Scariest commercial flight?

[brucets 94]

I used to love airports, airplanes and going places, back in the 60's, 70's, 80's. I worked for PAA and FL and then spent many years in the travel agency business. I was always going somewhere. I was so fascinated by the airline lingo and codes. When I went to work for Pan Am in reservations in Denver in 1962 there were no computers and everything was hand written in codes and abbreviations. The messages and reservations were sent by teletype. DENRRPA was Denver reservations Pan American. DENLLPA was lost luggage, and so on. PA102Y26AUGJFKLHRNN1 was need one seat on 102 to London Heathrow, HK was Holding Confirmed, WL was waitlist etc. I talked on the fone with res agts at all the airlines and got to know so many. We knew all the travel agents by name, in CO,UT and WY. At one time or another I was the group desk, rate desk, refund desk, lost luggage, cargo backup reservations. We got to know airport tkt agts. Riding the jump seat was not uncommon. We were a big happy family. All gone now. Computers!

Now I hate going to the airport! I dread getting on airplanes. It's a miserable experience. A lot of psgr's are disgusting looking! Some even stink! There doesn't seem to be a dress code for airline employees. Half of them look terrible, poorly dressed and groomed! The whole air travel thing sux now!

Bruce

[John_Cillis 2,406]

9 hours ago, birdguy said:

I always travel by train anymore Bruce.  I can't stand commercial air travel anymore.

Last Summer my daughter took me to San Francisco for a father-daughter weekend.  I took the train out but had to fly back to Denver with her to spend a couple days with my grandson and son-in-law.

Herded like cattle through TSA then boarded a plane with little leg room and had to pay for a soft drink.

My mind went back a few decades when you were treated like a customer instead of a suspicious piece of baggage.  Maybe some of you recall the stewardess asking if you wanted chicken or steak for lunch.

Now I walk into an Amtrak station and go into the first class passenger lounge and imbibe in some refreshments.  Then your train is called and you take your luggage and walk down the platform to your car and the car attendant checks your ticket and asks if you want your bag in the luggage rack or in your compartment.  No TSA agent glaring at you or X-Ray machines or emptying your pockets and taking off your shoes.

You go to your compartment or bed room and there is a bottle of water and a snack waiting for you.  If you prefer coffee or juice go the center of the car to coffee urn.  

After we get underway the dining car steward comes through and asks you what time you want to eat dinner and gives you your reservation.  When your time is called you make your way to the dining car and are seated with some other passengers for interesting conversation.  You are given a menu with several choices and you leisurely eat your dinner and enjoy the company of your new acquaintances.

Then before the car attendant makes up your bed you go to the lounge car for a drink and a snack.

The downside is it will be miserable if you are a clock watcher.  Trains are notoriously late.  I never make same day connections.  I spend the night in a hotel and catch my connecting train the next day.

Noel

 

I love the European trains, especially those in Switzerland (Which I rode again from Luzern to Lauterbrunnen and back last year).  They have uncanny punctuality, almost to atomic clock precision.  Rare is one later or cancelled, even one minute late.  I do not understand how US trains have punctuality problems other than maybe sharing their track with industrial trains.  Phoenix where I live is one of the only major US cities with no Amtrak service, one has to go down to Maricopa an hour south of the city (depending on where you live it may be a little more or a little less).  I used to ride the trains, the double decker ones, when I lived in Chicago as a small boy.  And I loved BART in the SF Bay Area, and the Atlanta and DC metro, along with the L in Chicago, which runs right into OHare like BART does for San Francisco, DC Metro for Regan in DC, and Atlanta Metro for Atlanta.  And I loved European trains running to most major airports, like the train I took out of Schipol last year to Amsterdam Central, or out of Frankfurt to Heldelburg, Zurich to Zurich Central, and Geneva to Geneva Central.  So convenient, connecting the city centers and the rest of Europe with those major airports.

John

[birdguy 3,943]

Notice how conversations morph from one subject to another.  I like that.

John, you are right.  Except for the Northeast Corridor Amtrak has to use the freight lines.  As long as an Amtrak train sticks to it's schedule it has the right of way over freight trains.  But if it falls behind the freights have the right of way and Amttrak has to sit on a siding and wait for them.

It's especially bad for the Seattle-Chicago route.  In North Dakota the oil trains are so long they don't fit on sidings so Amtrak has to wait for them.

