Most liked posts in thread: For 30 Seconds, I became religious.

Adventures in flying!

We were taking the puddle jumper from Charlotte to Asheville, NC - interesting plane - tiny, only one row of 8 or 10 seats down each side, no cockpit door or even a curtain, but it had 4 jet engines - anyway, on approach into Asheville, on flare out and just about to touch down when he slams all 4 throttles to the firewall and stands it as straight up as it will go......

We get up to about 2k altitude and he makes another lazy circle of the airport, and the next time we land perfectly normally - never did find out what that was all about.

 

Flew out of PHL just a few hours before you yesterday, Eric. Thankfully uneventful.

Had an aborted landing once. Almost landed on top of another jet which was sitting on the runway where we were landing. That was an "interesting" experience, going full thrust and steep climb, just moments before you were expecting the wheels to touch down.

 

Modfather I remember the rides on Blackhawks and done a few of those in a Chinook. Did a SERE course with the 160th SOAR and that pilot tried his best top make a brother of mine and me sick. Instead he made the extra crew chiefs sick. It's two went to sleep. I remember landing in Guantanamo Bay and they came out with the plane tug to pull the front wheels back up out of the water of the bay.

Eric glad you're still here. Sent you an e-mail on your company site.

 

If you are in need of everyday flying thrills, you should go to Honduras and land at the airport in Tegucigalpa. It is listed as one of the top 10 most dangerous airports in the world. To land, the plane has to negotiate the close by mountains [one half of the wing to the sky, the other to the ground], and then straighten out for a fast landing on a really short runway. Taking off is the thrill of that short runway and immediate sideways negotiation of those mountains again. Then, often times you must factor in one of their frequent thunderstorms and, well, you KNOW that that "ohhhhhhhh crap" feeling isn't just a premonition....:frown2:

 

I thought St.Patty's was amateur hour?

 

My theory is that everyone has a certain number of flights in them and when they get to that number, time is up.

My third in-flight (scheduled airline) fire was that moment for me - well, none of them were actual fires, though one certainly smelt like a fire and the cabin crew behaved like it was a fire - whether it's a fire or a bad warning light doesn't make that much difference to your sphincter muscle.

But full marks to the steward on a BA flight landing on old airplane (because all the modern ones were grounded by a fire a week earlier) using some, but not all, engines. With no reverse thrust, we went straight past the terminal buildings at Heathrow at something over minimum take-off speed with the brakes shuddering like a piece of construction plant. We eventually ground to a stop and were immediately surrounded by fire trucks with guys in silver space suits waiting to spray their foam cannons at us (we were saying "Just start spraying!" but I guess they couldn't hear...).

So the steward wanders down the aisle, to tell us to remain seated, bends down to look out the window at the fire trucks and says in a loud voice "Oh those fire Johnnies, they do like to get a chance to practice!" It may have been number 137 from the BA book of standard cabin crew quips, but the passengers' laughter must have been audible on the flight deck.

 

I am booked on a flight to Phoenix at noon tomorrow. It has been snowing all day, and they are predicting it will turn to sleet and freezing ran tonight.

No big deal if you live someplace like Pittsburgh. I live in Dallas.

My normal 30-minute drive to the airport will probably take three hours. If my MINI doesn't get hit by an idiot in a super-duty pickup trying to convince everyone he has a big dick, I'll probably end up running up a big bar tab waiting to actually leave Dallas, where they have one de-icing machine for every 200 planes.

Oh, and if congress doesn't pass a DHS funding bill today, the TSA workers are gonna' be working without a paycheck tomorrow, which should put them in a pissy mood.

I am not looking forward to tomorrow.

CD