UA flight diverted for coffee spill

Hey, that's what killed 53 people on Consolidated Flight 22, right?


For those unfamiliar, find a copy of the 1964 movie "Fate is the Hunter," starring Glenn Ford, Rod Taylor, Nancy Kwan, and a very young Suzanne Pleshette. Suzanne Pleshette was the only survivor, Rod was the "first one to the scene of the accident," and Glenn Ford had to figure out what went wrong, which was a cup of coffee spilled into the center console cutting off radio comm and triggering a false engine fire alarm. As the movie was just rebroadcast a couple of nights ago, somewhat prophetic, I should think.
 
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Of all the codes for the shorting transponder to broadcast, it picked 7500.
 
chucky said:
Of all the codes for the shorting transponder to broadcast, it picked 7500.
Click to expand...
Someone said elsewhere that it wasn't a short -- they cycled through 7500 on their way to 7600 to report the lost comm. Remember -- it only takes one sweep of that 7500 code to trigger the alarms, and once that happens, you cannot put the toothpaste back in the tube. So if you're squawking something with a "5" in the second digit, and you lose comm, be careful to roll it from 5 to 6 before putting the other three to 7x00.
 
Oh, that makes sense.
 
In a highly automated airplane, do they still roll in the squawk code? Even for GA planes there is a digital squawk select.

Given that a single drop of water rendered my entire stereo system OTS, I don't doubt a cuppa coffee could done the trick on a Boeing.
 
Gotta wonder if the diversion was the result of US authorities denying entry back into US airspace with that code squawking. "Out of an abundance of caution".
 
Considering the extent to which modern airliners rely on electronics, I'm not surprised that they diverted.
 
I can just see it now - the pilots co-workers giving him a sippy-cup as a gift!
 
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