Cabin pressurization

Cabin pressure redirects here. For other uses, see requirement above 8,000 feet (2,400 m). The principal
Cabin Pressure (disambiguation).
physiological problems are listed below. Pressurization
Cabin pressurization is a process in which conditioned of the cargo hold is also required to prevent damage to
pressure-sensitive goods that might leak, expand, burst or
be crushed on re-pressurization.
Hypoxia The lower partial pressure of oxygen at altitude
reduces the alveolar oxygen tension in the lungs and
subsequently in the brain, leading to sluggish thinking, dimmed vision, loss of consciousness, and ultimately death. In some individuals, particularly those
with heart or lung disease, symptoms may begin as
low as 5,000 feet (1,500 m), although most passengers can tolerate altitudes of 8,000 feet (2,400 m)
without ill eect. At this altitude, there is about 25%
less oxygen than there is at sea level.[2]
Hypoxia may be addressed by the administration of supplemental oxygen, either through an oxygen mask
or through a nasal cannula. Without pressurization,
sucient oxygen can be delivered up to an altitude
of about 40,000 feet (12,000 m). This is because
a person who is used to living at sea level needs
about 0.20 bar partial oxygen pressure to function
normally and that pressure can be maintained up to
about 40,000 feet (12,000 m) by increasing the mole
fraction of oxygen in the air that is being breathed.
At 40,000 feet (12,000 m), the ambient air pressure
falls to about 0.2 bar, at which maintaining a minimum partial pressure of oxygen of 0.2 bar requires
breathing 100% oxygen using an oxygen mask.

The pressurization controls on a Boeing 737-800

air is pumped into the cabin of an aircraft or spacecraft,

in order to create a safe and comfortable environment
for passengers and crew ying at high altitudes. For aircraft, this air is usually bled o from the gas turbine engines at the compressor stage, and for spacecraft, it is
carried in high-pressure, often cryogenic tanks. The air
is cooled, humidied, and mixed with recirculated air if
necessary, before it is distributed to the cabin by one or
more environmental control systems.[1] The cabin pressure is regulated by the outow valve.

Emergency oxygen supply masks in the passenger compartment of airliners do not need to be pressuredemand masks because most ights stay below
40,000 feet (12,000 m). Above that altitude the partial pressure of oxygen will fall below 0.2 bar even
at 100% oxygen and some degree of cabin pressurization or rapid descent will be essential to avoid the
risk of hypoxia.
Altitude sickness Hyperventilation, the bodys most
common response to hypoxia, does help to partially restore the partial pressure of oxygen in the
blood, but it also causes carbon dioxide (CO2 )
to out-gas, raising the blood pH and inducing
alkalosis.
Passengers may experience fatigue,
nausea, headaches, sleeplessness, and (on extended
ights) even pulmonary oedema. These are the same
symptoms that mountain climbers experience, but
the limited duration of powered ight makes the

Need for cabin pressurization

Pressurization becomes necessary at altitudes above

12,500 feet (3,800 m) to 14,000 feet (4,300 m) above
sea level to protect crew and passengers from the risk of
a number of physiological problems caused by the low
outside air pressure above that altitude. It also serves to
generally increase passenger comfort and is a regulatory
1

CABIN ALTITUDE

development of pulmonary oedema unlikely. Altitude sickness may be controlled by a full pressure
suit with helmet and faceplate, which completely envelops the body in a pressurized environment; however, this is impractical for commercial passengers.
Decompression sickness The low partial pressure of
gases, principally nitrogen (N2 ) but including all
other gases, may cause dissolved gases in the bloodstream to precipitate out, resulting in gas embolism,
or bubbles in the bloodstream. The mechanism
is the same as that of compressed-air divers on
ascent from depth. Symptoms may include the
early symptoms of the bendstiredness, forgetfulness, headache, stroke, thrombosis, and subcutaneous itchingbut rarely the full symptoms thereof.
Decompression sickness may also be controlled by
a full-pressure suit as for altitude sickness.
Barotrauma As the aircraft climbs or descends, passengers may experience discomfort or acute pain as
gases trapped within their bodies expand or contract.
The most common problems occur with air trapped
in the middle ear (aerotitus) or paranasal sinuses by
a blocked Eustachian tube or sinuses. Pain may also
be experienced in the gastrointestinal tract or even
the teeth (barodontalgia). Usually these are not seAn empty bottle, closed during a commercial ight with a cabin
vere enough to cause actual trauma but can result in altitude of around 8,000 ft, is crushed by the pressure at ground
soreness in the ear that persists after the ight and level after descent.
can exacerbate or precipitate pre-existing medical
conditions, such as pneumothorax.
descent until the interior cabin pressure matches the ambient air pressure of the destination.

