Stephanie Bevins & Marvin McCombs
Cleveland Center
Over the radio, Jay McCombs tried hard to understand the slow, slurring words muffled among the blaring sirens sounding in the background. The radio was poor, and the pilot difficult to understand, leaving only unintelligible transmission and uncontrollable noise to be heard.
Controllers at Cleveland Center were now faced with the complex and difficult task of deciphering the message if they had any chance of finding a solution. The critical diagnosis that was to come would make all the difference in securing the safety of the Kalitta Learjet, KFS66.
The events unfolded on July 26, 2008 when McCombs accepted the hand-off of KFS66, which appeared to have a stuck mike creating incomprehensible transmissions. Unclear to those in the Center, however, was that the co-pilot’s arm was all the while moving violently and uncontrollably on the other end as the captain worked hard to hand fly the aircraft.
Through the help of another pilot’s translation, Jay learned that the aircraft had declared an emergency. The plane was quickly changing altitude and McCombs immediately began to suggest closer airports, only to receive no reply.
Amid the chaos to translate the captain’s words, fellow controller Stephanie Bevins turns on the receiver so that she can now hear the pilot with her own headset. As she thinks through the symptoms in her head, she concludes that he must be hypoxic, a serious condition involving lack of oxygen due to pressurization problems. She knows immediately that they must descend the aircraft.
Following Bevin’s initiative, McCombs begins bringing the aircraft to the lowest altitude available in order to alleviate the possible oxygen deprivation. Unable to answer questions, the pilot is only able to respond to direct commands that the controllers now begin to voice.
“Descend and maintain,” they repeat.
Remarkably, the captain’s inability to turn on autopilot requires him to have to work in order to fly the airplane, keeping him conscious and the plane airborne. The pilot’s words gradually become more understandable, and around 11,000 feet, he returns to normal and confirms that he had, indeed, been suffering from hypoxia.
Without Bevins and McCombs, there is no telling what would have happened. Bevins’ diagnosis made all the difference to the fate of the passengers, and without McCombs, the necessary actions to solve the problem would not have been taken to get the aircraft down safely. Various individuals were involved in the assistance of KFS66, clearly stated by McCombs who says that “the entire area (Area 5) worked extremely well as a team.”
Seeing that this is amazing story embodied by unusual and startling circumstances, it is clear why this case study has not only been chosen as an Archie winner, but also as a classroom teaching aid at the Civil Aerospace Medical Institute in Oklahoma City.
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