Pilot Declares Emergency Because Of Extreme Hypoxia

There's also this ( ▶ this video ) famous recording of a Learjet 25 crew suffering hypoxia at 32,000 feet. I think it demonstrates quite well that you're _not_ going to lost consciousness within a few seconds at that altitude, although the danger is not to be understated.

The effects of hypoxia are profound on human performance -- it's not as simple as being unconscious and incapacitated, it can be irrational and incoherent. As an example, listen to the incoherency of this professional pilot suffering effects of hypoxia at 32,000 feet (flying a LearJet 25) -- he sounds falling over drunk, complaining about flight control problems, oblivious to the profound effects of hypoxia that he and his copilot are experiencing: ▶ this video Then listen to him after being coached to descend to 11,000 feet when everything really is "A-OK". He sounds like a completely different person at 4:10. The co-pilot who sounds young and spritely at 4:00 (who me? unconscious, nah, just a micro-nap) had this written about him: "the unconscious first officer's arm was moving violently and uncontrolled all the time kicking the controls and thus disengaging the autopilot"). [1] While I find all the wild speculation fascinating, sadly I believe the highest probability explanation is still a fire or depressurization, resulting in a pilot acting incoherently. Of course, all stones should still be turned over in the search, but there's been no evidence so far that changes the scenario above from being the highest probability in my assessment. [1] link

Thanks for saying this, Thomas... The worst part of depression is a sortof profound loneliness. This is the feeling that ends up leading a lot of people towards suicide. There's nobody that "gets" them, and nobody that they can talk to about what they're feeling. They feel isolated from their friends and family, and this feeling is exaggerated by people who don't understand that they are suffering from a neurochecmial/neurophysiological deficiency; not from something that they can just "push through". Imagine telling somebody with cancer that they just have to wake up one day and decide they don't have cancer anymore. What makes all of this worse is the feeling that what you're going through is somehow invalid. Not only are you suffering from the worst kind of emotional pain and loneliness imaginable, but you're being told that you're a fool for it, and that you're a failure or a weakling for not being able to snap out of it. That's dangerous . You know...a lot of my family members are pilots. Part of the training that they go through, something that seems to be constantly drilled into them, is to watch out for hypoxia. This is what happens when you're flying too high without supplemental oxygen, and your body starts malfunctioning. You sound like you're drunk. (This is what hypoxia sounds like, it's terrifying: ▶ this video ). This is recognized as a dangerous part of the job, something to monitor yourself for. I think that hackers need to keep in mind that depression is kindof o