Tell me your flying horror stories!

The BBQ Pit
1

Warning: Long OP ahead
Starting this because I decided it was best not to hijack this thread about missed plane landings. But I’m curious - what’s the worst air travel experience you’ve ever had? I have perpetual bad luck with flying, which is part of why I hate it, and I can’t remember the last time I was on a flight that wasn’t minorly delayed.

My most recent: This past Monday, flying back to school after Thanskgiving. It’s Philly->Denver->Albuquerque, at night, and then a shuttle back to school in Santa Fe. My flight leaves Philly at 6. I get to the airport at about 4:20. I check in just fine, and that was the last thing that went as it should’ve until I fell into bed at about 3 AM.

The security line, when I got in it, wasn’t moving. They were having a problem with the metal detectors or something. After about half an hour, they get it working. I’m towards the head of the line. I walk through: Beeeeeeeeep!. Okay. I take off my watch, the two necklaces I’m wearing, and my belt, and walk through again. Beeeeeeeep. Great. They take me aside and wand me. It beeps at the zipper on my jeans; they make me unbutton my jeans and prove I’m not hiding a knife in my crotch. The wand gets to my ankle - beeeep!

I sprained my ankle, badly, two weeks prior to this. It was wrapped with an ace bandage. The metal clasps set off the wand. They make me unwrap my ankle and prove that the bandage is not, in fact, a sheet of plastic explosives or something. Then, they decide they’re not satisfied just letting me go. They take me into a partitioned off-area with my carry-ons (my purse and a backpack with my laptop). They go through everything. They make me turn on my laptop and prove it’s not a bomb. They make me open the CD drive and take out the battery. They riffle through my books. They ask me where I’m going, why, etc. They honestly asked me if anyone had put anything in my bag without my knowledge. “Uh. Not that I know of.”

I finally get away from them and find my gate. The sign behind the desk says the next flight from this gate is a 9:10 flight to LA.

Uh…

It’s a problem with the computer system. Not reassuring, but not horrible. The gate staff is as frustrated as anyone else. We boarded about ten minutes late, but pushed off from the gate fairly quickly. You see, we were late, for our appointment to sit on the ramp to the runway and not do anything for an HOUR. I’ve got a mere 50 minutes between getting to Denver and my connection leaving Denver. I’m mildly claustrophobic, I was stuck in the middle seat, and the woman in the window seat shut the freaking shade. I was not happy.

Finally, we take off, only an hour behind schedule. The pilot comes on the PA, apologizes for the delay, and says there’s a very strong headwind, so we’re not likely to make up time. Also, it may be pretty bumpy.

The fasten seatbelts light was on the entire four hours. I was stuck in the middle seat. I hate flying to begin with. It was bumpy. They were out of diet soda, and even though I asked otherwise, they gave me ice in my tomato juice. I had to pee, really, really badly, but wasn’t allowed out of my middle seat. My ankle hurt.

We finally start the bumpiest descent I’ve ever felt, into Denver. They are holding some connections, mine included, but people with connections should deplane first and, the implication went, haul ass to their gate. We pulled into gate A-13. My connection is wating for me at gate A-54. DIA is a HUGE airport. Did I mention my ankle hurt because of a bad sprain? Good.

I also really, really had to pee. By that time, it didn’t much matter if I found a bathroom or not, I was going to empty my bladder in a minute or two regardless.

I found a bathroom. I then ran, literally, to the gate, as much as I could, with heavy backpack and a bad ankle. Until I was stepping mid-sprint off a moving walkway, landed wrong on my bad ankle, and fell. With an audible popping noise. Now I’m really in pain. I find my gate, hobble onto the plane. It’s nearly empty: I’ve got not only a window seat but the rows in front of, behind, and beside me are all empty. Aaaah. It’s also about a hundred and twenty degrees, but I can dig some ibuprofen and an unopened bottle of water out of my bag.

Denver’s about a mile above sea level. I purchased said bottle of water at, effectively, sea level. Okay, now I’m tired, stressed, in pain, hot, and soaking wet.

We taxi out to the runway. We promptly turn around, and go to what the pilot referred to as the “De-icing pad”, where a nifty truck appears to spray us liberally with water. I assume it was not in fact, water. We taxi back to the runway, and a gust of wind shakes the plane. It was not a fun take-off. I think the pilot had a hard time getting up to speed or something, because we went slow, slow, slow - ZOOMSTRAIGHTUP! Also, the middle armrests on that plane didn’t want to stay up, so whenever we dipped the slightest, there was this “thwackthwackthwack!” as armrest came down. I realized, as we were taking off, that there was no way - unless we flew at mach 3 or so, that I’d make the last shuttle of the night to Santa Fe. Which meant I’d spend the night at the airport, get on the shuttle in the early morning, and hopefully make it to my 9 AM class, and not pass out during the day, as, on Tuesdays, I have class from 9 in the morning to 4 in the afternoon.

