Why asiana crash was survivable

The jumbo jet came in at a frighteningly low altitude after a long trans-Pacific flight from South Korea and then, according to passenger reports, seconds before landing, smashed into the edge of the airport runway, tearing off its tail before spinning on its belly.

A fireball erupted, shrouding the plane in clouds of black smoke as rescue crews ran to the scene and passengers climbed out through aircraft doors and the holes that had been ripped into the hull. But by then, everyone had gotten out alive, except for two year-old Chinese students — Ye Mengyuan and Wang Linjia — whose bodies were found on the tarmac. The survival of so many in such dire circumstances does seem like divine luck. But aviation experts point out that fatal jumbo-jet crashes are very rare.

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The injured were being cared for at several hospitals, and at least 22 were in critical condition. While only one in 1. Experts say where you sit on a plane may prove to be the difference between life and death in a crash. Professor Ed Galea of the University of Greenwich, who has spent more than 25 years analyzing how humans react in emergencies, advised that the seconds before impact are the most dangerous.

Galea studied the seating charts of more than plane crashes and interviewed dozens of survivors. He uncovered that survivors move an average of five rows before safely exiting a burning plane.

He also found seats in the rear of a plane were generally safer, as were aisle seats. The survival rate in U.