If you are an ardent Action Movie seeker here is what you must know when a bullet hits a plane.
Wouldn’t the plane explode or depressurize as soon as the bullet hit the skin of the airplane?
There are four things that might happen if a person were to fire on an airplane:
- The bullet simply goes through the aluminum skin of the plane and punches a small hole as it exits.
- The bullet hits a window and blows it out.
- The bullet hits wiring hidden in the walls or the floor.
- The bullet hits a fuel tank.
If the bullet simply punctures the skin of an airplane, then it’s no big deal. The cabin of the airplane is pressurized, and the hole creates a small leak, but the pressurization system will compensate for it. A single hole, or even a few holes like this, will have no effect.
If the bullet blows out a window, that’s a problem, A big one. When the window blows, the plane will depressurize in seconds. Since all of the air in the cockpit is rushing toward the missing window, a lot of debris will be heading in that direction with it. If the person sitting next to the window isn’t strapped in, then it’s possible that he or she will get pushed out — another good reason to wear your Safety Belt at all times!
Loss of Cabin Pressure and Potential Bullet Damage
In the meantime, the loss of cabin pressurization creates a problem for everyone on the plane. A commercial airliner flying at 30,000 feet (9,144 meters) is flying slightly higher than the peak of Mount Everest. The air at this altitude is so thin that a person will become incoherent in a matter of a minute or so without supplemental oxygen. That’s why the Oxygen Masks will drop from the panel in the ceiling. If you’re in this situation, putting the mask on quickly, while you’re still thinking clearly, is important.
If the bullet hits wiring (or worse, if the bullet hits something important like the instrument panel in the cockpit), it could cause problems that range from trivial (in-flight entertainment stops working) to severe. The damage depends on what gets hit and how important it is.
Finally, there’s the problem of the fuel tanks. Commercial jets store a lot of their fuel in the wings, but there are also tanks in the fuselage (or body of the aircraft) on many planes. For example, a 747 airplane stores thousands of gallons of fuel in the fuselage. If a bullet were to puncture a tank, it would at least cause a leak and would have some potential to cause an explosion.
Source : Internet