Aaand…it’s turbulant. It’s very, very, very turbulant. According to the pilot, he couldn’t keep a safe altitude but get out of the “mild” turbulance. Apparently, to a pilot, mild turbulance equates, to me, to “Oh shit WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE” turbulance. We’re bumping bumping bumping along. And at one point, we honestly seem to lose about a thousand feet of altitude, not in a “planned, relax” way, but in a “Oh, shit” way.

Now, I’d like to explain that I’ve never in my life gotten airsick. Carsick, yes. Seasick, yes. AirsicK? No. I’ve been on some nasty flights and do admit to being intensely nervous when I fly, but I’ve never even gotten naseous from anything but nerves. Until that sudden drop, when it felt like someone decided to put my inner ear on a Tilt-A-Whirl. I can’t even explain what I felt, but all the sudden I was certain I was about to puke and I had no idea what direction was up. It was like I’d been spinning around as fast as I could and doing somersaults at the same time, for the past hour, only it came on all the sudden. So, I did the rational thing: freaked out and had a panic attack.

One of the flight attendants, may she have a wonderul, love-filled and long life, noticed my rather obvious distress and, rather expertly, talked me through it. She had me keep my head down for a good twenty minutes. It’s possible she explained why I was so disoriented, but I can’t recall, as I was to busy being sure I was about to die.

I’m about recovered as we start our final descent into Albuqueque. It’s pretty, lots of dark with the lights of the city. We get lower and lower and lower and hey, hope we land soon because the runway is about to end. Lower…

We hit the ground. Hard. Hard enough, in fact, to make me pretty sure that, still, I’m about to die. And then the pilot slams on the brakes. If you’ve ever been in a car accident or something similar, where you’re going one direction rather quickly and then, suddenly, you’re not, you know what this felt like. We must have gone from a couple hundred miles an hour to, say, twenty, in about fifteen seconds. It was not a good landing. I don’t like that pilot anymore.

I get my stuff, say a weak thank-you to the flight attendant who’d been so helpful, and sort of hobblelimpshuffle off to the baggage claim to see if there’s any way to get back to Santa Fe tonight. It’s, amazingly, only half an hour after I was supposed to get there.

The shuttle hasn’t left yet! They waited for me! And my luggage is…not there. Waiting, waiting, waiting, knowing there’s a van full of people waiting for me. Waiting, waiting…here it is! Here it…is sliced open along the bottom and soaking wet.

Things aren’t falling out, though; the inner lining seems almost intact. And…well, I’m just going to hope that it’s just water and not some sort of toxic jet fuel or something soaking my freshly-laundered clothes.

Then, just because I’ve had such a wonderous trip and the fates would hate to break that nice trend, it’s snowing. And really really cold. And the roads are really really icy. So it takes us about two hours to get from the airport into Santa Fe, and from there, another forty-five minutes to get to my college, the last stop on the route. I get into the room, have enough presence of mind to take my contacts out, and fall onto my bed. And sleep for…four and a half hours before getting up for class.

'Twas not a fun flight.

2

I loathe, despise, fear, and panic at flying. And your OP reminds me of all the reasons why. :eek: :frowning:

3

Ah, you poor thing - that was an unpleasent flight. Before I get to my Flight Horrors, let me see if I can explain some of what was going on here. I don’t know if it will make you feel better or not, but I’ll have a go at it.

(By the way - if any of the Doper airline pilots come in here and correct me on anything, go with what they say. I’m good, but I’m not a jet-jocky)

Yes, best NOT to “hijack” anything to do with airplanes! :smiley:

Airplanes flying on an instrument flight plan - and the airlines always fly on an instrument flight plan, no matter how nice the weather - are actually given a reservation in the air traffic system. You have a “window” in which you must take off. If you fail to take off in that time span you basically have to go back to square one and re-apply for a slot. A wait of an hour is not unusual. Which is why and how an airplane leaving the gate 5 minutes late winds up taking off an entire hour late more often than not - you have to go back to the end of the line and wait for your turn to come around again.

I’ll let the folks who fly under that system debate the merits and demerits of it.

{{{hugs}}}

I’m a touch claustrophobic, too.

At least he’s *trying * to keep you informed… Hey, he’s going to get home late, too, you know.

