drive to 5000ft. after diving.

[MSilvia]

My understanding is its not just the cabin pressure, but also the chance of unexpeced decompression thats the issue. If you were at 8000 ft in the cabin of an aircraft and some part of the pressurization system failed you would be transported to flight altitude very quickly.

Yeah, but at least the little yellow masks would drop from the ceiling so you'd be able to breathe some nice aviation-grade O2, right?

 

[Charlie99]

Yeah, but at least the little yellow masks would drop from the ceiling so you'd be able to breathe some nice aviation-grade O2, right?

It's chemically generated O2, similar to what the Navy uses in firefighting Oxygen Breathing Appuratus (OBAs). The reason the preflight briefing mentions pulling the mask down is that this pulls an igniter to fire off the generator. Only the pilots get the good stuff out of a bottle.

 

[Spoon]

Only the pilots get the good stuff out of a bottle.

wow i never knew that makes sense though as they are the ones flying the plane

 

[DiveGolfSki]

wow i never knew that makes sense though as they are the ones flying the plane

Learned a lot about this from BigJet on this thread:

http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?t=114913