UK: Emergency evacuation at Stansted slowed by passengers taking cabin baggage

Passengers who insisted on taking their cabin baggage during an emergency evacuation at Stansted airport hindered the escape, an official accident investigation has concluded. A Laudamotion flight to Vienna was accelerating along the runway when the left engine suffered a contained failure. During the subsequent evacuation, 10 passengers were hurt. The Air Accidents Investigation Branch has urged “research to determine how to prevent passengers from obstructing aircraft evacuations by retrieving carry-on baggage”. The report recommends that the EASA build in “a more realistic simulation of passenger behaviour in regard to carry-on baggage in the test criteria and procedures for the emergency demonstration”. Story has more details.<br/>