I normally leave the belt on regardless of what the light says… after 10 years of flying small planes it’s become such an ingrained habit. But, yeah, I hate really bumpy rides, too.

You are absolutely right - this was not a happy flight.

Oh, jeez, that’s a bummer! I’m sorry for laughing, but I’m sure you had a “wet kitty” look on your face at that point.

OK, why am I smooshing all of these bits together?

It’s because all of this is related.

First of all, the pilot is probably NEVER going to get on the PA and say “we’re in severe turbulence, folks” because he doesn’t need an alumimun tube full of screaming people. If it’s really severe, you’ll figure it out on your own.

Anyhow, let’s take it as a given that yes, your flight experienced some real turbulence.

Now, we’re going to deviate just a bit here while I explain some Airplane Facts. To begin, airplanes travel in two ways - on the ground and in the air (yes, we’re starting very basic). When it’s on the ground, the weight is supported by the wheels and the steering is controlled at least in part by the wheels. When it’s in the air, the weight is supported by the wings and the the thing is steered by movable surfaces on the wings (mostly - yes, I’m simplifying but the details aren’t important to the point I’m trying to make here). All well and good and obvious. However, there are two point in every flight when neither and both situations are in operation, and that’s on take-off and landing. When transitioning from one mode to another (wheels to wings or wings to wheels) neither system is working at its best. It’s that point where a pilot is most likely to lose control on the runway and, needless to say, we want to minimize the amoung of time we spend in that state.

One technique to solve this problem is to hold the plane down on the runway - you actually use the wings to do this - and keep the weight on the wheels as long as possible, then, when you have more than sufficient speed to fly you take-off quickly (that’s the ZOOOOOOOM! part) and get away from the ground as swiftly as possible so if you do get tossed around in turbulence you aren’t near anything you could hit. In gusty conditions this is safer than normal take-off techniques, even if it makes some passengers nervous. So, really, the pilot was doing this because it was in everyone’s best interests. Next time, you’ll know why this is happening and, I hope, you will find it somewhat reassuring that the person up front is doing everything possible to maximize your safety. Between holding the airplane on the runway longer than usual, and the fact that it does take a bit more runway to get off the ground in Denver (or any other relatively high altitude airport) it probably felt like he was having some trouble but, in actual fact, I’d be willing to bet good money that when the wheels finally left the ground you were actually traveling faster than you normally would in a normal take-off.

This is also true on landing - which may account for the… ah… firmness with which the wheels were placed on the pavement. Again, you want to be either in the air flying or on the ground rolling, but not in between. One technique is to drop the plane a little harder than usual (and landing gear can take the stress, please be assured of that), then use the flight controls/wings to press the weight of the airplane onto the wheels for maximum steering control. Rapidly decreasing the speed is also a good thing, as it puts even more of the weight onto the wheels.

And, also, when landing in gusting winds pilots do bring it in faster than usual to compensate for the effects of wind. This means you use up more of the runway and, yes, it may require more braking than usual.

The point is, again, that this sequence of events - coming in a little faster than usual, landing firmly (yes, with a noticable THUMP!), and braking hard is done to maximize your safety. It’s done delibrately, for good reason, and I hope understanding what is done and why might makes things better for you next time. Not necessarially pleasent - such landings aren’t a lot of fun however you look at them - but less provoking of anxiety.

Sounds like you had a touch of vertigo. It’s an amazing slice of hell, isn’t it? Yes, I’ve been there, too, once. I screamed. It was horrible. You lose ALL sense of up, down, and sideways.

When I had my bout of it I was on the front end of an open cockpit airplane, a couple thousand feet off the ground. I’m hanging out there in the middle of infinity and lost all orientation. AAAAAAAAAAAGH! Horrific. No one to hold my hand - the other guy on board was busy landing the airplane. I had to tough it out until we got back on the ground and I pretty much just fell out of the airplane.

By the way - this horrific state of existance can be triggered by some common over the counter medications in some people. Sudafed, for instance, can trigger vertigo (in fact, that is exactly what happened to me - I wasn’t in charge that day because I had taken Sudafed, but I wasn’t expecting such a violent reaction. Well, I’m glad I found out when I was a passenger - I am now extremely careful about not mixing pseudoephedrine and airplane controls). It is possible, if you had taken any medication recently, that it was a combination of that and the turbulence that triggered your vertigo. Dehydration (all too easy to fall into while traveling) may also be a risk factor.

If it was jet fuel you’d smell it - jet fuel is basically fancy kerosene. Should you ever get jet fuel on anything you own, remove as you would any other kerosene.