Every other first world nation has excellent passenger train service.  But they are neglected in the United States except for the Northeast Corridore between Washington nd Boston.  Like you said, they bypass Phoenix.

Noel

[n4gix 4,947]

On ‎8‎/‎31‎/‎2018 at 12:47 PM, Mace said:

We pop out of the clouds, and, we're no more than a few hundred feet above at best -- on short final.   Pilot drops it onto the runway with a bone-jarring thud (they tend to do that at Midway, get it down quickly to begin braking/reverse) -- you could hear a few pax exclaim "OH!" with alarm up and down the cabin.

I was returning from Harlingen, Texas on Southwest in 1998 after attending the funeral of my step-mother. As we were landing on 31C, the plane remained in ground effect and as we passed 4R I began to become concerned. Then we were still in ground effect as we passed over 4L. Now I was really nervous!

Just past 4L the pilot managed to firmly plant the tires on the runway and immediately stood on the toe brakes, and used full reverse thrust to finally manage to bring the aircraft slow enough to make the turn off at the very end of 31C...

...in fact the pilot left reverse thrust on the right engine all the way through the turn onto taxiway "M".

That was my one and only truly "scary" flight.

[John_Cillis 2,406]

51 minutes ago, n4gix said:

I was returning from Harlingen, Texas on Southwest in 1998 after attending the funeral of my step-mother. As we were landing on 31C, the plane remained in ground effect and as we passed 4R I began to become concerned. Then we were still in ground effect as we passed over 4L. Now I was really nervous!

Just past 4L the pilot managed to firmly plant the tires on the runway and immediately stood on the toe brakes, and used full reverse thrust to finally manage to bring the aircraft slow enough to make the turn off at the very end of 31C...

...in fact the pilot left reverse thrust on the right engine all the way through the turn onto taxiway "M".

That was my one and only truly "scary" flight.

The Midway takeoff made me nervous, remember the airline, ATA, it was a low budget airline I was not happy my office booked me on.  Rather than fly me nonstop into JFK they flew me with a stopover at Midway and then on to La Guardia, which was laughable since my client was the JFK Hilton (converting to a Best Western) back in '99.  At least I was flown home on America West nonstop.  Anyway, the aircraft departing Midway especially the 757 I was on use up every last inch of the runway, and you lift off on the opposite threshold markers and just seem to clear the fence.  Even John Wayne departing aircraft use less runway than that in Santa Ana California (but of course have the famous zero G maneuver at about 1000 feet AGL for noise abatement). 

In 77 on my first trip to Europe from JFK to Milan via Munich, on a Transinternational Charter Super DC8-63, we had the longest takeoff roll I ever experienced in a driving rainstorm and we were told after takeoff by the pilot that they shut down further takeoffs after our departure.  To make matters worse, on the inbound United DC10 flight we hit the most severe turbulence I have ever felt, even worse than clear air turbulence I hit just past the Rockies once, so I had to fly in and out of that severe weather.   We were shaken badly in the DC10 and in the DC8-63 outbound, until clearing the clouds each way.

The DC8-63 also had the sharpest pitch of any aircraft I have ever flown on at takeoff.  The DC8-63 also could use thrust reversers in flight to slow down, and we used them descending over the Alps into Milan.  The sensation over the clouds was like coming to almost a dead stop pulling pronounced negative G's.  Fortunately the friendly Transamerica flight crew came on the horn and told us what to expect, including the vibration of the aircraft as reverse thrust was applied in the descent.  The round trip to Europe and back a week later was my only experience on a DC8-63 but it was a lovely open and airy aircraft, albeit a bit old.

John

[KevinAu 441]

2 hours ago, Cactus521 said:

The Midway takeoff made me nervous, remember the airline, ATA, it was a low budget airline I was not happy my office booked me on.  Rather than fly me nonstop into JFK they flew me with a stopover at Midway and then on to La Guardia, which was laughable since my client was the JFK Hilton (converting to a Best Western) back in '99.  At least I was flown home on America West nonstop.  Anyway, the aircraft departing Midway especially the 757 I was on use up every last inch of the runway, and you lift off on the opposite threshold markers and just seem to clear the fence.  Even John Wayne departing aircraft use less runway than that in Santa Ana California (but of course have the famous zero G maneuver at about 1000 feet AGL for noise abatement). 

