Your most terrifying flight?
 

I'm not a fan of severe turbulence or a fire onboard; everything else I'm hip with.

I was on a JAL flight 777 from NRT to SEL in August 2012 when Typhoon Bolaven was slamming into the Korean Peninsula. I expected my flight to be cancelled but JAL opted to make a go at it.
I've experienced my share of crosswind landings in torrential downpours but this was on a whole new level of crazy. We aborted to attempts into Incheon and then attempted another at Gimpo, which we also aborted. The flight attendant strapped in just in front of me was on the verge of tears and people were screaming and praying. What made things even worse was the pilots stopped making announcements to keep everyone calm. After the third attempt there was no announcement as to what was going on until 30 mins later they tell us we were flying back to Tokyo! So I'm thinking to myself, did they fuel the plane expecting a round trip after three aborted landings? And if so, they knew there was a chance they wouldn't be able to land, so why take that risk in the first place? One of the more unsettling flights of my experience.

I was flying from Lanzhou to Beijing in Winter in an old DC10 when suddenly the pilot made an annoucement in Chinese. Everybody was staying rather calm but I noticed that people started to chat with each other so i asked my wife what he said. She:"Oh he said we have to make an emergency landing!"

Turned out the plane was just diverted as the airport in Beijing was completely covered in Ice.. but i paniced for a few minutes as you can imagine. Spent some hours in Hua Hott Inner Mongolia ;)

What is mountain wave turbulence? I've always made a point of keeping the seatbelt on when seated. So I think I would be ok unless I was already out of my seat. How much warning do progressive dips provide?

Three spring to mind:

1. Flying through Typhoon Haiyan last year - I looked at its current location on the map prior to take off and though we would be delayed as we would have to fly around it. Nope, straight through/over the top of it. It was as bumpy as you'd imagine a 200mph+ Typhoon to be.

2. Hit by lightning on approach to KL. The anticipation was the worst part. Flashes engulfing the plane every few seconds and you just know you're going to get hit soon, but when it actually happens you barely notice it.

3. Coming into Orlando about 20 years ago on a then brand new A340-300. About an hour from Orlando the pilot told the cabin we had to divert due to a storm in the MCO area. We proceeded to approach 2 airfields before the Captain decided neither were big enough and we headed to Jacksonville. During the whole episode we were flying through the worst turbulence I've ever experienced, with people screaming, being sick etc. as we bounced around. He then thought it would be a good idea to announce to the entire cabin we were low on fuel and had to get down quickly. Anyway, a few hundred feet off the ground in Jacksonville the pilot again decided it wasn't going to work. Finally, on the fourth attempt we put down at Cecil Airbase, and within seconds of stopping were swarmed by literally dozens of military wanting to see the brand new Airbus up close.

When we finally got going again we also ticked off a new box for me, starting the takeoff roll from the dirt past the end of the runway. The runway was only just big enough apparently and we needed every inch of it. Looking back, it was probably a relatively simple situation handled appallingly by the flight crew.

two

KLM flight from AMS-ORD last Feb., we get about an hour out of AMS and the captain comes on telling us there's a mechanical problem with one of the engines (744) and we have to turn back to AMS. Of course on my next KLM flight AMS-JFK in November, I walk up to the gate, check the registration and it's the same 744 waiting for me...

October '12 AV from CTG-BOG we line up to land, right before touch down we crank the engines and go around. We circle for a while and try it again, same drill. They finally set it down on the 3rd try. Apparently on both of our first two approaches ATC had vectored traffic onto the runway in front of us right before we touched down.

Are you sure your plane was flying through Typhoon Haiyan? Normal procedures will be to fly around the storm...or at most fly through the outer edges of the typhoon, but straight through the core of the storm (through the eye?)? That seems very unusual.

As for lightning, most commercial aircraft on average get hit by lightning once a year, so its not a big issue as the planes are designed to withstand lightning strikes. There are the more exotic (and powerful) types of lightning found in the upper atmosphere like sprites, blue jets and elf, those are potentially more dangerous than regular lightning and could cause damage to aircraft hit by it, however, since they only occur high above thunderstorms, (and since commercial aircraft usually steer well clear of such storms), the chance getting hit by such exotic electrical discharge is fairly remote.

JFK-DAY on a mainline jet of the era (1986), late night flight, the last leg of a Rome-Nice-JFK-DAY trip. My wife and I were the only passengers -- those were the days! I'd finally dozed off but woke with a start to notice we were flying low and slow. I saw both FAs running up and down the aisles with looks of real fear on their faces.

After a few seconds, one of them got on the PA to run very quickly through the pre-landing announcements. Apparently they were in a panic just because they'd both fallen asleep on this near-empty flight and therefore hadn't done their announcement duties.

I despise flying due to a fear or heights and falling but love traveling. I have two trips that are battling for 1st place on my most terrifying flight. One was back in 2009 on a trip to Jamaica from Miami, at one point the flight turned rocky and it felt like the aircraft dropped for a second or two. The other was last September on a flight from NYC to Europe. I usually like to sleep on my Europe bound flights, however within 30 minutes of takeoff we ran into heavy turbulence and it was a rough flight all the way through to our destination. Both flights were on American Airlines.

Typhoons generally don't have too much power in them at cruising altitude so its not such an issue, bumpy but not dangerous.

I seem to attract this kind of stuff:

1) flying BA from LHR to ZHR, 20min into flight announcement that we had smoke in the cockpit and hat to emergency land into Gatwick. Complete with brace position, emergency vehicles waiting for us etc.

2) sea plane in the Maldives on way back to Male hit thunderstorm, had to emergency land in the middle of the Indian Ocean, on waves several metres high, most people in plane being sick.

3) Flight hit by lightning, I was sat next to wing, and just heard Big Bang and what looked like an explosion at engine.

4) landed in terrifying thunderstorm at London City, later found out our flight had been the only one landing that morning, all others cancelled.

5) also managed to be on a flight when 9/11 happened, and was at London City departures when the liquid explosives scare started.

I used to commute weekly for a whole winter between London City and Edinburgh on 'Scot Air' (RIP) on the tiny propeller planes they had, I have to say I got pretty used to it all whilst doing that and the regular diversions and delays.

Not necessarily. There can be still be areas of severe turbulence in them, as some of the rain bands are known to have supercells embeded in them as well as strong updrafts and downdrafts in and around the eyewall. Normal procedures would be for airliners to steer around them or go through only the outer edges, not straight through as if its no big deal.

Amazing, I had no idea that a design feature of the 747 was to be able to ferry an engine slung under the wing. One learns something new everyday.

Not sure it was a 747. Memory fails me, but I think it may have been a DC-10.

Over a two year period I walked away from three shunts - pax okay, planes not so much - in the Aleutians. Two of the three (one in a Navajo, the other a YS-11) involved hard landings in williwaws, the third (Grumman Goose) had a wheel come off on landing at DUT. Not so much terrifying as shocking - no time to think.

In jets, my most frightening moment occurred in a Pan Am 707 going SEA-FAI late at night when we came within a few hundred feet of a southbound Western Airlines B720 somewhere over the Gulf of Alaska. A dead-heading PA captain sitting behind me said it was the closest he'd ever come to a midair.