4

Long ago, my mate Steve was flying to Australia via Kabul.
As the plane began final approach, the pilot came on the intercom and said there would be a ‘delay’.
It turned out the invading Soviet troops had just taken the airport.
Steve was stuck there for a week.

I’ve had an ‘experience’ with Al Italia.

** DO NOT FLY WITH THIS AIRLINE! [/B]

I flew in from London to Rome. Then came a simple internal Italian flight, all with the worst airline in the World.

We arrived at a tiny airport and my luggage was nowhere to be seen. Bad luck? Oh no.

There were 17 of us on the plane and 4 (!) had no luggage. In this miniscule airport there were 3 staff processing lost luggage claims. Happen much, Al ‘useless’ Italia?!
It took the airline 3 days to find my luggage. Well they didn’t find it. My wonderful hotel instantly said when I arrived without baggage ‘did you fly Al Italia?’. They spent the week phoning various airports, and tracked it down.
:smack:

5

Coming back from a maintenance run in my buddy’s twin we lost an engine while flying 1200 ft above the ground. He switched tanks and the other engine quit. Did I mention this was at night? In the few seconds it took to switch to a different tank I think I sucked my wallet up.

6

I’ve got one. I was actually just thinking about starting this thread two days ago.

I’m 15 years old, and I’ve flown to India alone. No big deal, this is actually the second time in my life. Well, time comes to go home. I’m flying PanAm right around the time they went out of business. This is important to know.

My Uncle takes me at to the airport 4 AM for the 6 AM flight. I go in, get my bags checked, he kisses me goodbye, loads me on the plane, and leaves.

Once on the plane, they say it’s going to be a LONG delay before we leave. We wait, and wait, and finally take off at 9 AM. I fall asleep.

I wake up three hours later. Something seems wrong. I turn to the person next to me, and before I can get two words out she says “We’re turning around.” :confused: The stewardess comes over, and tells me we’re turning around because *something’s wrong with the plane * and it won’t make it to London. :eek:

So after a couple of hours we land back in Delhi. Everybody gets off, and the stewardess says everyone can go to a hotel if they want. Well, I don’t know what to do. I didn’t know if they would pay for the hotel, so I didnt’ go with them. I have money on me, but no rupee coins for the phone, and very quickly the airport completely empties out.

Well, I’m frightened now. I spy one lady sitting alone behind some kind of desk. I go over to her, and ask her pretty please in Hindi for a rupee coin, explaining my situation. She refuses me.

I wander around for another minute, and then can’t take it anymore. I sit down and begin to cry. First sniffles, then great heaving sobs. It goes on for a few minutes, with the mean lady studiously ignoring me.

I feel a tap on my shoulder. I turn, and there is an airport security guard wanting to know why I’m crying. I explain it all, and I tell him the lady won’t give me any money and I have no rupee coins. He nods, and helps me up and takes me over to her.

He proceeds to shame her into giving me two rupee coins for the phone. I get to the phone, and call my Uncle’s office. Thankfully he hasn’t gone out to lunch or anything, and I cry my little heart out on the phone to him. He immediately agrees to come get me.

He comes to get me, and takes me home. At home he calls PanAm and finds out that they won’t be leaving until they get another plane from Karachi. (I never thought of it then, but years later I thought WTF? They only have ONE plane?)

And then begins the saga of two days of my poor Uncle sleeping on the couch, and calling the airport every two hours to find out if the new plane is here yet, because of course they won’t call us.

Luckily it was a happy ending for all concerned but PanAm. Two days later the new plane comes. We get on, fly home…and I think six months later they filed Chapter 11.

I’ve never forgotten the feeling of wandering around the Indira Ghandi airport all alone, wondering if I’d have to sleep there, being afraid if any of the blue-collar workers would accost me.

And that is my worst airline story. I’ve flown to India four times, and something has happened each time, but that was by far the worst.

7

You are not shitting about, my inlaws have booked tickets for me and my wife on these spaghettifuckers four seperate times and each one has been more horrific than the last. I won’t go into details on most of it but last month we flew back from France to Boston on Alitalia (an 8 hour flight). The flight attendants wouldn’t give me any water and I hadn’t had any for about 6 hours before that because their fuckups literally had us standing in one line after another where we absolutely physically could not leave. I begged and they finally gave me a 4 oz glass. I got pissed and went into the bathroom and drank to my heart’s content from the sink. The next day, I broke out into a massive rash on my face, neck, and shoulders. It is just now healing, over one month later.