Cabin altitude

The pressure inside the cabin is technically referred to as

the equivalent eective cabin altitude or more commonly
as the cabin altitude. This is dened as the equivalent altitude above mean sea level having the same atmospheric
pressure according to a standard atmospheric model such
as the International Standard Atmosphere. Thus a cabin
altitude of zero would have the pressure found at mean
sea level, which is taken to be 101,325 pascals (14.696
psi).[3]

2.1

Aircraft

In practice, cabin altitude is almost never kept at zero due

to design limits of the fuselage and practical considerations for landing at airports located above sea level. In
a typical pressurization approach for a commercial passenger plane, the cabin altitude of an aircraft planning
to cruise at 40,000 ft (12,000 m) is programmed to rise
gradually from the altitude of the airport of origin to
around a maximum of 8,000 ft (2,400 m) (approximately
10.9 psi, or 0.75 atm), and to then reduce gently during

A typical cabin altitude for an aircraft such as the Boeing

767 is 6,900 feet (2,100 m), when cruising at 39,000 feet
(12,000 m).[4] A design goal for many, but not all, newer
aircraft is to lower the cabin altitude, which can be benecial for passenger comfort.[5] For example, the highest
internal cabin altitude of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner is
6,000 feet (1,800 m). The Bombardier Global Express
business jet has one of the lowest cabin altitudes of currently ying aircraft; 4,500 ft (1,400 m) when cruising
at 41,000 feet (12,000 m).[6][7][8] The Airbus A380 has
a cabin altitude of 4,990 feet (1,520 m), which is lower
than that of the Boeing 747-400 (9,010 feet (2,750 m)).[9]
The absolute lowest cabin altitude available on an aircraft
is found on the Emivest SJ30 business jet which features
a sea level cabin altitude when cruising at 41,000 feet
(12,000 m).[10][11]
Keeping the cabin altitude below 8,000 ft (2,400 m)
generally prevents signicant hypoxia, altitude sickness,
decompression sickness, and barotrauma. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regulations in the U.S. mandate that under normal operating conditions, the cabin altitude may not exceed this threshold at the maximum operating altitude of the aircraft. This mandatory maximum
cabin altitude does not eliminate all physiological prob-

3
lems; passengers with conditions such as pneumothorax
are advised not to y until fully healed, and people suffering from a cold or other infection may still experience
pain in the ears and sinuses. Scuba divers ying within
the no y period after a dive are at risk for decompression sickness because the accumulated nitrogen in their
bodies can form bubbles when exposed to reduced cabin
pressure.
Before 1996, approximately 6,000 large commercial
transport airplanes were type-certicated to y up to
45,000 ft (14,000 m) without having to meet high-altitude
special conditions.[12] In 1996, the FAA adopted Amendment 25-87, which imposed additional high-altitude
cabin pressure specications for new-type aircraft designs. Aircraft certied to operate above 25,000 ft (7,600
m) must be designed so that occupants will not be exposed to cabin pressure altitudes in excess of 15,000 ft
(4,600 m) after any probable failure condition in the pressurization system.[13] In the event of a decompression
which results from any failure condition not shown to
be extremely improbable, the plane must be designed
such that occupants will not be exposed to a cabin altitude exceeding 25,000 ft (7,600 m) for more than 2
minutes, nor to an altitude exceeding 40,000 ft (12,000
m) at any time.[13] In practice, that new Federal Aviation
Regulations amendment imposes an operational ceiling
of 40,000 ft (12,000 m) on the majority of newly designed commercial aircraft.[14][15] Aircraft manufacturers
can apply for a relaxation of this rule if the circumstances
warrant it. In 2004, Airbus acquired an FAA exemption
to allow the cabin altitude of the A380 to reach 43,000
ft (13,000 m) in the event of a decompression incident
and to exceed 40,000 ft (12,000 m) for one minute. This
allows the A380 to operate at a higher altitude than other
newly designed civilian aircraft.[14]

