Personal Dread of Flying

[John A langley]

On the interstate at least I have some control on what's going to happen

[Jerome Stanek]

On the interstate at least I have some control on what's going to happen

That's what you think it isn't you it's the weakest link in the other vehicle you know the nut that holds the steering wheel

[Ole Anderson]

My scariest moment was coming out of Minneapolis when the pilot cut back the engines for noise control I swore they shut totally off it was so quiet scared the heck out of me.

[John A langley]

Jerome The key word in that sentence is some as opposed to none in a plane

[Art Mann]

I agree completely. However, you didn't mention the part about being herded like cattle about to be slaughtered or the shake down treatment reminiscent of a strip search at a maximum security prison.

Being in the 500 mph aluminum tube of potential death at 30,000 feet is fine.

Being packed like a sardine with strangers for interminable hours gives me the willies.

Evidently a personality defect..

[Art Mann]

My second commercial flight was a return trip to Columbus Georgia from a job interview in Johnson City Tennessee. I was already a little edgy from my lack of experience. On the final approach, the pilot came in for what looked like very gentle approach. At maybe 300 ft above the ground, the engines throttled up and the plane angled sharply upward. People started yelling and it was quite a spectacle. We came around a few minuted later and landed without incident. I asked the pilot and he acted like nothing happened. A flight attendant explained that there was some kind of vehicle on the runway and the pilot didn't want to take any chances of it pulling into the path of the plane. I'll bet some airport employee got fired over that one.

[Rick Potter]

I hate flying, but I have to appreciate the humor when they announce you can now get up and move about the cabin. That is when the stewardess breaks out the drink cart, and no one can move down the aisle.

I guess I am afraid of flying also. My dad had a small plane in the '70's, and I went up in it once. Just wanted to throw up. My son now has a 1940 Fairchild, which I have never sat in. He also is licensed to fly people around at air shows. My wife went up with him in a WWII Marine T6, and a 1943 Stearman biplane. Not me, even though I love that Stearman.

Been to many airshows and hangar parties. Love the machinery. Last weekend the son got us rides on a 1943 DC3. It took me a week to say OK, but we actually enjoyed it, even though the woman behind me screamed constantly, starting when they towed the plane backwards down the runway before take off, and the pilot jokingly raised his arms and said 'look, no hands'. They hadn't even started the engines yet (which also made her scream).

Maybe there is still hope for me.

[Mark Blatter]

I have long said you can tell where the pilot trained by the landing.

A nice long gentle landing, taking up the entire 8000 feet of runway means he was an Air Force pilot.

One of those harder ones, followed by an immediate hard turn onto a short taxiway, concluding with a hard braking action (and only using 1000 feet of the 12000 feet runway) means he was a Navy trained pilot.

Only time I have been scared on a plane was flying between Yakima, WA and Seatac. We were in a smaller 41 passenger Bombardier and hit a heavy's wake. We did a few twisty turnies, dropped about 1000 feet in 2 seconds before the pilot got it under control. That was a bit of a concern.

[Jim Koepke]

Still safer than driving on the interstate.

At least on the interstate my ears do not pop and my sinuses aren't messed up for two days afterwards.

jtk

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Johnny Carson commented one night that he didn't like flying and always got the last seat at the rear of the plane. When asked why his reply was "How many planes have you heard of backing into the side of a mountain?".


I have a real fear of heights and yet flying doesn't bother me.

[Brett Luna]

I'm retired USAF and worked fighters for ~12 of those 20+ years. Post-retirement, I hired on with the FAA in 2001...first with Flight Standards, now in Air Traffic. The only thing I don't like about flying commercial are those medieval torture devices they call seats. I darned-near can't walk off the plane.

[Bruce Wrenn]

I really like those newer 737's with the in the back of the seat monitor that not only shows speed, temp, route, but a moving picture of ground below, which is really cool when it's cloudy or dark. First time we flew into ORD, wife asked where the heck were we? She saw ships out the window. We've taken a couple flights that as stand bys. We couldn't get on plane unless air temp was less than 32 F. Max fuel and passenger loads, so air density played a big roll. Got bumped in Dallas once, as there was only one seat left. Spent the night in Dallas. Got home the next day and son said "Be glad you weren't on the 11:30 last night. They circled for a couple hour to burn off, and dump fuel as landing gear indicator said it didn't lock into position." Being "stand bys" we have to be flexible. One down and back to BTR took two days, while next one only took nine hours from gate at RDU to gate at RDU

[Randy Rizzo]

A night fright


The early years of my flying career were spent like most other guys who have chosen flight as a way of life. Flight Instructor. It was a path that afforded us a way to build time to capture the gold ring, an airline job. For even back in the day flying was an expensive proposition. In the few years that I instructed as a way of making a living I accrued close to 2,000 hours of instruction time. And in those years aside from from instruction , I, like most of the other guys, flew anything I could lay my hands on. One such endeavor involved flying night freight. The Fixed Base Operator (FBO) I worked for at the time had a contract to supply pilots to a local company who owned and operated a Cherokee Six. He was a small operation, picking up odd jobs that were too small for the likes of major carriers. A Cherokee Six is a rather large single engine machine as light aircraft go, capable of hauling weights that were just about equal to its empty weight. So it was on a September night of 1968 I found myself at O’Hare in this Six picking up the annual report for Collins Radio. A load so large that it would requiring breaking the load into two shipments of about 1200 pounds each. The shipments were being delivered to Collins Radio headquarters in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. I had already made the first run earlier, this would be the last of the evening and it was now about 2AM.