8

NinjaChick, if it helps at all with your travel plans, I suggest going through either Dallas or Phoenix. While I hate DFW and don’t like flying further west than I have to (so I try to avoid going to Phoenix), either one will keep you from being over the mountains going into Albuquerque. I’ve noticed that turbulence is generally worse going to/from Denver than DFW and I’m pretty sure it’s weather effects from the mountains. Coming in from Dallas, you can have a slight turbulence going over the Manzanos while approaching the airport, but it’s generally clear most of the way, depending on the weather. Heading in from the west, it’s clear the whole way. Trust me, I’ve done this for years. Personally, I enjoy turbulence (within reason, of course.) I just hate delays.

9

Broomstick, I’d just like to thank you for a very interesting post. Thanks. :slight_smile:

10

Nothing I’ve experienced can match the tale told by a friend of mine. About 10 years ago he was on a business trip to Korea. Three hours out of San Francisco, it becomes apparent that there is a problem on board. After a few minutes, there is a call for any passenger who’s an MD. A doctor steps forward and is taken to see a woman in difficulty.

My friend speaks to a flight attendant, explaining that he is prone to kidney stones, so always carries some strong prescription pain reliever. He suggests that she pass this info on to the doctor. She more or less dismisses this, saying “Everything is under control.”

But it isn’t: an announcement soon comes to the effect that the plane is diverting to Anchorage for a medical emergency. Passengers groan a bit, but the estimated delay is only a few hours. As the volunteer doctor returns to his seat, my friend asks him what happened. “It’s one of the flight attendants - could be a kidney stone - I don’t have any medication with me.” My friend volunteers his meds, and the doctor says “If only I’d known these were available…” The patient gets her pain relief, but it’s now too late to resume course to Korea - so the plane proceeds to Alaska.

At Anchorage the patient is offloaded, the plane is fueled and taxis out to resume the journey. But it soon is taxiing back again. It seems that some light was giving a bad indication. The problem is minor, and easily fixed. Unfortunately, the extra taxi time has put the flight crew over its monthly allotment of flight time - they can no longer legally fly the plane to Korea

It will be at least 10 hours until a qualified crew can be found and flown to Anchorage. All passengers de-plane and make plans to spend the night. But it’s the summer tourist season, and accommodations are very scarce. The first-class passengers get rooms, but most of the rest don’t - they spend the night sleeping on the floor of the terminal building.

At 8 the next morning, the plane has a flight crew and is ready to go. But the attempt at a takeoff has much the same result as before. This time, the problem is genuine - something about hydraulics. After a couple of hours, the announcement comes: a Boeing mechanic will have to be flown in on a Lear jet with the necessary part.

Late that afternoon, the mechanic arrives. By evening, the plane is ready. This time, all goes well, and they make it to Korea, with most passengers somewhat the worse for wear.

11

NinjaChick

I completely sympathise. I’m a total white-knuckled flyer. Any bump and I’m grabbing onto the seat. I’ve never had anything even close to what you went through, although I did have a flight from Chicago to Fort Lauderdale with a stop-over in Orlando in March of I think 1988… Chicago was completely socked in with fog and rain. I’m petrified of course, but I board the plane at O’hare (it’s unfortunate that Xanax hadn’t been invented yet :eek: ) , and as I’m going to my seat I ask the flight attendant if there was any trouble coming in. She says cheerily “it was a little bumpy, but it should be fine. I honestly don’t know why all the other flights were canceled!” My eyes pop out, then she happily says “please move to your seat, sir!” The flight was solid turbulence all the way to Orlando. Usually when I fly through turbulance I’m holding onto the seat in terror, then I look around and everyone else is calmly reading magazines like nothing’s wrong. This time everyone was nervous. The pilot kept coming on to tell us he was going to try to find a different altitude where there would be calmer air, then the engines would fire up and we’d shake even more as we climbed, then it would calm down for about five minutes and then bam! The pilot kept going up and down looking for calmer air, but we were tossed around wherever we went. This woman sitting next to me who was flying to Columbia and spoke not a word of English saw that I was nervous and kept giving me candy from her purse. Bless her!

That was my scariest flight. I had some silly experiences, like one time in Boston where we were waiting to pull away from the gate and the two flight attendants were arguing over which position the lever on the emergency exit had to be in for it to be locked. I was sitting across from it and staring at it the entire flight.

Last time I flew my plane was waiting to take off from LaGuardia in a blizzard. They de-iced the wings, but we waited a long time to take off. The pilot came on and said “we’ll be taking off in just a minute. I’m just going to make one more check to make sure the de-icers have done their job.” I figure the plane has some high-tech sensors to test this. Instead, the cockpit door opens, the pilot walks out to the middle of the plane, looks out the windows at both wings and says out loud “well, looks all right to me,” then walks back to the cockpit and closes the door, and off we went into the blinding storm! Ironically it was one of the smoothest flights I’ve ever had.