2.2

Spacecraft

Russian engineers have chosen to use an air-like nitrogen/oxygen mixture, kept at a cabin altitude near zero at
all times, in their 1961 Vostok, 1964 Voskhod, and 1967
to present Soyuz spacecraft.[16] This requires a heavier
space vehicle design, because the spacecraft cabin structure must withstand the stress of 14.7 pounds per square
inch (1.01 bar) against the vacuum of space, and also because an inert nitrogen mass must be carried. Care must
also be taken to avoid decompression sickness when cosmonauts perform extravehicular activity, as current soft
space suits are pressurized with pure oxygen at relatively
low pressure in order to provide reasonable exibility.[17]

used 27,000 feet (8,200 m) (5.0 pounds per square inch

(0.34 bar))[22] in space. This allowed for a lighter space
vehicle design. Before launch, the pressure was kept at
slightly higher than sea level (a constant 5.3 pounds per
square inch (0.37 bar) above ambient for Gemini, and
2 pounds per square inch (0.14 bar) above sea level at
launch for Apollo), and transitioned to the space cabin
altitude during ascent. However, the high pressure pure
oxygen atmosphere proved to be a fatal re hazard in
Apollo, contributing to the deaths of the entire crew of
Apollo 1 during a 1967 ground test. After this, NASA
revised its procedure to use a 40% nitrogen/60% oxygen
mix at zero cabin altitude at launch, but kept the lowpressure pure oxygen in space.
After Apollo, the United States chose to use air-like
cabin atmospheres for its Skylab, Space Shuttle, and the
International Space Station.

3 Mechanics
Pressurization is achieved by the design of an airtight
fuselage engineered to be pressurized with a source of
compressed air and controlled by an environmental control system (ECS). The most common source of compressed air for pressurization is bleed air extracted from
the compressor stage of a gas turbine engine, from a low
or intermediate stage and also from an additional high
stage; the exact stage can vary depending on engine type.
By the time the cold outside air has reached the bleed air
valves, it is at a very high pressure and has been heated to
around 200 C (392 F). The control and selection of high
or low bleed sources is fully automatic and is governed by
the needs of various pneumatic systems at various stages
of ight.[23]
The part of the bleed air that is directed to the ECS is then
expanded and cooled to a suitable temperature by passing
it through a heat exchanger and air cycle machine known
as the packs system. In some larger airliners, hot trim air
can be added downstream of air conditioned air coming
from the packs if it is needed to warm a section of the
cabin that is colder than others.

At least two engines provide compressed bleed air

for all the planes pneumatic systems, to provide full
redundancy. Compressed air is also obtained from the
auxiliary power unit (APU), if tted, in the event of an
emergency and for cabin air supply on the ground before
the main engines are started. Most modern commercial
aircraft today have fully redundant, duplicated electronic
By contrast, the United States chose to use a pure oxy- controllers for maintaining pressurization along with a
gen atmosphere for its 1961 Mercury, 1965 Gemini, and manual back-up control system.
1967 Apollo spacecraft, mainly in order to avoid decom- All exhaust air is dumped to atmosphere via an outow
pression sickness.[18][19] Mercury used a cabin altitude of valve, usually at the rear of the fuselage. This valve con24,800 feet (7,600 m) (5.5 pounds per square inch (0.38 trols the cabin pressure and also acts as a safety relief
bar));[20] Gemini used an altitude of 25,700 feet (7,800 valve, in addition to other safety relief valves. If the aum) (5.3 pounds per square inch (0.37 bar));[21] and Apollo tomatic pressure controllers fail, the pilot can manually