Loaded up, the Six trundled out to the active at ORD and on an IFR flight plan I was on my way. 4,000 ft. V172 as I recall. Things began to go awry shortly after passing DuPage airport, NW of St. Charles, and just crossing the mighty Fox river. The engine began to run a little rough, not a problem. I had been running on an aux tank and had probably run it dry though the gauge still indicated it had fuel. Gauges of that type were not very reliable. Switching tanks back to a main did not rectify the problem and the engine began get a little rougher. So I ran the time honored emergency drill, carb heat, switch off one mag then the other. Did nothing. And it began to run worse than ever. I made a turn back toward DuPage airport now about 5-6 miles behind me and told ATC I was declaring an emergency. During the turn I had been switching tanks again and when I looked up I could no longer see through the windscreen. I soon realized the impediment to my forward vision was oil. It covered the windscreen and from the corner of an unobstructed portion of the windscreen I could see a glow from under the fuselage, FIRE! It was about this time the prop stopped completely. As low as I was, 4,000 ft., there was no way I could glide the 5 miles to DuPage. Cherokees are not known for their gliding qualities and this one with its 1,200 pound load was flying like an anvil. I knew my position, in the immediate vicinity of the Fox River, mostly heavily wooded forest preserve. The prospects for a successful emergency landing were at best, horrendous! Much to my devout Mother’s dismay as soon as I was in the Air Force at 19 years of age my church going days ended. And I’ve not been back since. Nonetheless, it’s been said there are no atheists in foxholes. This night would be no exception. My prayer was a simple one. “Please God, no houses”. I just knew this was my last night on earth. A cardinal rule in this situation, keep the airplane flying, to stall is to die for sure. You trade altitude for airspeed, in fighter pilot lingo, “Speed is Life!”, or "Maintain thine airspeed lest the Earth rise up and smite thee!" But I didn’t have much altitude in the bank. And while the fighter jocks were talking about numbers of 500 kts+, 80 kts was keeping this tub airborne. This was going to be a short flight. Now during the course of giving flight instruction students were given night checkouts. Naturally one of the items was a forced landing at night. The standing joke among flight instructors was, “When you think you’re getting close to the ground, turn on a landing light, if you don't like what you see, turn it off!” Adding to my difficulty, ground fog had formed in the vicinity of the Fox, landing light or not there was no way I could see the ground. Without know why I had turned to the west, away from St. Charles and was now on a west heading gliding to? It didn’t take long. Something began to beat against the fuselage, I yanked full flaps and raised the nose slightly. Didn’t know what was in front of me, but I’d know in seconds. And out the side window, corn! I was touching down in a corn field. The only clear area for miles in any direction. The landing roll was short for the corn was at harvest height. The roll out was probably less than 200’, thru a barbed wire fence. The nose of the battered and totally destroyed Six came to rest on Randall Road

Keep in mind this was 1968, today the same area is a sea of homes, and strip malls, big box stores and the like. A forced landing in the current year would have had a far different outcome! I ran a quick shut down check and exited the aircraft. And according to the report I filed with the CAB, tore my shirt while exiting over a barbed wire fence, the extent of my injuries. I still have the report, typed on an old ribbon typewriter, the report near the end nearly illegible as the ribbon was near it end. The report and a polaroid given to me by a County Mounty summoned by ATC is framed. The Polaroid is faded, but not my memory of that evening. One more thing. Every pilot’s thought, did I, “Screw the Pooch”, or had I done something wrong to cause this? I had checked the oil back at ORD and added some gas. Had I not secured the dipstick and run the engine out of oil? It was one of the first things I checked on the aircraft after determining it was safe to return to it. Thankfully not. An investigation would later reveal the owner had not complied with an Airworthiness Directive (AD) to have the valves replaced with ones of stouter material. The engine had in fact “sucked a valve”. An intake valve had broken off and began internally turning the engine into little chunks that the camshaft had punched thru the case as the lobes came around, trapping debris between the cam and case. The Six was a total write off. The corn cobs had done a number on the wings and fuselage.

[Jim Koepke]

Wow Randy that was a night to remember and thankfully you can.

jtk

[Jason Roehl]

Wow Randy that was a night to remember and thankfully you can.

jtk

No kidding. So, Randy, what was the resolution of the fire? It looks like you set the ground on fire, but not much fire damage to the plane.