Once the pilots failed to respond to the hand-off from ATC, ATC likely asked NW 188 to reconfirm. Not having a response, they’d ask another NW plane nearby to contact via company channels, etc.

After 5-10 minutes of hearing my flight number being searched for, I would probably go find the purser, calmly explain, and suggest she try contacting the cockpit.

Surely the cabin crew or some of the pax should have realised earlier that the aircraft was way overdue to land?

It’s a weird situation.

I loved listening to Channel 9. My best memory is when once flying out of Chicago O’Hare in blizzard conditions – ontime and incredibly surprised that we were flying at all.

The taxiway markers were barely visible, and everything was white – I don’t know how the pilots could tell where they were meant to be.

As we lined up for the runway, the pilots asked control if all was clear for them to go. Control came back and said, “Yes, all looks good, except for a blip halfway down the runway which we think is a luggage cart, but you should be off the ground by then”, followed by a little snigger. The flight crew responded with, “well, we’ll try not to take it with us as we don’t want to be charged for it.” And then we were rolling, with all pax listening to Channel 9 holding our breaths and waiting for the impact thump! We lived.

Sometimes Channel 9 is silent. When this happens, I do NOT assume that there’s something is disastrously wrong. So far my assumptions have been 100 percent correct.

But in this case, would it have been dead silence? Weren’t lots of people trying to contact this flight over a significant period of time, using the last known frequency to which their radio had been tuned?

In that case, we Channel 9 listeners would have heard the increasingly-disturbed controllers calling our flight, with no reply.

THAT would have been disturbing.

And you bet your ass I’d have used the Airphone to call a news station. But what would I have said to the flight attendant? “Yes, ma’am, I rang the call button. Here, take a listen… It appears that we’re toast. Could you maybe ask the crew on the flight deck if they’re dead, or something?”

I believe that Mr. Kalman has an excellent point. I don’t know how much good this would have done.

In a post last week (here?) someone said that the attendants were likely aware that descent was long past due. Can they not reach the flight deck via intercom? If they can, then why didn’t they? If they can’t, then what’s the reward vs the risk for a planeload of passengers suddenly aware that the flight is going on without pilot intervention? (Panic would be my guess).

What I’m asking here is what good could have come from the passengers knowing that the pilots were not paying attention? Conversely, what harm could have come from them acting out? What if they started pounding on the cockpit door? Might one of those groggy pilots have come out with an ax [or handgun]? Might passengers have physical problems (heart attack, even) due to false fright after assuming hijacking? Might some passenger have used an airphone to call a news station?

I can think of lots of things that would have made the event far worse. Unless someone can point out something that would have made it better, I’d just as soon see ch9 off the air.

On a related topic, how much extra flying time (fuel) would that plane be carrying? Would a longer nap have been a tragic problem?