John

There was nothing dangerous at all about that takeoff at midway you described. Most takeoffs are done using assumed temperature in order to save wear and tear on the engines. The takeoff thrust setting used is calculated to a reduced setting that will use all the runway available. What you experienced was normal procedure. Only in special situations will we use full power, such as contaminated runways, or certain mel procedures, or special local procedure takeoffs, like sna.

[John_Cillis 2,406]

20 minutes ago, KevinAu said:

There was nothing dangerous at all about that takeoff at midway you described. Most takeoffs are done using assumed temperature in order to save wear and tear on the engines. The takeoff thrust setting used is calculated to a reduced setting that will use all the runway available. What you experienced was normal procedure. Only in special situations will we use full power, such as contaminated runways, or certain mel procedures, or special local procedure takeoffs, like sna.

Yes, I assumed it was normal procedure like the Santa Ana noise abatement takeoffs are too.  Just startling and I was admittedly in a bad mood about having a non direct flight out of Phoenix.  When I finished with my client at JFK nearly four weeks later, on Christmas Eve, they asked the day before what airline I was on.  I was always somewhat careful about that because some unscrupulous clients in the past had cancelled my colleagues flights in order to get free assistance, they complained about our cost even though our company set the cost, not us.

But my JFK client had other ideas, they knew the senior staff at America West and had me upgraded to first class in appreciation for my voluntarily staying on with them and also teaching them how to program custom reports in SQL.  My company was also elated since they earned an extra few thousand from my selling them my extra time, right up to getting thanks from the company owner, which he rarely gave us directly accept in pep talks every other month.  Wish I had seen that money though, lol.... 

Sadly the hotel went out of business right after 9/11.  And it was a sad memory for me because while I was there in '99 I went atop the WTC while my colleagues went bar hopping, they wanted me to go along.  They left two weeks before I did, their work for me was done.  When I went atop the WTC in December of 99 the conditions were exactly like 9-11, clear and very windy, I could see well into Jersey and Connecticut.  Some folks from England took my pic and I took theirs. 

I then went to the underground mall, poked around for a bit, then took the A train back to the JFK terminals, though it did not quite connect and I had to transfer to a bus then to the hotel's courtesy shuttle, which I took from the old TWA terminal I flew out of often back in the 80's, now Jet Blues.  Had I gone to Grand Central I could have taken a faster train but it would have ended up the same amount of time because I would have had to take the Subway north.  In 2016, my daughter went atop the New World Trade center, a generation removed from the old twin towers.  When I was at the JFK hotel, the Jet Blue flight attendants and flight crew were finishing training for the then new airline.  We became good friends and shared drinks.  Also a treat, I got to meet Alan Alda, the MASH actor, while he was eating dinner down in the hotel's restaurant.  I did not bother him more than nodding my head hello since he had guests with him, but I overheard him talking, a very nice man, a great actor with a show that had a great message.

John

Edited September 1, 2018 by Cactus521

[RudiJG1 172]

1998, and I was traveling from Jakarta to Washington DC to arrive in time for the scheduled C-section birth of my son. I had a layover in Honolulu and boarded the flight to LA (the second of three flights!) well before dawn. The flight took off uneventfully, and just as we reached cruising altitude and breakfast began to be served...the entire passenger cabin rapidly depressurized. At that point, two oxygen masks tumbled from the seat back in front of me onto my lap. I stared at them, handed one to the guy on my left, and put the other on. The plane then began a steep dive...a really steep dive, with the noise of the wind and the shaking aircraft increasing.No screams, no conversation, and no announcements over the PA. Needless to say, I wondered if I was going to meet my soon-to-be-born son and see again my 4-year old daughter and my wife.

After what seemed like a really long time, the plane began to level off. At that moment, the captain came onto the PA, apologized for the lack of communication ("I was kind of busy up here..."), and explained that all the panel lights were green but one - cabin pressure. He had no idea why we lost cabin pressure. He had had to dive from cruise to 12,000 feet in order for us to take off the oxygen masks. The bad news? We had to return to Hawaii!

When I got off of the plane, avoided the reporters and TV cameras and went straight to the pay-phone (remember those?). I called the local office of my company, who arranged for another LA flight within 2 hours! I arrived in DC 2 hours before the birth, jet-lagged, stressed, but happy and relieved to be there with my wife and daughter. My son turned 20 last February.

