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Let's start with the odds: I've soloed something like 150 students in my life. My student solos occasionally involved distractions and drama but incurred not so much as a single scratch on the pilot or airplane. This is not to say that the students didn't experience varying levels of exhilaration, but none developed into panic or debilitation. This is not an unusual record. It happens by plan.Learning to fly involves several categories of information to be studied, assimilated, and merged into the physical process of flying the airplane. For example, the FARs — the American system of Federal Aviation Regulations (14 CFR). This is bookwork and we refer to the FARs inflight so the student can make judgments to be safe and comply with the law. By the way, this is easier and more naturally done than it was to describe above.Before flight, students are taught all the maneuvers necessary for safe flight. I tell students, “you learn the maneuvers on the ground and practice them in the air. The first is like the university lecture, the second is the lab.” These are maneuver elements that include things the pilot does on every single flight as well as other maneuvers that represent “edges” of the performance envelope, like slow flight and steep turns. We spend quite some time flying the airplane into and out of “stalls” of every conceivable type. The goal is to train the pilot so that there is nothing the airplane can present that the student doesn't think, “oh yeah, I've seen that before and I know exactly how to handle it!”Students learn how to handle emergencies. Engine failure is simulated (the throttle is closed and the instructor announces “engine failure!”) and the student sets up and flies the gliding powerplane to a mostly normal landing (maybe onto a runway if an airport is close enough, otherwise onto the best, safest, flatest stretch of land within gliding distance). The odds of an actual engine failure? Not counting airplanes flown in intentional violation of FAR maintenance standards (believe it or not, they're out there!), nor from carburetor ice (easily preventable with carburetor heat), nor engines that quit due to fuel exhaustion or mismanagement of the fuel system: actual engine failures in flight in the US occur about once every 160,000 engine hours of flight time. Yet we train for this possibility!In flight, the students practice a list of maneuvers (that probably hasn't changed since Wolfgang Langewiesche standardized them decades ago) that represent every situation a pilot might encounter when flying alone. The list may have been revised from time to time as early flight instructors discovered new ways for students to get in trouble, but after literally millions of airplane soloes over the last century, we pretty much know every possible failure mode.What's left to cause crashes, at least in the context of the question asked, is the emotional fragility of the student pilot. In my experience, every student has wondered at the outset whether they have what it takes to be a pilot, and it was my job to teach them not only “to fly” but to think and know real confidence. If the student soloes and experiences a debilitating panic attack, it is my fault as the instructor.In three cases in my life I determined that the student was not psychologically capable of being trusted with an airplane. In each case we pressed on through about 6 hours of instruction before it was clear that the emotional, psychological issues were profound and no progress was being made. In two cases, money was not an issue and we continued pre-solo training for upwards of 25 hours, hoping for a break through. I should mention that all 3 were intelligent, successful, charismatic individuals. But in flight things fell apart. A college starting quarterback was so nervous he locked his head looking forward, was non-responsive, and seemingly catatonic. The psychiatrist had bought a new, very expensive single engine, retractable landing gear airplane and announced (by ego), “I'll learn in this or nothing else!” But no amount of training could get this student to remember to extend the landing gear for landing: his failure rate was about 80%. The third student was the smartest guy I ever met. Multiple inventions and patents. Multiple real, serious, PhDs on his wall. Successful author with several books in print. And a model handsome athlete! But somehow, learning to fly was not easy for him.In the end I had to advise them (a painful thing for me) that they were not suited to fly airplanes. It happens. But these were cases where shortcomings were identified and no emotional breakdown inflight was allowed to happen.Teaching emotional resilience and strength is part of being a flight instructor: developing emotional strength and confidence is a core element of being a pilot. This subject is not an afterthought.Some pilots including many on Quora relate that their first solo was something of a surprise. Often, a big surprise, so much so that they were startled and chagrined that, “What!? I'm supposed to do my first solo now?”The flight instructing tradition of stepping out of an airplane whose engine was running, slapping the pilot on the back and saying with a grin “go make three takeoffs and full