I just posted this in a response to a one-world topic, but think it would make for an interesting topic by itself.

I have been on Asiana once and it was a very memorable trip. About 5 years ago, I flew JFK-Seoul (fuel stop in ANC). Anyway, they curtain off a few rows on one side of the plane for FAs to rest in during the flight. The curtain needs to be drawn during taxi, takeoff, and landing. When we were approaching ANC, I decided that I wanted to sit next to a window to get a view of Alaska. Since the curtain was drawn, there were a few empty window seats, so I got up and went to one. However, there was a blanket and pillow on the seat. So, I did the only reasonable thing, I picked them up. Underneath, on the seat, was a handgun. I was startled, but being a high-school junior, I decided to tell my friends on the flight about my find. I told them to come look and soon there were 3 of us huddled around the gun. We then saw an FA walking down the aisle towards us, so we sat down in the row behind the one with the gun. The FA then picked up the blanket, put the gun on top of it, and covered the gun with the pillow. He then walked to the back of the plane. Nothing was ever said or done.

That has become one of my favorite flying stories, and ensures that I am unlikely to fly Asiana again.

What are your favorite flying stories? I'm sure there are some great ones out there.

I think it was a Continental DC-10 taking off from Newark. As we left the ground, a poorly secured beverage cart broke loose in the forward galley, and a soda can came rolling down the aisle. The can had been punctured and sprayed wildly as it rolled... all the way to the back of the plane.

Back in 1986, I flew MSP-STL-BOS-CDG by myself. I was about 14. Our travel agent failed to mention the change of plane in BOS, L10 -> L10 'international'.

I had an aisle seat in the last row, next to the toilet. The lady next to me was French, and she had a very sick infant on her lap who vomited and had terrible diarrhea the entire flight. The mother changed the baby on the tray table 4-5 times duing the flight. The mother herself was wearing a sleeveless shirt and had not showered for several days. She had a very large bush of armpit hair that still haunts me today.

I was the very last person served dinner, and it was Manicotti that was still frozen in the middle. The a/c was broken and it was sweltering hot in the cabin. I could not see the movie screen, and had failed to bring anything to read with me. It was a living hell.

A lady I worked with flew Pakistani Airlines from JFK - PAR once, and she was stuck between two fat arab gentleman who oozed into her seat. They chain smoked cigars, and chatted with one another the entire flight. She said the body odor was unbearable, and she was ill for 4 days upon arrival in Paris. The thought of the return flight made the rest of her stay uncomfortable enough so that she didn't enjoy herself at all.

Favorite:
Reserved a Y mileage award ticket to Asia and held it for 2 months. Somewhere in the middle, I changed the dates and change it to a C award ticket. When I finally called to have the ticket issued, to my own surprise, the original mileage quote was still in the computer for the revised itinerary; and even better, the agent asked his supervisor for an override without my input. I thought he was going to apologize to me and tell me that I had been misquoted.

I ended up flying in C class for 67,500 miles, when it should've cost 90,000 miles. Y class should have cost 70,000 miles.

From that point onward, I've been a C-class addict and resort to FT to find good mileage-earning opportunities for int'l upgrades.

- Pat

A buddy of mine, a former Pan Am f/a, was working in F on a Pan Am LHR-SFO flight during the early 80s. Muhammed Ali was a F passenger. As the plane began its descent into SFO, my friend noticed that Ali's seatbelt wasn't fastened. He said, "Excuse me, Mr. Ali, but in preparation for landing, you must fasten your seatbelt."

To which Ali replied, in jest, "Superman don't need no seatbelt!"

My friend said, "Yes, that's true, Mr. Ali. Then again, Superman don't need no airplane, neither."

Mr. Ali smiled and fastened his seatbelt.

Edited to insert SFO instead of LAX

[This message has been edited by FTraveler (edited 02-02-2002).]

FTraveler......





[This message has been edited by Carioca Canuck (edited 02-02-2002).]

A few years ago I was on a flight where before landing the pilot came on and said something like "it appears that they found some pieces of tire on the runway after we took off. We'd like you to assume the crash position while we land." So we ended up landing along with a bunch of fire trucks. It was pretty cool but only because our tires ended up being intact. I hope they found the plane without the tire though

wow, i would think the bigger issue here would be that the pilot is landing at the wrong airport!

then again, it is pan am we're talking about.