HISTORY

Outow and pressure relief valve on a Boeing 737-800

control the cabin pressure valve, according to the backup

emergency procedure checklist. The automatic controller
normally maintains the proper cabin pressure altitude by
constantly adjusting the outow valve position so that the
cabin altitude is as low as practical without exceeding
the maximum pressure dierential limit on the fuselage.
The pressure dierential varies between aircraft types,
typical values are between 7.8 psi (54 kPa) and 9.4 psi
(65 kPa).[24] At 39,000 feet (12,000 m), the cabin pressure would be automatically maintained at about 6,900
feet (2,100 m) (450 feet (140 m) lower than Mexico Passenger oxygen mask deployment
City), which is about 11.5 psi (79 kPa) of atmosphere
pressure.[23]
for each seat. The oxygen systems have sucient oxygen
Some aircraft, such as the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, have
for all on board and give the pilots adequate time to dere-introduced electric compressors previously used on
scend to below 8,000 ft (2,400 m). Without emergency
piston-engined airliners to provide pressurization.[25] The
oxygen, hypoxia may lead to loss of consciousness and
use of electric compressors increases the electrical gena subsequent loss of control of the aircraft. The time of
eration load on the engines and introduces a number of
useful consciousness varies according to altitude. As the
stages of energy transfer, therefore it is unclear whether
pressure falls the cabin air temperature may also plumthis increases the overall eciency of the aircraft air hanmet to the ambient outside temperature with a danger of
dling system. It does, however, remove the danger of
hypothermia or frostbite.
chemical contamination of the cabin, simplify engine design, avert the need to run high pressure pipework around In jet ghter aircraft, the small size of the cockpit means
that any decompression will be very rapid and would not
the aircraft, and provide greater design exibility.
allow the pilot time to put on an oxygen mask. Therefore,
ghter jet pilots and aircrew are required to wear oxygen
masks at all times.[26]

Unplanned decompression

On June 30, 1971, the crew of Soyuz 11, Soviet cosmonauts Georgy Dobrovolsky, Vladislav Volkov, and Viktor
Main article: Uncontrolled decompression
Patsayev were killed after the cabin vent valve accidenUnplanned loss of cabin pressure at altitude is rare but tally opened before atmospheric re-entry. There had been
has resulted in a number of fatal accidents. Failures range no indication of trouble until the recovery team opened
from sudden, catastrophic loss of airframe integrity (ex- the capsule and found the dead crew.[27][28]
plosive decompression) to slow leaks or equipment malfunctions that allow cabin pressure to drop undetected to
levels that can lead to unconsciousness or severe performance degradation of the aircrew.

5 History

Any failure of cabin pressurization above 10,000 feet

(3,000 m) requires an emergency descent to 8,000 feet
(2,400 m) or the closest to that while maintaining terrain The aircraft that pioneered pressurized cabin systems inclearance (MSA), and the deployment of an oxygen mask clude:

5
Packard-Le Pre LUSAC-11, (1920, a modied forced into it by small external turbines.[29] The chamber
French design, not actually pressurized but with an had a hatch only 22 in (0.56 m) in diameter that would
enclosed, oxygen enriched cockpit)
be sealed by the pilot at 3,000 ft.[29] The chamber contained only one instrument, an altimeter, while the con Engineering Division USD-9A, a modied Airco ventional cockpit instruments were all mounted outside
DH.9A (1921 - the rst aircraft to y with the addi- the chamber, visible through ve small portholes.[29] The
tion of a pressurized cockpit module)
rst attempt to operate the aircraft was again made by
Junkers Ju 49 (1931 - a German experimental air- Lt. John A. McCready, who discovered that the turbine
craft purpose-built to test the concept of cabin pres- was forcing air into the chamber faster than the small
release valve provided could release it.[29] As a result,
surization)
the chamber quickly over pressurized, and the ight was
Farman F.1000 (1932 - a French record breaking abandoned.[29] A second attempt had to be abandoned
pressurised cockpit, experimental aircraft)
when the pilot discovered at 3,000 ft that he was too short
[29]
Chizhevski BOK-1 (1936 - a Russian experimental to close the chamber hatch. The rst successful ight
was nally made by test pilot Lt. Harrold Harris, making
aircraft)
it the worlds rst ight by a pressurized aircraft.[29]
Lockheed XC-35 (1937 - an American pressurized
The rst airliner with a pressurized cabin was the Boeing
aircraft. Rather than a pressure capsule enclosing
307 Stratoliner, built in 1938, prior to World War II,
the cockpit, the monocoque fuselage skin was the
though only ten were produced. The 307s pressure compressure vessel.)
partment was from the nose of the aircraft to a pres Renard R.35 (1938 - the rst pressurized piston air- sure bulkhead in the aft just forward of the horizontal
stabilizer.[30]
liner, which crashed on rst ight)
Boeing 307 (1938 - the rst pressurized airliner to
enter commercial service)
Lockheed Constellation (1943 - the rst pressurized
airliner in wide service)
Avro Tudor (1946 - rst British pressurized airliner)
de Havilland Comet (British, Comet 1 1949 - the
rst jetliner, Comet 4 1958 - resolving the Comet 1
problems)
Tupolev Tu-144 and Concorde (1968 USSR and
1969 Anglo-French respectively - rst to operate at
very high altitude)
SyberJet SJ30 (2005) First civilian business jet to
certify 12.0 psi pressurization system allowing for a
sea level cabin at 41,000 feet.
In the late 1910s, attempts were being made to achieve
higher and higher altitudes. In 1920, ights well over
37,000 ft were rst achieved by test pilot Lt. John A.
Macready in a Packard-Le Pre LUSAC-11 biplane at
McCook Field in Dayton, Ohio.[29] The ight was possible by releasing stored oxygen into the cockpit, which was
released directly into an enclosed cabin and not to an oxygen mask, which was developed later.[29] With this system
ights nearing 40,000 ft (12,000 m) were possible, but the
lack of atmospheric pressure at that altitude caused the
pilots heart to enlarge visibly, and many pilots reported
health problems from such high altitude ights.[29] Some
early airliners had oxygen masks for the passengers for
routine ights.