12

Broomstick thank you very much for the explanation. I had a similar landing back in August and I was petrified of getting back on the plane to go home.

13

Echoing the thanks to Broomstick - I got mostly the same explanation from my sister (who has both a private pilots license and a glider license), but you said it better. And it may help next time I fly, though I’ve already acknowledged my fears about flying are completely totally irrational and baseless. :frowning:

Right now, I think that the “worst flight” award is a tie between glee’s friend and magiver.

sigh And only two and a half weeks until I need to fly again, home for winter break…I’m flying Alb. → Minneapolis → Philly though; dunno if that’s going to be any better or worse…

14

I’m lucky with planes. When I was in school in Champaign I went home to NY on the late, unlamented Ozark Airlines with a friend, who said she never had a bad experience. Our trip was her best and my worst - the plane blew a tire on landing and they had to send a bus out for us.

My airline never to take is Northwest. The one and only time I flew with them, through Minneapolis, was just after they found that all their deicing equipment had a flaw in the crane, and had to be taken out of service, leaving with just one old one for their entire fleet in their hub. Coming back they somehow cancelled the flight, dumping me on American. The agent was surprised that I was so glad to be flying her airline.

The real worst was being stuck for 24 hours in Denver due to a blizzard, made much better because my old boss, who I was visiting, had a secretary who was smart enough to reserve me a hotel room before I went to the airport. That was not Continental’s fault - what was their fault was that 24 hours later, when we were deicing, they somehow got the deicing fluid into the engine, requiring a plane switch.

But no turbulence stories. I like turbulence. And I thought SOP these days was to keep your seatbelt on at all times unless you got up. It helps that I’m a claustrophile, I suppose.

15

I sat next to a guy that talked way to much and could not take a hint to stop talking and apparently never got tired, so the entire flight was me listening to him talk. That is a horror story, after about 30 minutes 98 per cent of what he said I didn’t hear, he actually began sounding like a grown up in a “Peanuts” cartoon.

16

It’s 1986, and I’m flying from San Diego to Milwaukee, via Eastern Airlines. BTW, anybody else notice that a lot of these stories are about airlines that are either out of business or state agencies? Anyway, we are barreling down the field when the pilot stomps on the brakes – I’m talking luggage bins opening, heads hitting the seats in front of them, people screaming.

He comes on and explains that an indicator light came on, we’re going back to the gate for a mechanic check. I’m watching out the window, and some beach-bum looking guy with half-unzipped coveralls, a Star Wars t-shirt, and a Mets cap strolls out with a huge screwdriver. I hear some scraping and clanking down below, then he walks off. Pretty soon the pilot comes on and says the problem is fixed, but we have to wait for 45 minutes to take off so the brakes can cool down. Forty-five minutes later we barrel down the runway again, and yep, you guessed it – we aborted the takeoff again, albeit not so dramatically.

Now they figure the sensor is broken, and they have to wait for a new one to be flown in from somewhere. If it was me, I’d have asked one of the other airlines if I could borrow a sensor – but maybe that’s not allowed with airplane mechanics. Hospitals borrow parts and supplies from each other, why not airlines? Anyway, they put me on a Northwest flight to Atlanta, where I’m supposed to catch another Eastern flight to Milwaukee. I’ll only be 3 hours late, but that’s OK.

Flight to Atlanta is unremarkable, but the Eastern plane to Milwaukee, waiting for me at the gate, is the filthiest plane I’ve ever seen (on the outside). There are oil and grease stains all over it, and obvious dirty hand prints on the fuselage. I’m sitting in the plane, and I notice a large puddle of oil under the left engine. Looking closely, I can see that the engine is slowly dripping oil!

Sure enough, when they start the left engine, they immediately shut it down. Some beach-bum looking guy with half-unzipped coveralls, a Star Wars t-shirt, and a Mets cap strolls out with a 5-gallon can of oil, a small ladder, and a funnel. At least their mechanics have a consistent uniform! Anyway, he sets up the ladder on the other side of the engine, and a few minutes later takes everything away. I watch the oil leak change from a drip to a rivulet to a stream as he walks away. When they try to start the engine t looks to me like they left the drain plug out, because there are a few gushes of oil at that point.

To make a long story end, I ended up on another, later plane, and was 6 hours late. Never flew Eastern Airlines again. Five years later, they were out of business.

17

All of my worst flying experiences involve, in some way, Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport. The happiest day of 2004 for me was when Delta announced that they were abandoning DFW as a hub airport. I now have a decent chance of never having to change planes there again. And I don’t willingly go to any part of Texas, but especially Dallas.

