I second... 
the motion!
Posted on 09/25/2007 4:18:21 PM PDT by George from New England
MOSCOW, September 24 (RIA Novosti) - A 15-year-old boy from the Urals suffered acute frostbite after riding the wing of a Boeing-737 plane on a two-hour flight from Perm to Moscow, Russian radio station Mayak reported on Monday.
After clinging on for the entire 1300-kilometer (808-mile) flight to Vnukova Airport, the boy, named Andrei, collapsed onto the tarmac. His arms and legs were so severely frozen that rescuers were at first unable to remove his coat and shoes, the radio station said.
The airport did not confirm the report. "We have no information on this," the Vnukovo press service told RIA Novosti.
However, Moscow's air and water transport control department said the radio's claim was true. A department spokesman said the incident occurred on Friday, and that the boy's parents were immediately informed, and flew to the capital the same day.
Doctors said it was nothing short of a miracle that Andrei survived the flight, with temperatures hitting minus 50 degrees Celsius (-58 Fahrenheit), the radio station said. The Boeing-737 has a cruising speed of 900 kmh (560 mph).
The boy reportedly made the journey after a commonplace domestic dispute. Angry with his father, who reportedly has a drinking problem, and with his mother for siding with her husband in family rows, Andrei ran away to the neighboring village, where his grandmother lives. On reaching the village, he decided to go on, and hitched a 220-km (137-mile) ride to the regional center, Perm, where he was dropped off at the airport.
It remains unclear how Andrei was able to climb on a plane wing un-noticed, and the Perm Airport security service is being asked some serious questions, the radio station said.
Andrei is now being treated in a Moscow hospital, Radio Mayak said.
Why in my day...I used to have to fly 500 miles to school
hanging on the wing of a 747, up hill both ways, some times
my hands would never defrost and the teacher would stand me in the corner and use me for a coat rack...
And you was grateful!
Ding, we have a winner. Of course its BS, I’m surprised it took so long for the ‘lack of oxygen’ reason to be mentioned...
Could be worse, he could have flown Southwest!
I second... the motion!
I don’t believe this.
It looks a lot like CBS.......
I’m not challenging you, its a great story, but I do doubt he held onto the wing. Not possible that long.
Strap on maybe. But @ 300 MPH it can be quite hard to breath even. Not accounting for cold either.
Just to set the record straight. Oxygen is not normally needed for a pilot unless he will be above 12,500’ for half an hour or more. I am acclimated at 8,000’ and my blood oxygen level at 13,000’ while I am flying is above 90%. At !8,000’ things start getting really serious and at 25,000’ people start dying. Everest and K2 are at the 25,000’ level. Everyone at that level is slowly dying. From the 30,000’ to 35,000’ range life expectancy is measured in seconds, as in how long can you hold your breath because as soon as you exhale you will pass out and die.
An hour and a half flight is certainly long enough for the jet to want to reach cruising altitude. The story is a hoax.
Do a Google search and you’ll see that this same story is reported in a gazillion different places. Looks quite real to me. One thing missing in the version linked here is the fact that he was inside a wheel-well, not hanging on outside the wing.
MM (in TX)
Huh ?
In my humble opinion, if not for southwest we would all still be slaves to “21 day advance purchase, round trip, penalties and lose your kids for any changes, and mortgage payment size prices on one way travel”
Southwest makes the others get in line in every market they serve. If they don’t fly there, it usually costs a lot more with a lot less freedom.
I may be a Texas A&M Aggie Former Student... but go ahead and claim B.S. on this story ;-)
TAMU... BTHO the Baylor teddies.
RckyRaCoCo... that is classic!
Another bump here for Southwest.
Without SW we would all be paying so much more.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
>>Why in my day...I used to have to fly 500 miles to school
hanging on the wing of a 747, up hill both ways, some times
my hands would never defrost and the teacher would stand me in the corner and use me for a coat rack... <<
ROFLMAO! I haven’t laughed so hard for a long time! You poor soul... are your arms tired??
It’s a follow-up on the Beslan propaganda. ...tear-jerkers from an evil empire.
now that’s scary! LOL!
are your arms tired??
No, they’re in the safe.
hehe.
You can call me “Armas De Fuego!”
Yeah. No-one could hang on to a wing for 2 hours in flight. Maybe he hid in the wheel well.
Before the FAA put in the 12,500 foot rule, many of us flew regularly higher than that just to get a cooler and smoother ride. Even my 85 HP Culver Cadet could easily top 14,000. But I do remember one trip, coming back to Dallas from Santa Fe in a Stinson at 13,500 on a moonlight night, I mistook Mineral Wells for Ft Worth, so naturally Ft Worth became Dallas, until we got low enough to figure it out. Maybe there was something to the FAA’s “nanny” reasoning after all.
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