World War II era ying helmet and oxygen mask

World War II was a catalyst for aircraft development. Initially, the piston aircraft of World War II, though they
often ew at very high altitudes, were not pressurized
and relied on oxygen masks.[31] This became impractical with the development of larger bombers where crew
were required to move about the cabin and this led to the
rst bomber with cabin pressurization (though restricted
to crew areas), the Boeing B-29 Superfortress. The control system for this was designed by Garrett AiResearch
Manufacturing Company, drawing in part on licensing of
patents held by Boeing for the Stratoliner.[32]

In 1921, a Wright-Dayton USD-9A reconnaissance bi- Post-war piston airliners such as the Lockheed Constelplane was modied with the addition of a completely en- lation (1943) extended the technology to civilian service.
closed air-tight chamber that could be pressurized with air The piston engined airliners generally relied on electrical

7 FOOTNOTES

compressors to provide pressurized cabin air. Engine su- The designed operating cabin altitude for new aircraft is
percharging and cabin pressurization enabled planes like falling and this is expected to reduce any remaining physthe Douglas DC-6, the Douglas DC-7, and the Constel- iological problems.
lation to have certied service ceilings from 24,000 ft to
28,000 ft. Designing a pressurized fuselage to cope with
that altitude range was within the engineering and met- 6 See also
allurgical knowledge of that time. The introduction of
jet airliners required a signicant increase in cruise alti Aerotoxic syndrome
tudes to the 30,00041,000 feet (9,10012,500 m) range,
where jet engines are more fuel ecient. That increase in
Air cycle machine
cruise altitudes required far more rigorous engineering of
Atmosphere (unit)
the fuselage, and in the beginning not all the engineering
problems were fully understood.
Compressed air
The worlds rst commercial jet airliner was the British
Fume event
de Havilland Comet (1949) designed with a service ceiling of 36,000 ft (11,000 m). It was the rst time that
Rarefaction
a large diameter, pressurized fuselage with windows had
Space suit
been built and own at this altitude. Initially, the design
was very successful but two catastrophic airframe failures
Time of useful consciousness
in 1954 resulting in the total loss of the aircraft, passengers and crew grounded what was then the entire world jet
airliner eet. Extensive investigation and groundbreaking engineering analysis of the wreckage led to a num- 7 Footnotes
ber of very signicant engineering advances that solved
the basic problems of pressurized fuselage design at alti- [1] Brain, Marshall (April 12, 2011). How Airplane Cabin
Pressurization Works. How Stu Works. Retrieved Detude. The critical problem proved to be a combination of
cember 31, 2012.
an inadequate understanding of the eect of progressive
metal fatigue as the fuselage undergoes repeated stress cy- [2] K. Baillie and A. Simpson. Altitude oxygen calculator.
cles coupled with a misunderstanding of how aircraft skin
Retrieved 2006-08-13. - Online interactive altitude oxystresses are redistributed around openings in the fuselage
gen calculator
such as windows and rivet holes.
The critical engineering principles concerning metal fatigue learned from the Comet 1 program[33] were applied directly to the design of the Boeing 707 (1957) and
all subsequent jet airliners. One immediately noticeable
legacy of the Comet disasters is the oval windows on every jet airliner; the metal fatigue cracks that destroyed
the Comets were initiated by the small radius corners on
the Comet 1s almost square windows. The Comet fuselage was redesigned and the Comet 4 (1958) went on to
become a successful airliner, pioneering the rst transatlantic jet service, but the program never really recovered
from these disasters and was overtaken by the Boeing
707.

