US theater group reenacts horror of plane crashes - Yomiuri Shimbun
A US theatrical troupe is presenting a play that has attracted attention in the New York area recently by focusing on the events of six major air disasters. The play is based on voice recording recovered from the ill-fated planes, including that of the 1985 Japan Airlines crash that killed 520 people.
The stage production, which has been running since November at the Collective: Unconscious Theater in New York, is based on real cockpit conversations recorded on voice recorders on the flights in question, and US pilots have praised the accuracy of the production.
Bereaved family members of the JAL flight victims were also glad to hear about the New York play, believing it may help to remind people about the accidents.
The play is titled "Charlie Victor Romeo," which comes from the phonetic alphabet representation for "cockpit voice recorder," or CVR.
When an airline accident occurs, rescuers usually search very hard for the CVR, as information regarding the cause of the accident is often recorded. Apart for the JAL accident, in which the plane crashed into Mt. Osutaka in Gunma Prefecture, the 70-minutes documentary-style production focuses on a 1989 United Airlines crash is Iowa and an AeroPeru crash in 1996.
Each scene of the play takes place on board a plane. Black-and-white slides projected above the gray cockpit introduce the facts of each flight, including the carrier's name, the date of the crash, the number on board and the type of problem encountered.
In the scene depicting the JAL flight, the slides inform the audience that 509 passengers and 15 crew members were on board, and that the partition separating the pressurized compartments of the plane was broken. The stage lights gradually fade out, and a loud noise echoes in the dark.
A spotlight then comes on and a flight attendant shouts out in Japanese,"Sanso msuku o tsukete kudasai. Tadaima kyu-koka chu" (Please put on your oxygen masks. The flight is going into a nosedive). After that, all lines are spoken in English, reenacting the crew's conversation in the strained situation.
Immediately after the pilot cries out, "Pull up! Pull up!" there is a blackout followed by a huge creashing sound. Slides show that 520 people died and four survived the accident.
The CVR from the JAL flight actually lasts about 30 minutes, but in the show, the crash is summed up in a four-minute scene.
Many US television and radio programs have run reports on the play, and a Web site has been set up by people in the aviation industry praising the accuracy of the production.
"Charlie Victor Romeo is the closest any of us will ever get to experiencing the tense final moments of a commercial flight gone bad," it says on the site, pointing out that the play could be a good lesson in accident prevention.
The theater located in central New York only has about 100 seats, and due to the popularity of the production, it has become hard to get tickets for weekend performances.
Collective: Unconscious' Bob Berger, 38, director and producer of the play, was previously employed as a CNN engineer, and has experience of reporting on aviation accidents.
In August las year, after reading a book about crashes titled "The Black Box," written by a US journalist, Berger said he was reatly impressed by the incredible teamwork shown by crews undersuch unbelieveable pressure and was inspired to transform the book into a stage play to show people the drama and emotion behind the records left of such terrrible events.
In preparation for the play, the actors and actresses met pilots and flight attendants to learn about the technical terms used when used when dealing with emergencies, Berger said. His aim was to verify how closely the play reproduced the events surrounding the accidents.
Audrey Crabtree,31, who plays a co-pilot in the production, said that at first she could not understand why the co-pilot just kept either asking questions to the pilot or answering "yes, yes."
Gradually, she came to think that perhaps the co-piolot she plays was proposing emergency measures to the pilot by imply repeating the questions.
Speaking of the stage production in New York, Kuniko Miyajima of an association formed by the bereaved families of the victims of the JAL crash said, "As the entire picture of the accident is not yet clear, I hope things like this stage play will help to stop people forgetting about the
accident."