[John_Cillis 2,406]

8 minutes ago, RudiJG1 said:

1998, and I was traveling from Jakarta to Washington DC to arrive in time for the scheduled C-section birth of my son. I had a layover in Honolulu and boarded the flight to LA (the second of three flights!) well before dawn. The flight took off uneventfully, and just as we reached cruising altitude and breakfast began to be served...the entire passenger cabin rapidly depressurized. At that point, two oxygen masks tumbled from the seat back in front of me onto my lap. I stared at them, handed one to the guy on my left, and put the other on. The plane then began a steep dive...a really steep dive, with the noise of the wind and the shaking aircraft increasing.No screams, no conversation, and no announcements over the PA. Needless to say, I wondered if I was going to meet my soon-to-be-born son and see again my 4-year old daughter and my wife.

After what seemed like a really long time, the plane began to level off. At that moment, the captain came onto the PA, apologized for the lack of communication ("I was kind of busy up here..."), and explained that all the panel lights were green but one - cabin pressure. He had no idea why we lost cabin pressure. He had had to dive from cruise to 12,000 feet in order for us to take off the oxygen masks. The bad news? We had to return to Hawaii!

When I got off of the plane, avoided the reporters and TV cameras and went straight to the pay-phone (remember those?). I called the local office of my company, who arranged for another LA flight within 2 hours! I arrived in DC 2 hours before the birth, jet-lagged, stressed, but happy and relieved to be there with my wife and daughter. My son turned 20 last February.

That must have been an eye opener, none of my hundreds of commercial flights ever lost cabin pressure, or even an engine in flight, thank goodness.  All my mishaps were either weather related or ground related, and only one was truly life threatening, the one with the open aft door on the MD80 with the airhead flight attendant that almost got us hurt.  But now years later I think she was not in the wrong, she was just in a state of shock from the loud jet noise and did not know how to respond or react, she just went into zombie mode which humans sometimes can under extreme hurt and stress.  To this day my ears have never recovered from that, I still hear the ringing from time to time, not painful, but there as a reminder to my closest encounter with an air tragedy.

John

[RudiJG1 172]

9 minutes ago, Cactus521 said:

That must have been an eye opener, none of my hundreds of commercial flights ever lost cabin pressure, or even an engine in flight, thank goodness.  All my mishaps were either weather related or ground related, and only one was truly life threatening, the one with the open aft door on the MD80 with the airhead flight attendant that almost got us hurt.  But now years later I think she was not in the wrong, she was just in a state of shock from the loud jet noise and did not know how to respond or react, she just went into zombie mode which humans sometimes can under extreme hurt and stress.  To this day my ears have never recovered from that, I still hear the ringing from time to time, not painful, but there as a reminder to my closest encounter with an air tragedy.

John

John, the guy next to me on that flight was retired USAF...he was sure the incident we experienced together resulted in a broken eardrum...he was in pain, but it was pain he was familiar with due to his USAF flight record. I was shaken but physically fine.

[John_Cillis 2,406]

9 minutes ago, RudiJG1 said:

John, the guy next to me on that flight was retired USAF...he was sure the incident we experienced together resulted in a broken eardrum...he was in pain, but it was pain he was familiar with due to his USAF flight record. I was shaken but physically fine.

Yes, as I have grown older I have found air travel harder on me than when I was young.  Especially the long haul nonstop to London and back from Phoenix last year, and my other Transatlantic hops and my one TransPacific hop to Japan and Guam.  Aircraft just feel like vampires to me, the longer I am in the air, the longer I battle dehydration and I just can't keep up enough, now having diabetes.  Being a frequent commercial flyer took its toll, not to mention the radiation exposure that frequent flyers experience and is not often talked about.  It took its toll on my father before me, who like me was a frequent flyer and when our adulthoods were together, we often left for separate road trips from my mother's home, where I lived until I was married, it was quite surreal.  One day we literally crisscrossed in the sky, though I did not quite capture the moment, I knew it had happened as I flew east/west and my father had to fly north/south for US government business.  We laughed about it before and after the flights because we knew it was coming, lol.  Sadly all that travel took its toll and I am sure the cancer that brought my father down was due to his air travel, plus his lifelong radiation exposure as a navy nuclear carrier and sub health engineer, which we were sometimes exposed to when he came home.  We had a Geiger counter in our home for the entire time I lived there.  I feel this radiation exposure in me like a ticking time bomb and feel the government owes my family for what my father did.  My father knew Senator McCain, Admiral Rickover, and Jimmy Carter.