stop landings and I'll wait back at the office” was bad in the 1930s and is still indefensible today. In my opinion it is bullying by an insecure man or woman who ignored the professionalism module in their CFI training course. It violates several FARs and is dangerous. It further establishes a bad series of examples and precedents for the pilot. In the context of the question posed on Quora, it does nothing to set up the soloing pilot’s proper mental state. If there was any possibility of a psychic “break,” the instructor has just maximized the student's chances of experiencing it. Students that have undergone this solo method often mention later that while airborne the first time, they were gathering their thoughts for the landing. Gathering their thoughts! This means they weren't prepared and were catching up only when in the air! A common statement they made was that once airborne, they looked down at the runway and said to themselves, “WHAT IN THE HELL AM I DOING!”So you can see the question posed is a good one.With my students my goal was to minimize surprises. It should go without saying that their safety was paramount, but obviously other instructors who used the traditional “surprise!” method of soloing assessed the solo milestone differently. My students were briefed on their upcoming solo starting a couple of weeks before the event.My brief sounded like this. “Amelia, you're progressing well and it looks like you'll be ready for solo in a couple of weeks. How do you feel about that? About soloing, being alone in the airplane and responsible for getting the airplane safely around the pattern and back to a safe landing?”And then I'd listen. There are questions about the student's readiness, and I'd describe how soloing meant that two people had to agree that she (my daughter, in this case) agreed that she was ready and competent. First was me, as the flight instructor. I had to assess and approve, and then make the necessary paperwork to be legal. Second was the student who before accepting the offer had to independently assess and decide that she was capable of acting as pilot in command. She had to go through the mnemonic IMSAFE and either agree to solo, or disagree and decline the solo. This would be her first official decision as a pilot in command. We take this occasion and mark it both with gravity and celebration.At some point in the two week early conversation I slip in what sounds like a joke. I say, “How will you feel if you are downwind (that is, airborne in the airport traffic pattern) and look down at the runway and think, ‘I better do this right because if I really screw up, I could end up famous; as in a flaming death crash kind of famous?’”Although said as a joke, there is a serious point to it. Ninety percent laugh and riff into the joke, but they make it clear this is not a thought that troubles them. But 10% will get quiet, sometimes sullen, and want to talk about the risks. They were aware of them and weren't sure their flight instructor (a True Believer in aviation) would want to discuss the subject. Some of this last group are just thorough and want to analyze everything, and some decide that flying isn't for them. This is how it should be; not everyone has the disposition to fly.In fact, I bring up the possibility of death at the very outset, before the student has committed to learning to fly. Often, if the student is young this includes and focuses on the parents, who are the real obstacle. The conversation is direct: “Learning to fly is not risk free. You can get killed. It doesn't happen often, and flight training is centered on never having an accident of any sort, but it obviously happens. How do you feel about that?” Most of the time this is a fruitful discussion and ends in the prospective student deciding he or she still definitely wants to learn to fly; occasionally, I'll encounter a parent who politely breaks down in front of me, is happy I brought up this dirty little secret, and we work through their maternal/paternal issues and often continue, only very occasionally will the parent withdraw support. I don't consider this a loss because (1) trust is retained and their son/daughter learning to fly is revisited a few months later, and flight training might resume, and (2) the parents would have withdrawn support anyway, except that in this “undefined” case it would include a lot of parent/child drama and hurt feelings and still no progress in learning to fly.I should mention that I have not seen flight schools take this direct approach. First, their flight instructors are young and enthusiastic. Their mindset of “I'm a flight instructor and I can do anything” is laudable, except for the part about being indestructible. Second, most flight schools are very tightly budgeted and profits are thin and scarce. More than a few flight schools are run and managed by people who are primarily motivated by paying their skills forward, making the world a better place. In this environment, “selling aviation” and more to the point, “selling safety” is the rule and incompatible with teaching the risk of death as a pillar of leadership skill.I, on the other hand, am older (65 as I write) and am not motivated by the paycheck. My family still has a home and food if I “lose a student.” Please