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Speaker 1: From the Australian Hiss. What's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.

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Speaker 1: It's Thursday, May twenty three. One hundred thousand Chinese students

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Speaker 1: have swollen the ranks of foreign enrollments at Australia's elite universities.

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Speaker 1: The Australian dot com dot U is revealing today new

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Speaker 1: figures showing overseas enrollments are at their highest ever level

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Speaker 1: for this time of year. The federal government is at

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Speaker 1: war with a tribunal after it released an immigration detainee

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Speaker 1: who'd been convicted of domestic violence offending and now has

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Speaker 1: been charged with murder. The tribunal blamed the minister, and

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Speaker 1: the Coalition says it demonstrates labor has lost control of

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Speaker 1: the detention system. Singapore Airlines is scrambling to recover from

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Speaker 1: a devastating mid air accident that killed one passenger and

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Speaker 1: injured dozens. It was via turbulence, So what caused it

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Speaker 1: and what can passengers do to stay safe? That's today's episode.

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Speaker 2: They'll come about sing of our airlines. As the safety

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Speaker 2: equip mentioned, this aircraft may differ from that on other aircraft.

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Speaker 2: Please give us your attention.

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Speaker 1: We've all heard this announcement, and we've all probably rolled

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Speaker 1: our eyes at the spiel.

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Speaker 2: And the unlikely event off in the emergency or when

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Speaker 2: you hear to command brace brace, assume the brace position.

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Speaker 1: Airlines try to make the safety videos fun in the

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Speaker 1: hope passengers actually watch, and there's a breed of flight

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Speaker 1: attendant who knows how to get everyone's attention.

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Speaker 2: That we're going to show you how to.

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Speaker 3: Fact and make three.

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Speaker 4: If you're coming with children or anyone that's acting like one,

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Speaker 4: make sure you put your own mask personal, look to

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Speaker 4: the letter and look to the raid, and then choose

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Speaker 4: the one with the most earning predential after college, and

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Speaker 4: then work.

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Speaker 2: The beautiful bikini is a quickleather the water active beat

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Speaker 2: it late.

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Speaker 3: How in the world that works, They have no idea,

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Speaker 3: So if you figure it out, please do let me know.

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Speaker 3: And if my chanswers does not in plate, well, grab

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Speaker 3: your neighbor and hold on for dear lady.

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Speaker 1: It's all very entertaining, but maybe we should have been

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Speaker 1: paying attention all along. On Tuesday night, Singapore Airlines flight

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Speaker 1: s K three two one suddenly became seriously scary.

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Speaker 5: As seventy three year old man has died when a

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Speaker 5: flight from London to Singapore experienced extreme and sudden turbulence.

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Speaker 5: The Singapore Airlines flight with fifty six Australians on board

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Speaker 5: an emergency landing in Bangkok. Dozens of other passengers have

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Speaker 5: been taken to hospital as well, including seven people who

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Speaker 5: were critically injured.

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Speaker 1: Passengers have since spoken out about those horrifying few moments.

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Speaker 6: It was instantaneous, It really was in horrible.

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Speaker 4: The entire thing happened within the span of less than

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Speaker 4: ten seconds, Like it was really really quick.

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Speaker 1: And I ended up pitching my head on the ceiling.

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Speaker 5: Some four people are walking around, ended up doing somersaults.

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Speaker 4: I saw people come across the aisle just like going

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Speaker 4: completely horizontal, hitting the ceiling and landing back down and

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Speaker 4: like really a positions.

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Speaker 1: Robin Ironside is the Australian's aviation writer Robin This must

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Speaker 1: have been a terrifying incident for the people on board.

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Speaker 3: Absolutely to be having your breakfast to you two hours

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Speaker 3: from your destination, I should imagine people would have been

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Speaker 3: fairly calm and then all of a sudden, absolute chaos

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Speaker 3: breaks loose. Everything's flying through the air, including people, and

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Speaker 3: nobody actually knew sort of why it was happening and

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Speaker 3: when it would end, and it certainly looked very ugly.

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Speaker 1: The plane was over me and mar at the time,

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Speaker 1: flying from London to Singapore, and there were reports that

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Speaker 1: there were thunderstorms in the area at the time. What

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Speaker 1: do we know about what happened exactly and why.

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Speaker 3: We have seen the radar images which suggest there was

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Speaker 3: some thunderstorm activity. Normally pilots would try to avoid flying

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Speaker 3: close to a thunderstorm so they weren't subject to any

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Speaker 3: sort of turbulence. So we don't really know what was

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Speaker 3: in the pilot's minds if they were attempting to go

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Speaker 3: around a thunderstorm and just clipped the outer edges of it.