John

[nealmac 260]

On 8/31/2018 at 6:47 PM, Mace said:

Pilot drops it onto the runway with a bone-jarring thud (they tend to do that at Midway, get it down quickly to begin braking/reverse) -- you could hear a few pax exclaim "OH!" with alarm up and down the cabin.   Then, the aircraft began to skid -- just a little -- and just a little more -- as we were hurtling down the short Midway runway, at what seemed like a sideways angle.

Sounds like a standard operating procedure for Rynair 😅

[Chock 17,769]

Was on a deHavilland Comet 4C many years ago (operated byDan Air London), flying from Manchester to Girona. I was sat on the left side window seat over the leading edge of the wing where the emergency exit door is located. When we were up over the Pyrenees mountains, I noticed there was some ice forming on the inside over a small plastic screw cover holding the interior trim in place above the window, shortly after I noticed that ice formation, there was a rather loud clunk noise and the emergency exit door visibly moved in its frame. This is not something you want to see an emergency exit door do when you are sat next to it at 30,000 feet in a pressurised aeroplane. I mentioned it to a stewardess and pointed out the ice too (yup, they were stewardesses in those days), and she said, 'oh don't worry about it'. I said that was easy for her to say, she wasn't sat next to it!

Anyway, I fastened my safety belt really tightly and stayed in that seat, trusting that if the door did blow off, the seatbelt would hopefully do its job (doubtful). Anyway, nothing untoward happened and we subsequently arrived at Girona, but I was certainly glad when that thing landed.

I came back home on one of Dan Air's Boeing 727s, so did not have to repeat the experience, although in fairness, I did actually fly on one of their Comets again without any trouble. Having said that, Dan Air did actually lose both a 727 and a Comet 4C on flights to Spain, both of those flights originating from Manchester and in both cases the airliners flew into terrain following navigational errors, thus it would seem Dan Air was not exactly the safest airline to fly on.

[fluffyflops 1,843]

Jeez where to start...

About 12 years ago I was cabin crew on the vs8 klax to Heathrow middle of the night about 3am, lights down, heating up to make the punters sleep, half the crew asleep in crew rest. Myself and my mate Martin in the back galley, curtin closed having a cup of tea, we look down the aisle to see some dude hopping down the aisle on one foot holding his ankle. 

On the 340-600 we used to have metal IFE boxes under the seats and the one underneath his seat had a bit of metal loose and had cut his ankle on a vein. (Unknown to us at the time) 

Guy comes closer and I nudged Martin, ' here mate look at this nutter' 

He closes into the galley, sits down blood all over his hands and takes his hand off his ankle then all hell broke loose. 

Blood everywhere really horrible nasty gash on his leg. Had him in the last row of seats, bandages on, pressure and position etc etc, the dude kept passing out so had him on oxygen too

Called up the skipper on the phone told him to get us down. It was 1 hour to CYFB.  On approach into CYFB we apparently descended at 8000 feet a minute with gear down to wash the speed and off the 340 was shaking like nuts with the descent.  

Arrived at cyfb in the middle of the night got him off with paramedics etc etc.  Apprently the guy sued. 

Both the skipper and 2 first officers are still at virgin and whenever I see them in the canteen when they are in for training I always mention that bloody VS8!!!  And buy them a cup of tea 

[fluffyflops 1,843]

Another one... 

At easyJet we had a LPL IBZ and had 26 guys arrested on arrival in IBZ  for being drunk and disorderly.  Started off with them grabbing the PA in the galley shouting 'you're all going to crash and die' then the kicker was one of them poured brandy on the carpet and lit it. 

That promted the skipper to send us an acars in ops 'request police in IBZ to arrest group of drunk passengers' 

We replied, 'confirm how many please' 

Captain replied 'all 26 please' 

The occ in h89 was awash with 'alot of Confused faces and managers ' 

On arrival the guardia civil got on and put all 26 in jail for the night., as none of them admitted to liting the carpet no charges where pressed. 

I believe the record before that was 9 on a flight, and I believe the 26 record still stands to this day. 

 

 

I littery have 100s of stories after working in travel since 1995 and aviation since 1999

Edited September 5, 2018 by tooting