keep in mind my circumstances before you embrace my thinking when you talk to a young flight instructor. In many ways, the young are better than I am and we see the world differently. I know I can count on all Quorans to balance these thoughts when seeking out a personal instructor to teach you to fly.Back from the discussion of risk to a point a few days before impending solo:I describe the whole process of solo in the after flight debrief when there are about 2 training flights to go. The goal is for the student to picture the entire event in his or her head with no surprises at the time.Solo Day! But nothing says the student must solo. There is no pressure and plenty of time to defer. We start with a “dual” lesson (term meaning “with instructor”) that flies through most of the course maneuvers. By now the student is comfortable and mastering all of them. This lesson is shorter, however—maybe :45 to :50 minutes—to retain the student’s high mental energy level. Then we return to the airport, land, and shut down the airplane. Note: this is the point where my practice diverged from the old, traditional, surprise method!After running the full parking checklists, we get out of the airplane and talk about whether the student is up to soloing. I state that in my opinion, she is, but that's only half of it. I then point out (again) that this is her first judgment and decision as a pilot in command and must be taken seriously: is she physically and mentally prepared to fly by herself?Most of the time I can see that they are anxious to solo, in the sense that they want me to shut up so they can finally go fly without the irritating weight of me in the right seat. But I walk them through IMSAFE and they articulate their reasoning.One student, very competent to this point, finally hung his head and said, “I really, really, really want to solo but I feel I must tell you that I can feel a migraine just coming on.” He used his first judgment as PIC to not fly. EXCELLENT! I had faith he would be an outstanding pilot (and probably flight instructor in a couple of years) because of this. He soloed a few days later.While sitting and talking, the student might have a sandwich and iced tea and then freshen up in the bathroom. We walk out to the airplane and after I wish her good luck, I step back a respectful distance and she runs the whole flight from the beginning. Checklists, engine start, radio/tower, taxiing, run up, flight.I'm holding a hand held radio and mostly listen with satisfaction. Only once have I interceded when a student had an important question to ask. The tower people are happy to have me jump in and answer: mostly, they're pilots too and in any case, do not want (DO NOT WANT!) to ever watch anyone get hurt. At the end, the tower operator said, “Cessna 34A, did you copy your instructor’s answer? Do you want me [with my more powerful microphone and radio] to repeat any of that?”I've never had a student panic but in about 5% of cases, non-standard drama occurs which requires the soloing student to get creative and do non-standard things to remain safe. While unusual on a solo flight, the student works from 2–3 hours of lecture and discussion about handling this problem. All are prepared, 95% just don't need it.Example: my student was on a first solo when a private pilot flying a Cessna 172RG “Cutlass” (a retractable landing gear version of the ubiquitous fixed landing gear Cessna 172 Skyhawk) landed gear up. There was one runway and it was blocked with a damaged airplane on it. Of the several options available, the student pilot left our little airport, flew to a nearby airport, landed and tied down. Perfect! No panic, it happens.In another case, an idiot flew his Mooney in a series of “high speed passes” back and forth down the runway, both directions. (He later belligerently refused counseling and stated he had a “right” to “calibrate his airspeed indicator.” Neither I nor the local FAA office could find such a right in the FARs or AIM, and we disagreed. Sometimes this is how local air safety is improved.)The first solo’s pilot was on final approach—a tense moment the first time—when she saw the opposite direction Mooney, gear up and flying as fast as a little Mooney could (maybe 200 mph) out of a dive coming at her from the opposite direction. The student wisely just pulled up into a goaround, made a right turn and exited the traffic pattern in the maneuver called “blowing out of the pattern in the safest, least occupied direction possible.”She flew around for :30 minutes, slowly circling a local big lake, until she thought the idiot had left. It turns out that he had. But when she re-entered the airport traffic pattern and was once again on final, the crazy Mooney reappeared for Act II. She repeated her escape maneuver.Her first solo? An hour and a half and one full stop landing. She showed good judgment and became a fine pilot.The closest case to first solo panic came to a 60 year old student. His takeoff looked good but as he climbed through 20′ of altitude, coming the other way was an emergency aircraft, barely under control and skimming the treetops in turning flight to land. My student did the correct thing, the only thing open to him which was to immediately turn right to avoid the midair collision. (My heart