Touchy touch and go
Jul 10, 2001 | 6:21 am
#31
Join Date: Sep 2000
Location: Great Britain
Posts: 1,442
In 40 years of flying, I have had five aborted landings, two very hard landings, and two aborted take-offs. I can say without reservation that as I walked off each one of those incidents that we were lucky to be there. Pilots in your country, and thank God mine, are trained to be the very very best and my thoughts are that they ought to be rewarded for hauling a lot of souls skywards and away from certain death.
As a Lufthansa captain said at Dusseldorf after a very heavy landing in a 727
"Every landing is a good landing"
Paul
As a Lufthansa captain said at Dusseldorf after a very heavy landing in a 727
"Every landing is a good landing"
Paul
Jul 14, 2001 | 3:03 pm
#32
Join Date: Sep 1999
Location: SF Bay Area
Programs: UA 1K MM, Accor Plat, Htz PC, Natl ExEm, other random status
Posts: 2,879
Paul -
You have the point exactly right.
I've heard the phrase "Every landing you walk away from is a good landing."
This situation is different from those, such as an emergency decompression, where there could arguably be airline culpability for the uncomfortable situation. Plus, people are commonly injured in decomps (ear injuries, bloody noses, etc.).
In this situation, pax should just be thankful for the skills found in the hands of the pilots. Those skills, combined with ice cold nerves, more than their fair share of smarts and thousands of hours of practice are what separate them from bus drivers.
Greg
You have the point exactly right.
I've heard the phrase "Every landing you walk away from is a good landing."
This situation is different from those, such as an emergency decompression, where there could arguably be airline culpability for the uncomfortable situation. Plus, people are commonly injured in decomps (ear injuries, bloody noses, etc.).
In this situation, pax should just be thankful for the skills found in the hands of the pilots. Those skills, combined with ice cold nerves, more than their fair share of smarts and thousands of hours of practice are what separate them from bus drivers.
Greg
Jul 15, 2001 | 4:48 pm
#33
Join Date: Sep 2000
Location: MCI. AA Plat, UA PrmEx., Mrrtt Gold, Hz Pres.Circle, HHonors Gold
Posts: 1,070
I've been onboard for 2 go-arounds and 2 aborted takeoffs. One of the go-arounds was in a Midwest Express DC-9 into SAT; the other was in an AA F100 into MCI. SAT was because the guy in front of us took a longer-than-expected rollout. MCI was during a storm and we circled for 15 minutes until weather settled a bit. In both cases I still got to my end destination on time and I was quite thankful that the pilots valued our safety more than the on-time landing. A go-around isn't that discomforting anyway, so it seems goofy that these Southwest pax are whining about it.
The aborted takeoff is a more unnatural sensation - going from 0 to 140 and back to 0 in a matter of a few seconds. Both of the times this happened to me were because a cockpit indicator showed one of the doors in the plane to be open. The FA's rechecked the doors, we taxied back to where we started, and took off. Again, even though the doors were probably closed, I'm glad the pilots didn't take any chances.
The aborted takeoff is a more unnatural sensation - going from 0 to 140 and back to 0 in a matter of a few seconds. Both of the times this happened to me were because a cockpit indicator showed one of the doors in the plane to be open. The FA's rechecked the doors, we taxied back to where we started, and took off. Again, even though the doors were probably closed, I'm glad the pilots didn't take any chances.