Sorry, about that. Typo! I'll fix that right up.

I have heard this from several sources...about several flights Ali took...

flying back from Portland two years ago...

We're all aboard and waiting, waitng, waiting.. people are starting to fume.. Here comes the announcement:

"Ladies and Gentlemen this is the Captain. Unfortunately a person has checked baggage but has since apparently left the airport (groan) I know it's an inconvenience but I'm going to go ahead and have them pull the baggage just to be safe. (Muttering and moaning from PAX, me included)

About twenty minutes later every firetruck and police car in the world descends on our plane.

"This is the captaion (no ladies and gentlemen) I want all of you to get up, right now, leave whatever you have in the overhead bins and deplane the aircraft. Now."

That plane emptied in about twenty seconds flat. In that time he made the second annoucement, that Captain went from being the guy who was going to make me miss my connection (that sonuvab@@ch) to the guy who may've just saved my life.

We eventually got another plane and got out of there, and I have never ever once complained about delays for maintenance or baggage checks since. You WANT to find out the plane is good to go while you're on the ground. Discovering the problem later on is a NASTY alternative.

I don't begrudge them any time it takes to verify this. Doesn't do any good to leave on time but crash or be blown out of the sky.

Regards,
-Bouncer-

About 10 years ago flying AA into ORD in bad weather we hit some turbulance and the plane dropped quickly though an air pocket about three times. In the middle of the third drop a woman sitting three rows behind me stood up and yelled at the top her lungs "WE'RE FALLLLLINNNNG". Needless to say nothing happened and the entire flight glared at her until we got into ORD.

Come on now. You really think he (the pilot) saved your life? How many bombs have they found going through this exercise? By the way, bag matching might be a good idea, but the current run of bad guys have made it clear they will die with the plane, so there is a slim chance of someone checking a bag, then missing the flight. But still, we go through the effort. What a waste of time and money.

We were returning from our honeymoon in Bermuda. We landed at Bradley airfield in Hartford CT. It's February 23, 1980, and it's in the middle of a blizzard in New England. My in-laws didn't want to pick us up because of the 50 mile drive from Waterbury so they arranged for a local charter service to fly us to an airport closer to Waterbury. We get off the Eastern jet and hear our names being paged. An obviously awed young gate agent informs us that "our charter aircraft is waiting at the private aviation hanger." We had to walk about 200 yards through the blizzard, carrying our luggage to get to the hanger. We get on the aircraft. It was big enough to hold 4-5 people besides the 2 pilots, but on this flight it is just us and the pilots. We taxi out of the hanger and get into line to take off. Because of the blizzard, this takes awhile. After about 20 minutes, the pilot opens his side window, leans out as far as he can and, using his hand, wipes the snow off the windshield. Once back inside, he turns to us and says "bet you've never seen the pilots on the big jets do that!" The flight was rough due to the weather and the short distance we were flying. The pilots also had to contend with the fact that we were in JFK's control space and the controllers down there were more interested in getting the big jets in safely than dealing with a little aircraft up in CT. In the end we had a good time with the pilots and got to Waterbury safely. It was a very interesting way to end one's honeymoon.

Flying MCI-LGA in 1991. I arrived late at MCI. So late, in fact, that when the agent checked my bag, she stuck a huge sticker on it reading "Last Bag" or something like that. As I was handing my boarding pass to the gate agent, another agent rushed up behind me escorting three more late-arriving pax to the gate. They were hustled through just moments before the boarding door was shut. As it turned out, they were seated in the row behind me. Overhearing their conversation, I learned that none of them had ever flown before (even though they were all in their mid-late 50s). After takeoff, the pilot came over the PA with the usual "welcome aboard" message and told us what our flying time to New York's LaGuardia airport would be. One of the women behind me asked her companions, "Did he say New York?" A conversation with the FA revealed that these three were indeed on the wrong flight. The flight they were supposed to be on (to MCO) had left from the next gate over at roughly the same time as ours. In their rush to get them boarded, the gate agents had apparently failed to check a few simple facts. (I don't know how it turned out that the row of seats they'd been assigned for the MCO flight happened to be open on the LGA flight. Perhaps the agent who checked them in originally had made a mistake on the boarding passes or something.) The FA was very apologetic and accomodating, and luckily these folks were pretty laid back about the whole thing.