was in my throat!)The student was rattled but came up with a good plan. Fly to a familiar point, climb to a comfortable altitude (he chose 4,500′), and just circle and wait until the adrenaline rush subsided. This took about :45 minutes. Then he returned and made a normal landing. He probably legitimately felt panic but our discussions kicked in and he beat it.The emergency was another student solo pilot but this guy was ready for his private pilot check ride. Starting out in what had been a perfectly beautiful, mostly calm summer evening he had been stricken with what appeared to influenza. Over the course of a few seconds he said he went from feeling wonderful to vomiting and diarrhea, but what scared him was the lightheadedness—he thought he was going to pass out and die. He said he barely remembered getting on the ground.I called family to pick him up. His clothes were uncomfortably contaminated; I live on the airport only 200 yards away so brought him clean clothes while he was washing under the garden hose. The bad news was that I never saw him at the airport again.I'd like to return to the idea of a flight instructor doing the traditional solo where he or she tells the student to stop after landing, then by surprise, opens the door and steps outside while the engine remains running. There, they lean across the seat and, enjoying the surprise they pulled on the student, explain that the student will now perform their first solo. The student nods, the instructor closes the door and walks away a the student taxis off to fly. Very clever (since 1903).Pilots are trained by their instructors to never let passengers in or out of the airplane if the engine is running. I know this rule is often ignored but I make it a point of talking to people who do it to secure from them the better practice. The design of many cockpits encourages only the pilot to operate the door or doors. The biggest worry is that a frightened or airsick passenger, in his or her haste to get out of the airplane, upon landing will leap out and walk or run forward through the spinning propeller. Death or terrible injury always follows. The correct procedure in this case is for the pilot to shut down the engine and only then let passengers deplane. In the case of the traditional flight instructor, this is not done.But surely this is harmless error, right? A professional flight instructor knows the airplane and can exit and walk away safely so what's the big deal?The big deal is that students learn more by watching than by nice sounding words. The rule becomes “never let anyone out of the airplane when the engine is running … unless you're pretty sure it's safe.”It isn't just the student pilot who’s imbued with a dangerous idea but all the pilot witnesses who see the flight instructor doing it! “It must be okay. That professional flight instructor does it all the time.” Thus, the seeds are planted for future tragedy.This plays out in one other area and that is Aviation Day at a local airport where volunteer pilot/owners give rides to the public in their Cessnas and Pipers. A roped off waiting area is arranged, there is a safety ticket taker who escorts groups of 2–3 passengers out to the airplane, and when finished, from the airplane back to the safety of the designated viewing area.The Cessnas load up with people, fly around the general area for :15 minutes or so, and return to pickup another group of people. This might go for 6–8 cycles before the pilot takes a break to refuel, verify oil, and rehydrate himself/herself.It can be done safely and in compliance with the FARs. Weight and balance limits can be calculated and verified with bathroom scales.Safety breaks down where the operating protocol allows the pilots to stop and trade out passenger loads while leaving the engine running.I've been told, “that's why we have the Safety Officer escorting the people, to prevent anyone walking into the propeller; and we marked painted lines and instructed everyone to stay within the marked passenger lane. ” But calling someone a Safety Officer doesn't necessarily make anyone safe, and airsick passengers and young children may ignore the painted lines.The real reason, I'm so often informed, is that the owners don't want to burn out their starters. Better to leave the engine running and “save” the starter.The numbers don't compute. A starter typically lasts 1000 hours on a little airplane and costs about $800 to replace. That's less than a dollar per start. But killing a child (as just one possibility) would “cost” far more than that. Simply, if you can't afford the cost to do 10 engine starts that day, you shouldn't be flying.Some airplanes have fuel injected engines, and fuel injected engines are notorious for being difficult to start while the engine is hot. An Aviation Day series of joyrides poses a real dilemma about starting. This “hard-to-start” characteristic isn't dangerous, just inconvenient.How do we handle this? Answer: park the bigger, faster, nicer airplanes with fuel injected engines and use only carbureted engines such as those on a Cessna Skyhawk or a Piper Cherokee.I started off talking about solo students panicking and finish with a dissertation on why we teach students to fly a certain way. To those who stayed with me, thanks for reading.