Sometime around six or eight years ago, I was asked by a business acquaintance to interview for a job with the company he worked for in Dallas. Against my better judgement, I agreed. The plan was that I would fly into DFW early in the morning, spend the morning and early afternoon interviewing, and fly back to Atlanta mid-afternoon. Everything went great until I boarded the plane for the return flight at about 2 pm. We pushed back on time in order to clear the gate for the next flight, but were soon informed we’d be hanging out on the tarmac for a while because of weather problems at ATL. Not terribly unusual. We were on the ground for nearly two hours before the ATC ground hold on flights to ATL was lifted and we could take off. More or less uneventful flight until we got into the general vicinity of ATL. Because of the earlier weather problems, there were lots of flights arriving, so we were stacked up in holding patterns for quite a while. After a half-hour or so of this, the pilot announced that (1) there were new weather problems at ATL, and (2) we only had enough fuel to continue holding for another 25 minutes or so, after which we’d have to divert to another airport, probably Jacksonville. Almost the full 25 minutes later, he came on again to say that we’d been cleared to land and were going in. It was dark, I was in an aisle seat, and there was a very low ceiling, so I don’t know how close to the ground we actually got, but it seemed like we were fairly low when we suddenly weren’t descening any more but were climbing rapidly into a turn to the left. A few minutes more, and the pilot announced that during our approach wind shear had been detected on the runway sensors, and that we were now diverting to Birmingham. By the time we got on the ground in Birmingham, it was about 8 pm Central Time. We’d boarded the plane six hours earlier. People were tired, hungry, thirsty, and ready to get off the plane. Unfortunately, Delta has only a small presence in Birmingham, and only a couple of gates. There were lots of Delta (and other airline) planes on the ground there that night, owing to the weather situation in ATL. So we sat on the tarmac in Birmingham – the flight attendants served up the remaining soft drinks and pretzels on board and put on a movie. The people I felt the sorriest for were the ones sitting next to me whose final destination was – Birmingham. They were effectively home, but couldn’t get off the plane. We sat until a few minutes before 10 pm local time, approximately two hours, when a gate for us finally opened up (a gate for a different airline whose last flight of the day had departed). Everyone deplaned and made a beeline for the one snack bar/restaurant that was still open, but which had run out of everything except for fried chicken filet sandwiches and french fries, and which was closing at 10. After getting what passed for a meal for the first time in 8 hours, we set about figuring out what to do next. Because by the time the got the plane to the gate and got it refueled/serviced, the flight crew timed out on their duty hours for the day, so they couldn’t legally fly the plane to Atlanta. Delta had to scramble a reserve crew in Atlanta, get them to ATL, and onto the last scheduled flight of the night from ATL to Birmingham. A number of passengers attempted to blow off the flight to ATL and either stay in Birmingham or rent a car and drive to Atlanta, but every hotel room and rental car in the city was already gone by then. We finally got off the ground from Birmingham at about 2 am local time. The flight to ATL and landing were reasonably uneventful. The concourses and terminals at Hartsfield were as full and busy as I’ve ever seen them at 8 am on a Monday, however, and it was about 4 am on a Thursday. There were thousands upon thousands of folks who’d had flights cancelled or who’d missed connections sitting, sleeping, and standing everywhere. I read a news story months later about Delta’s head of customer service, in which this whole fiasco was referred to as the “April Fool’s Day Massacre” (it happened on April 1 of whatever year it was).