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Speaker 3: Speaking to pilots today that have suggested that even the

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Speaker 3: kilometers from a thunderstorm, you can still experience some of

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Speaker 3: the effects in the plane, which you think this plane

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Speaker 3: might have experienced those effects.

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Speaker 1: At seven forty nine am, the Boeing Triple seven three

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Speaker 1: hundred er suddenly went up about fourteen hundred feet and

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Speaker 1: then down about eighteen hundred feet. For a bit of context,

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Speaker 1: the World Trade Center towers in Manhattan were just over

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Speaker 1: thirteen hundred feet high. The Sydney Harbor bridge rises about

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Speaker 1: four hundred and forty feet from the water. This is

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Speaker 1: fourteen hundred feet up, then eighteen hundred feet down in

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Speaker 1: a second or two, and then four minutes later the

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Speaker 1: plane descended another six thousand feet, but this was the

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Speaker 1: pilots beginning their emergency controlled descent into Bangkok. Singapore air

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Speaker 1: Lines is regarded as one of the safest airlines in

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Speaker 1: the world. The last time it experienced a major incident

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Speaker 1: was two thousand, when a plane bound for Los Angeles

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Speaker 1: smashed into construction equipment at a Taiwan airport after it

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Speaker 1: tried to take off from the wrong runway. More than

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Speaker 1: eighty people died.

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Speaker 3: They've got a really good safety records, Singapore Airlines, so

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Speaker 3: it's a terrible blow for them. Their CEO made a

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Speaker 3: video address. They've been doing fairly regular updates on their

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Speaker 3: Facebook page as well as on other social media platforms

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Speaker 3: to inform people of what's happening with that particular flight

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Speaker 3: and with the people on board.

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Speaker 6: On behalf of Singapore Airlines, I would like to express

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Speaker 6: my deepest condolences to the family and loved ones of

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Speaker 6: the DC's We are very sorry for the traumatic experience

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Speaker 6: that everyone on board as Q three to one went through.

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Speaker 3: I think they'll be looking very closely at exactly what

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Speaker 3: happened and to ensure something like this never happens again.

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Speaker 1: So what is turbulence? There are different types. One is

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Speaker 1: called clear air turbulence. It's virtually invisible to pilots and

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Speaker 1: happens when air is moving inside the jet streams. They're

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Speaker 1: the high altitude air currents that ring the globe up

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Speaker 1: where planes travel. Then there's the kind of turbulence encountered

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Speaker 1: by this Singapore air Lines flight. It's caused by moisture

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Speaker 1: in the air from storm activity. Normally, is turbulence dangerous.

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Speaker 3: There's certainly a lot of different variations in turbulence. As

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Speaker 3: you described. You know that that feeling when your stomach drops,

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Speaker 3: I mean that's probably considered a fairly mild form of turbulence,

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Speaker 3: whereas this is probably at the other end of the scale.

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Speaker 3: A lot of flights do experience turbulence, and pilots do

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Speaker 3: plan the journey around that. They do try to minimize

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Speaker 3: it as much as possible. But aircraft are built to

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Speaker 3: withstand a lot of force. They are built to withstand

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Speaker 3: such turbulence as they experienced on this particular flight and

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Speaker 3: fly through it intact.

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Speaker 1: Coming up what we should be doing to stay safe

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Speaker 1: in the air. Exciting news Later this week, we're releasing

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Speaker 1: a new cold case investigative podcast by our friend and

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Speaker 1: colleague Headley Thomas. He created The Teacher's Pet, The Night

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Speaker 1: Driver and Shandy Story, and the new podcast is the

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Speaker 1: gripping mystery of a young mum who tucked her kids

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Speaker 1: into bed one night and was never seen again. To

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Speaker 1: be the first to know when the podcast drops, go

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Speaker 1: to the Australian dot com do au and join our subscribers.

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Speaker 1: We'll be back after this break. In January, a panel

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Speaker 1: suddenly flew off a Boeing plane mid flight.

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Speaker 7: Passengers in the United States have survived a terrifying mid

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Speaker 7: air remergency, and Alaska Airlines flight bound for California was

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Speaker 7: forced to make an emergency landing in Oregon after the

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Speaker 7: door of a brand new aircraft blew out.

