chicken tragedy

[cappy]

A village a few miles from the village i live in has had the most terrible fire in a barn containing 37000 chickens which is the figure lost .....i can only wonder at the panic fear and pain in which these feathered birds endured before there final moment .......it brings to my mind what will happen on these cruise liners carrying thousands when one does have an uncontainable fire aboard.....and it will happen at some stage .....i think jokes about the chicken fire would not be a good thing to read ........R683532 CAPPY

[j.sabourn]

I can’t think of any animal that doesn’t feel pain. Maybe fish don’t judging by the way they pull the barbs out of its mouth if returning it to its own domain. Human beings is one of the worse deaths imaginable , and pity the poor witches of Salem if their story was true. Cheers JS. Then they reckon all cold blooded creatures feel no pain but true or not I don’t know, that would bring in a lot of reptiles JS .

[Keith Tindell]

I know where you are coming from with that Cappy, seeing something dying in fires is not a pretty sight, particularly human beings, not a nice subject, but you would be astounded at the length of the human tongue, in death by fire the tongue hangs out, as a reaction of being unable to breath and is excess of 12-15 inches, terrible sight. with regard to passenger liners of today, i can only imagine, at sea, well alight, and 5000 passengers, and several thousand crew, trying to evacuate the ship. time will tell.

[vic mcclymont]

Latest new ship I on of the Seas can carry 7,000 passengers and a crew of over 2,000.
Vic

[j.sabourn]

Don’t all the people employed as stage hands , usherettes in cinemas and the many many actors and entertainment all classed as crew but in no way can you call seamen . It may sound like a lot of crew but maybe not the crew one would expect for lifesaving they would probably be the first of course the casualty’s themselves.You will find there are also the talkers and the workers , it all shows up in dire circumstances , there is no hiding place , you are either going to save people or be responsible for their deaths . Doing nothing will kill them so like the many sightseers you see at any disaster they are always there doing nothing. JS.

[James Curry]

Doing a survival at sea course in Fleetwood years ago. There was a young girl who was absolutely terrified anytime we entered the pool righting the liferaft exercise. As to the Helo escape she really bricked it. The instructor asked me to buddy up to her. I was well the eldest so he thought I may be the beat tom assist her. We had to jump off the upper deck arrangement around the pool. Special effects wave machine and water spray lights out so a stormy night!!!. Comes to her turn and she froze. Shall we say a nudge in the small of her back assisted her down ward passage. She passed and that was her dream come true as haordresser or some sich job in the cruise worl. I wonder her she got on?

[Keith Tindell]

I think going back to the Costa Concordia, i recall seeing a part video, where the entertainment section of the crew were trying to organise the evacuation. Here on the Solent they do have evacuation exercises, usually on a ferry, which is good, but i don't know how good it would be in a real situation, with as Viv says, a passenger count of 7000, and a crew , probably of 3000+. i have experienced evacuation of large hotels, and there is always confusion. an example with hotels that would probably not affect a cruise liner, but several times in hotel evacuation, and trying to account for everyone registered, some missing, so more BA guys committed to find them, only to find that the missing persons had legged it, most probably booked in with someone other than their wives.

[vic mcclymont]

Keith, on a lot of the larger passenger ships it's the entertainment crew who do the roll call and escorts you to your disembark meant station at emergency muster.
A Deck Officer eventually turns up to check all is going well.
When the emergency station sounds you have to go down to your cabin, pich up your life belt an make your way back up to muster station.
Ships don't carry lifebelts up top.
Vic

[Keith Tindell]

Thing have changed so much Vic, i was on the Stirling Castle, same trip as Vernon, and i remember we had someone go over off the South African coast, cannot remember exactly where, but i remember being amazed how quickly everyone was accounted for , except the missing guy, we never found him, searched for some time. The system of crew members having to check their department members made it a quick result on who it was, turned out to be a crew member who jumped if i recall correctly.Today i could see it being a long time before finding out who it was gone over.

[j.sabourn]

The HUET course was done out here in Australia every 2 year and was compulsory otherwise No helicopter transfer over water. I was 11 years working offshore here so must have done 5 times at least and was the only thing I was pleased about when retired was no more escaping from confined spaces underwater. Before joining a Seismic vessel had to carry 3 more crew wise they were 2 cooks and 1 chief steward . They were flown across from Sydney over to Perth . The chief steward panicked in the mock up helicopter on its first of the 5 escapes from when upside down in the water , he had to be rescusitated when got ashore .He never did the other 4 escapes ,was lucky to be alive , he was sent back to Sydney and a local took his place. He was called the chief steward , but he was the one and only steward on the usual manning for a seismic vessel . He had about 6 cabins to look after as well . JS