The plane is pressurized. It is held together by a very thin aluminum skin stretched over ribs. Break that skin almost anywhere and there is a sudden, progressive cascade of events, each worse than the one before it. Ripples caused by the air current flow down the sides causing even more breakup. From start to finish is typically very short.
Survival of the aircraft from events like the flight that lost a large upper fuselage section as it approached Hawaii are rare. If I recall that was a Boeing and Boeing tends to design with a belt and suspenders approach. I believe this was an Airbus. Airbus has had more of this type structural failure probably because the basic design philosophy is looser.
Explosive decompression resulting in structural disintegration does not happen any longer. It became famous because of the first jet airliner, the Comet, was lost this way. Modern aircraft do not have this weakness.
“The plane is pressurized. It is held together by a very thin aluminum skin stretched over ribs. Break that skin almost anywhere and there is a sudden, progressive cascade of events, each worse than the one before it.”
This is not true. Airplanes are constructed with spars, ribs, formers and stringers. Then they are skinned with aluminum. Composite aircraft are the exception.
Wide body aircraft can have more than one window blow out and still maintain pressurization.