[3] Auld, D.J.; Srinivas, K. (2008). Properties of the Atmosphere. Retrieved 2008-03-13.
[4] Commercial Airliner Environmental Control System:
Engineering Aspects of Cabin Air Quality (PDF).
[5] Manufacturers aim for more comfortable cabin climate.
Flightglobal. 19 Mar 2012.
[6] Bombardiers Stretching Range on Global Express
Global Express XRS. Aero-News Network. October 7,
2003.
[7] Bombardier Global Express XRS Factsheet (PDF).
Bombardier. 2011.
[8] Aircraft Environmental Control Systems (PDF). Car-

leton University. 2003.

Concorde had to deal with unusually high pressure differentials because it ew at unusually high altitude (up to
[9] Airlines are cutting costs Are patients with respiratory
60,000 feet (18,000 m)) and maintained a cabin altitude
diseases paying the price?". European Respiratory Society.
[34]
This made the aircraft signiof 6,000 ft (1,800 m).
2010.
cantly heavier and contributed to the high cost of a ight.
The Concorde also had smaller cabin windows than most [10] FLIGHT TEST: Emivest SJ30 - Long-range rocket Retrieved 27 September 2012.
other commercial passenger aircraft in order to slow the
rate of decompression if a window failed.[35] The high [11] SJ30-2, United States of America Retrieved 27 Septemcruising altitude also required the use of high pressure
ber 2012.
oxygen and demand valves at the emergency masks unlike
the continuous-ow masks used in conventional airliners. [12] Final Policy FAR Part 25 Sec. 25.841 07/05/1996|Attachment 4.

[13] FARs, 14 CFR, Part 25, Section 841.

[14] Exemption No. 8695. Renton, Washington: Federal

Aviation Authority. 2006-03-24. Retrieved 2008-10-02.
[15] Steve Happenny (2006-03-24). PS-ANM-03-112-16.
Federal Aviation Authority. Retrieved 2009-09-23.
[16] Gatland, Kenneth (1976). Manned Spacecraft (Second
ed.). New York: MacMillan. p. 256.
[17] Gatland, p. 134
[18] Catchpole, John (2001). Project Mercury - NASAs First
Manned Space Programme. Chichester, UK: Springer
Praxis. p. 410. ISBN 1-85233-406-1.
[19] Giblin, Kelly A. (Spring 1998). "'Fire in the Cockpit!'".
American Heritage of Invention & Technology (American
Heritage Publishing) 13 (4). Archived from the original
on November 20, 2008. Retrieved March 23, 2011.
[20] Gatland, p. 264
[21] Gatland, p. 269
[22] Gatland, p. 278,284
[23] Commercial Airliner Environmental Control System Engineering Aspects of Cabin Air Check |url= scheme
(help).
[24] Dierential Pressure Characteristics of Aircraft.
[25] Boeing 787 from the Ground Up
[26] Jedick MD/MBA, Rocky (28 April 2013). Hypoxia.
goightmedicine.com. Go Flight Medicine. Retrieved 17
March 2014.
[27] Time Magazine (12 July 1971). Triumph and Tragedy of
Soyuz 11. Time Magazine. Retrieved 20 October 2007.
[28] Encyclopedia Astronautica (2007). Soyuz 11. Encyclopedia Astronautica. Retrieved 20 October 2007.
[29] Cornelisse, Diana G. (2002). Splended Vision, Unswerving Purpose; Developing Air Power for the United States
Air Force During the First Century of Powered Flight.
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio: U.S. Air Force
Publications. pp. 128129. ISBN 0-16-067599-5.
[30] William A. Schoneberger and Robert R. H. Scholl, Out of
Thin Air: Garretts First 50 Years, Phoenix: Garrett Corporation, 1985 (ISBN 0-9617029-0-7), p. 275.
[31] Some extremely high ying aircraft such as the Westland
Welkin used partial pressurization to reduce the eort of
using an oxygen mask.
[32] Seymour L. Chapin (August 1966). Garrett and Pressurized Flight: A Business Built on Thin Air. Pacic Historical Review 35: 32943. doi:10.2307/3636792.
[33] R.J. Atkinson, W.J. Winkworth and G.M. Norris (1962).
Behaviour of Skin Fatigue Cracks at the Corners of Windows in a Comet Fuselage (PDF). Ministry of Aviation.
[34] Hepburn, A.N. Human Factors in the Concord. Occupational Medicine, 17: 1967, pp. 4751.
[35] Nunn, John Francis (1993). Nunns applied respiratory
physiology. Butterworth-Heineman. p. 341. ISBN 07506-1336-X.