A year or so before that, my wife and then-infant son made plans to fly from ATL to visit my family in Arkansas. All of the reasonable fares involved changing to commuter flights at DFW. We were scheduled to leave two days before Christmas. That morning, a terrible ice storm blew through Texas, causing hundreds of flight cancellations. Our scheduled flight was cancelled hours beforehand, well before we’d even left for the airport. We rescheduled for the next day (Christmas Eve), and of course the flight was absolutely packed, since so many people had been rescheduled from the day before. It took until 20 minutes after our scheduled departure time just to get everyone on the plane. We only had about an hour between flights in DFW, and as anyone who’s ever changed there knows, it can take a hell of a long time to make connections. We arrived in DFW about 30 minutes after our scheduled arrival. Meaning we had 30 minutes to make our connection. Delta burned 10 of that having us cool our heels while they tried to find my son’s stroller, which we had gate checked (how do you lose gate-checked items?). We ended up abandoning the stroller and flagging down one of the carts they use to move the old and infirm around. We had to go from a gate at one end of B concourse to a gate at the far end of A concourse. We made it to the gate just seconds before the scheduled departure time for that flight, only to find that it had been delayed. Two hours later, it was cancelled. By this time, it was nearly 7 pm on Christmas Eve. Delta arranged a hotel room for us, but because so many folks were already stranded, it was a long way from the airport. The shuttle was supposed to pick us up downstairs in ten minutes, so there wasn’t time to get any food or anything from one of the few airport shops/restaurants still open. We got to the god-forsaken Days Inn they’d put us in, and realized that there were only three restaurants within walking distance, and they were all closed by 7:30 Christmas Eve. Our only option was junk food and hot dogs from the 7-11 store next to the hotel. We caught the shuttle back to the airport the next morning (Christmas Day) fairly early, figuring that someplace we could get some food would be open and we would have time before our flight. We arrived at the gate to check in and get boarding passes, and found out that they were just closing the doors on an earlier flight to our destination, with several empty seats, so if we wanted we could go ahead and change to that flight. We did, even though it meant putting off eating for another couple of hours. We had a similarly tight connection with a similarly long distance between gates in DFW on the return – we walked off one plane, went to the restroom to change my son’s diaper, made a beeline to the next gate, and made it on just before they closed the doors. And then sat on the tarmac for 90 minutes because of a ground hold in ATL. My son had been really good for most of the trip, but by this time he was tired and done with it, and he didn’t deal well with just sitting there for an hour and half.

That doesn’t even mention the time I had a connecting flight – the last of the night to my destination – canceled in Dallas and I had to spend the night there when it was 4 below zero. Or the many other times I’ve had to sprint between gates to make connections. I so hate DFW that I will willing spend up to a couple hundred dollars extra to avoid it when I’m planning travel.

OTOH, I’ve been extremely fortunate in other ways – I fly several times a month on average (I’ll fly ten segments this month, and that’s typical), and I’ve had no serious “OhMyGodWe’reGonnaDie” flights where something seemed terribly wrong. A few through thunderstorms that were rough, several out west where the turbulence was pretty wild, but nothing where the wheels wouldn’t come down or the plane seemed out of control or anything.

18

It was about three days after the September 11th attacks, and I was scheduled to be on one of the first planes back in the air. it was a red-eye from Maui to California. First, our flight was delayed late into the night because of a bomb scare- not exactly the sort of thing you want to hear three days after Sept. 11th. Then I had to get in to the airport with my ticket which had gotten issued with the wrong last name. It wasn’t a big deal at all on my way out to Maui, but obviously a lot of things changed in those two weeks.

I was the only person awake on the flight. I was awake because something was going on. All the flight attendents were whispering and crying. I was near the seats they used on breaks, and I heard them crying all night. Of course I sat there wondering what they knew that I didn’t, and I was scared out of my mind. The only thing I could think of was that something horrible happened in the cockpit and the flight attendents knew we were doomed. I never figured out what was going on, but I was never so certain I was going to die as on that flight.

19

A couple years back I ran into what is a fairly amusing dilemma. I showed up at the airport in Honolulu only to find out that my tickets were for the next day! $100 later I was on the plane home, but it was a lesson to always check the tickets issued because somewhere between ordering and receiving, mistakes do happen. (And my agent swallowed the cost, since it was his error.)

But my worst flight was the first leg of a flight from JFK to France last September. MrsB and I sat in our seats, and one of the last people to arrive, stowing his luggage as the plane taxis away from the gate, sits beside us. And good god did he stink.

He was essence of sci-fi convention. His odour was tangible. Three people slumped into unconsciousness in adjoining rows. And I was supposed to be next to this guy all the way to Heathrow.

I’m telling you, I’ve cleaned restaurant grease traps that smelled better than this guy. He was walking tear gas.

After enduring his stench until the seatbelt light dinged, I leaned over and politely mentioned to the man that it appeared his deodorant might have failed, and would he mind washing up his armpits.

Dude sprang up, rummaged through his luggage to rip out a gift deodorant/ aftershave set (!) and a clean shirt, then spent 40 minutes in the bathroom.

It was the bravest thing I’ve ever done, and the worst humiliation I’ve ever inflicted on a fellow human being, but it damn near got me a standing ovation from everyone within sniffing distance.

20

I’m glad to say that this is my worst experience, as I’m a “white knuckle” flier.

The flight was on Southwest, only two months or so after 9/11, and the memory was fresh in everyone’s mind. We taxied out to the runway - no word from the pilot. We suddenly took off - no word from the pilot. Eventually, we landed, never once hearing a single word from the pilot over the intercom. Everyone was noticable confused and weirded out by it.