11:40 the Captain entered the cockpit but says that the plane would have stalled around 02:11:15.

Another thing is that

it hit the ocean surface at a speed of 152 knots (280 km/h), comprising vertical and horizontal components of 108 and 107 knots respectively

the vertical and horizontal speed components are nearly identical so I'm not sure you would feel the sensation of falling

Irish Steve

Depending on the aircraft, a stall can and does result in very normal sensations, the only issue is that it may be coming down like the proverbial brick sh1t house, because of the absence of lift. If you can't see ground, or another reliable reference point, then inner ear feelings, or seat of the pants will be totally misleading, and potentially fatal, (as was seen with AF447).

A very long time ago, an old and wise instructor suggested to a friend, "if you find yourself unable to continue to fly, trim for straight and level, reduce power to 900 rpm, deploy the flaps, take your hands off everything, and wait for the bump"

Effectively, what he was suggesting was putting the aircraft into a benign stall, and in that situation, it would waffle it's way down until it hit something, and the likely outcome would likely be relatively benign. The aircraft in question was a Rallye 110, which even stalled was not likely to do anything unexpected other than descend towards earth. with a few rpm of power on, the descent rate was benign, so the likely outcome was also going to potentially not be life threatening.

Other aircraft are not friendly when stalled, and can depart from stable flight very suddenly and dramatically, and the most frequent stall is an over banked turn on to final approach, at low speed and low level, which can very quickly become a potentially fatal spin and crash, as one wing can stall before the other, due to the turning moment. Recovery in that situation can be a serious challenge, as getting the wings level and increasing the speed may take more vertical space than is available, so a crash with significant vertical speed is the unfortunate result.

Dublinflyer

I would be pretty sure they would notice, but maybe not understand what is happening. The majority of the time in an uncontrolled stall one wing will stall before the other causing the aircraft to bank to the side of the stall.

CatFromHue

Those are good points about about how the aircraft reacts when it stalls (i.e. rolls or whatever) and I'd say they'd cause alot of worry for the passengers so they'd know something was wrong.

I'm not sure if they'd know they're falling out of the sky though.