8 General references
Seymour L. Chapin (August 1966). Garrett and
Pressurized Flight: A Business Built on Thin
Air.
Pacic Historical Review 35: 32943.
doi:10.2307/3636792.
Seymour L. Chapin (July 1971). Patent Interferences and the History of Technology: A High-ying
Example. Technology and Culture 12 (3): 41446.
doi:10.2307/3102997. JSTOR 3102997.
Cornelisse, Diana G. Splended Vision, Unswerving Purpose; Developing Air Power for the United
States Air Force During the First Century of Powered Flight. Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio:
U.S. Air Force Publications, 2002. ISBN 0-16067599-5. pp. 128129.
Portions from the United States Naval Flight Surgeons Manual
CNN: 121 Dead in Greek Air Crash

9 External Links
Video with Cabin Pressurization Demo in Civil Aircraft on YouTube

10

10
10.1

TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

Text

Cabin pressurization Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cabin_pressurization?oldid=675329469 Contributors: Robert Merkel,

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Socrates2008, Sun Creator, Qwfp, DumZiBoT, HIF-1A, Dthomsen8, Alansplodge, Dsimic, Addbot, M.nelson, Lightbot, Bkusmono, Rccoms, Donfbreed, Triquetra, Elizgoiri, Starbois, AnomieBOT, Leyka~enwiki, Citation bot, .45Colt, Gammarian, This is ECS, Shadowjams, GliderMaven, FrescoBot, Tavernsenses, Citation bot 1, Thinking of England, Full-date unlinking bot, DexDor, EmausBot, JustinTime55, Sp33dyphil, ZroBot, Enginesmax, , , Jguy, Correctaboot, Mikhail Ryazanov, ClueBot NG, Siraustintatious, Helpful Pixie
Bot, BG19bot, Rskurat, BattyBot, Cyberbot II, Zackoo77, Paul.levold, Reatlas, Zlelik2000, Monkbot, Laatu, Mfairchildsj30, Inkycallig,
KasparBot, Exit Pursued by Bear, Mitnerf and Anonymous: 133

10.2

Images

File:B-8_winter_helmet_&_A-14_oxygen_mask_(1944).jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f7/B-8_

winter_helmet_%26_A-14_oxygen_mask_%281944%29.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/
shared/media/photodb/photos/071026-F-1234S-020).jpg Original artist: USAF
File:Empty_bottle_crushed_by_cabin_pressurization.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/ae/Empty_bottle_
crushed_by_cabin_pressurization.jpg License: PD Contributors: ? Original artist: ?
File:Outflow.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/72/Outflow.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Own
work Original artist: wsombeck
File:Passenger_oxygen_mask_dsc06035.jpg Source:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fb/Passenger_oxygen_
mask_dsc06035.jpg License: CC-BY-SA-3.0 Contributors: Own work Original artist: David Monniaux
File:Pxctl.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5e/Pxctl.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Own work
Original artist: --Wsombeck 11:38, 21 February 2007 (UTC)wsombeck

10.3

Content license

Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0