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Speaker 1: This thing for Airlines flight was a Boeing aircraft. Boeing's

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Speaker 1: having a tough year, isn't it. Would there be anything

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Speaker 1: to do with the make of this aircraft that has

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Speaker 1: contributed to this? Do you think, Robin No, I don't

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Speaker 1: think so.

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Speaker 3: In this instance. I think it's probably just a bit

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Speaker 3: of bad luck for Boeing. Again, I'm sure they weren't

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Speaker 3: terribly thrilled to hear that it was a Boeing Triple

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Speaker 3: seven that was involved in this incident. Boeing have thousands

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Speaker 3: of aircraft that fly around the world every day, as

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Speaker 3: do Airbus, and it was just probably unlucky that this

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Speaker 3: particular incident involved a Boeing Triple seven.

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Speaker 1: I remember reading an article by a pilot talking about

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Speaker 1: turbul and why it was nothing to worry about, and

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Speaker 1: he compared it to being in a boat on a

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Speaker 1: slightly bumpy lake. He said, the plane's going to bump

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Speaker 1: up and down a little bit, but you're completely safe.

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Speaker 1: You know, you're not going to fall out of the sky.

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Speaker 1: Is that still right?

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Speaker 3: Well, you'd certainly like to think so. And just given

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Speaker 3: the safety record of jet aircraft, it's quite incredible. Last

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Speaker 3: year and twenty twenty three there were no fatal jet

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Speaker 3: airliner incidents. It's quite extraordinary. So far on twenty twenty four,

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Speaker 3: we'll have to say that there has been one fatality

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Speaker 3: with this unfortunate gentleman on this particular flight. So I

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Speaker 3: guess we're already doing worse than we did the previous year,

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Speaker 3: but it's still incredibly safe. When you think of the

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Speaker 3: billions and millions of people who fly every day and

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Speaker 3: the very low level of incidents, it's much safer than

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Speaker 3: getting in your car and driving to work.

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Speaker 1: So how important are those safety briefings?

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Speaker 3: I think the main takeaway that is the seat belt.

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Speaker 3: I mean, hopefully we won't have to worry about if

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Speaker 3: the oxygen masks fall down. Hopefully we won't have to

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Speaker 3: worry about that life jacket and be relying on that

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Speaker 3: little light and whistle. I wouldn't like to test it out,

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Speaker 3: but the seat belt is something that you can control.

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Speaker 3: I mean, seat belts are an important safety feature of cars.

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Speaker 3: They're just as important, if not more so, in planes.

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Speaker 3: So the idea is to keep them on anytime that

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Speaker 3: you're sitting down, but they understand that every now and

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Speaker 3: then you might have to get up stretch your legs.

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Speaker 3: But if you keep your seat belt on when you're

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Speaker 3: sitting down, that's the best protection that you have from turbulence.

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Speaker 1: Why do you think this story is taken off so much?

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Speaker 1: I'm certainly reading everything I can find about it.

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Speaker 3: I think It's one of those things because we all

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Speaker 3: do travel on planes at some stage, and the idea

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Speaker 3: of being in that very closed environment in such a

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Speaker 3: terrifying situation. I think it's something that we can all

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Speaker 3: relate to a little bit and is one of our

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Speaker 3: worst fears. I mean, as a bit of a nervous flyer,

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Speaker 3: I really don't like turbulence at all, So the idea

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Speaker 3: of having your flight turn into like a rollercoaster ride

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Speaker 3: is really horrifying. It's like anything that happens at aviations.

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Speaker 3: It's the unusualness of it, but still it's still familiar

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Speaker 3: in a lot of ways. So I think that's what

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Speaker 3: makes it resonate with a lot of people.

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Speaker 1: Robin, I feel terrible that we've made you be aviation

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Speaker 1: writer when you're a nervous flyer. Does a job caused

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Speaker 1: this or is it a coincidence.

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Speaker 3: It's a very mild level of anxiety that I experience.

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Speaker 3: I have to say, it's just you know, when that

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Speaker 3: turbulence strikes, though, I always do feel a bit uneasy.

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Speaker 3: I don't know, probably everyone experiences a sense of unease,

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Speaker 3: but yeah, I just think, oh, maybe I'm not such

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Speaker 3: a confident flyer as I like to think I.

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Speaker 1: Am Robin Iroinside is the Australian's aviation reporter, come back

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Speaker 1: to the front to borrow for the big reveal. Headley

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Speaker 1: Thomas will join us to discuss his new podcast in

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Speaker 1: the meantime. Subscribe to get Australia's best journalism at the

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Speaker 1: Australian dot com dot au