Sunday, April 15, 2007

What happens to an overheated window at FL390

cracked windshieldTake one burned out heating element, apply it to the windshield of a Boeing 757 and what do you get? Have a look at the photo for the answer.

I snagged the photo from the Captain's Log, a blog by an airline captain who writes under the name of FlyGuy. He writes:
There we were minding our own business at Fl 390 when we heard a loud bang, the copilot jumped, and his outside window screen shattered into numerous pieces. This all happened at once and in the blink of an eye. BANG! Then a seriously damaged window.
His blog post, titled Pop Goes the Window (of course!), has more photos -- including one of the burned out heating element that caused the damage -- and tells the rest of the story about this incident.

FlyGuy also reminisces about a particular bird strike experience from his military flying days. The only thing that cracked that time was the poor duck that slammed into that military air transport hardware.

For a good read and interesting photos, click on over to Pop Goes The Window in the Captain's Log.

[Photo Source]