From the FAA report:2.8 Survival AspectsPrelanding preparation improved the prospects of survivability for those occupants seated in areas where the fuselage remained intact. Passengers were in protective brace positions, seatbelts were tightly fastened, and the cabin was properly secured.With the exception of two elderly passengers who died of asphyxia from smoke inhalation, all of the occupants in rows 9-21 were able to evacuate in spite of smoke from the postcrash fire. Although most passengers were able to escape without assistance, several passengers stated that they were assisted by other passengers.The ceiling structure collapsed throughout the fuselage; however, the greatest amount of collapse was found in the area near the left wingbox. Consequently, passengers in that section of the fuselage had less space available in which to extricate themselves from their seats and escape. Thirty three passengers in this section died of smoke inhalation: twelve of those 33 passengers had blunt trauma injuries that may have incapacitated them or slowed their escape; the other 21 persons did not sustain blunt trama injuries. Escape for those passengers seated on the left side of cabin in rows 22-30 was hampered by the hazardous combination of fuselage crush and immediate exposure to the smoke entering the fuselage. Most passengers on the right side of the cabin in rows 22-30 were able to escape because there was less crushing in that area.The other fatalities resulted from blunt force impact injuries. These passengers were located in areas where the structural integrity of the airplane was destroyed during the impact sequence.Current FAA regulations allow occupants who have not reached their second birthday to be held in the lap an adult. The Safety Board believes that this regulation does not adequately protect occupants under age 2 and urged the FAA to require that infants and small children be restrained in child safety seats appropriate to their height and weight. The Safety Board believes that time consuming flight attendant duties, such as providing special brace-for-impact instructions for unrestrained infants, answering questions about those instructions, and distributing pillows in an effort to enhance the effectiveness of adult lap belts on small children, could be reduced if child restraint was mandatory. Thus, flight attendants could devote more time to other important duties while they prepare the cabin for an emergency landing. The Safety Board issued Recommendations A-90-78 and A-90-79 to address the child restraint issue on May 30, 1990. (See section 4).When the engine failure occurred, the flight attendants were conducting a meal service. The captain contacted the senior flight attendant and instructed her to prepare the cabin for an emergency landing.There were two types of cabin preparation contained in UAL's Land Evacuation Checklist: Full Cabin Preparation (over 10 minutes) and Short Notice Emergency Landing Preparation (under 10 minutes). Both types of preparation required the senior flight attendant to determine how much time was available prior to landing. The senior flight attendant determined to keep things "normal" in the cabin and delayed the emegency cabin preparations. Although the delay did not affect the eventual safety of passengers, the Safety Board believes that the senior flight attendant's primary goals should have been to ensure that there was adequate time to complete a full cabin preparation in the face of an obviously severe emergency.

Well, if one paid attention to the safety briefing, then they’ll remember this part:In the event of a loss in cabin pressure, an oxygen mask will drop automatically from the panel above your seat. Pull the mask towards you to start the flow of oxygen. Place the mask over your mouth and nose and breathe normally. The bag attached to the mask may not inflate. This is normal.If you are traveling with small children or others who may need assistance, put on your own mask first before assisting your child or companion.The point of putting on your own mask is that in the event of an explosive decompression where the pressure loss is sudden and complete (like what happened on Southwest Airlines flight 1380,) at higher altitudes, the period of effective consciousness is measured in seconds before the effects of hypoxia start to take hold. If you lose consciousness before you’re able to put on your own mask (but you got a mask on your five year old, for example,) then your child or companion can’t help you. By helping yourself first, you stay conscious and can help your child or companion. They may lose consciousness before you get their mask on, but once the oxygen flows, they’ll regain it.Here’s the physics of the situation: An A350 or B787, for example, can cruise at 40,000 feet or higher. If the cabin pressure is suddenly lost, the pilots are going to spend the first few seconds running the memory items of the loss of cabin pressure checklist. That includes, before anything else, donning their own oxygen masks. Then they have to work the problem. They’ll start an autopilot controlled rapid descent. That means descending at Mmo with the engines at flight idle and the spoilers deployed. Whatever descent rate they get out of that is as fast as the aircraft can descend, but 6,000 ft/min is not unheard of. However, that descent rate doesn’t happen immediately.The Death Zone on Mt. Everest starts at 26,000 ft. This is for climbers who are typically in peak physical condition. Their cardiovascular systems are extremely efficient at pulling what little oxygen there is at that altitude out of the air they breathe in. Mom and pop vacationing traveler likely isn’t in as good as physical condition.Anyhow, 14,000 ft to lose to get down below the Death Zone. At that point, the air pressure is enough to prevent serious medical issues from hypoxia. That’s likely three minutes, minimum. In medicine, there’s the rule of 3’s - 3 months without food, 3 days without water and 3 minutes without oxygen to avoid serious health problems or death.Once the aircraft descends into thicker air, the passengers won’t have to contend with hypoxia any longer. Typically the target altitude is 10,000 ft unless there are mountains above that height that are in the direct flight path of the aircraft. The masks don’t trigger below 14,000 ft pressure altitude. The O2 canisters that are creating the oxygen by an exothermic chemical reaction will last about 15 minutes or so, whether one is breathing the oxygen or not. Plenty of time for the descent.So, put on your own mask first, then help others if they need it. You’re no good to anyone else if you pass out. There are always extra masks in a row, just in case a flight attendant has to use one or, as the question states, one has a lap child and the row is full.As for pets, well they’re on their own as the emergency masks aren’t designed for pets. One can try to get an unused mask near enough to the pet that the oxygen they do get is enough and they’re concerned about their pet because of pre-existing conditions or the pet is a breed with known breathing issues.