Your scariest moments while flying

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21

Oh, and I’m sure somebody will have this beat, but I flew on a United 767 into Newark, NJ, about four weeks before a United 767 out of Newark NJ was crashed into the Pentagon by terrorists on Sept. 11.

I can actually remember worrying about terrorism on that flight, pre-September 11. (Hard to remember the world then, isn’t it? But we were worried about Osama Bin Laden even then, after the bombing of the USS Cole in particular.)

Anyway, I can remember thinking that my flight would never be targeted, because it included a lot of Brazilians that terrorists would have no quarrel with.

In hindsight, the flight would have been perfect, because there are few that would have been carrying more fuel.

::shudder::

22

While teaching me to fly gliders, my instructor wandered a bit too far from the airfield. He flew around frantically looking for lift, before giving up and telling me to prepare for an off field landing. And then he starts apologizing to me. :frowning:

The apology was warranted. Normally, off field landings are no big deal for gliders, but we were over swampland and too low to make it to any of the nearby fields. The FI managed to slip and then stall the glider into a remarkably small clearing. We pancaked into waste deep water.

It was a very soft landing and a credit to the FI’s skill, if not his judgment. Any appreciation I felt however, was dampened by the ensuing trek through deep Florida swampwater. I was pretty calm throughout the whole epsiode, but I got a nice case of the shakies as soon as we reached dry land.

23

I trust this is non-combat horror stories, so:

Chopper trip from Kaiserslautern to Kassel in about 1970. We lost the tail rotor somewhere around Darmstadt. As long as you have some forward air speed, you don’t really need a tail rotor. The air stream keeps the craft pointed in one direction. At low speed or hovering the tail rotor keeps the whole aircraft from spinning around the rotor shaft the opposite direction of the main rotor. The pilot came in very low and very fast and sort of skidded to a halt in a beet field in order to keep air speed up as long as possible. There was a very good chance that we would hit and swing sideways and roll over. We stayed upright but there was a lot of dust and mashed sugar beets flying around.

Ozark Airlines (remember them!), flight from Cedar Rapids to Omaha at the height of the blizzard season. High winds from the Northwest. The pilot flew contours all the way. We could not have ever been more than 500 feet of the deck. We were in snow squalls all the way. Us poor passengers had to do the whole thing sober because the flight attendants stayed strapped in their jump seats the whole time. It was a very quiet flight.

Trip from Schweinfurt to Bitberg in a four seater, single engine fixed wing during a huge thunderstorm that covered all of central Germany. Dodged storms for an hour or so until the other passenger, who had beef stroganoff for lunch, got air sick. We finished the flight with the door open because the cabin was so disgusting. Not really scary, just highly unpleasant.

Flight from Frankfurt, Germany, to Kansas City in an Air Malaysia chartered jumbo jet. The seats were set up to accommodate passengers who were no more than five foot six. Into this plane we load some 600 soldiers fresh off the fall European deployment exercise, each with two duffle bags of stuff along with web gear, helmet and personal weapon. We were grossly over loaded. As we taxi, the pilot announces that he wants 50 people to leave the nose of the airplane and stand at the rear for the take off. We do it! We use up most of the strip but we get off the ground and stagger up to altitude. At this point we have used up enough fuel that the guys standing around the rear rest room can go back to their seats in the forward section.

24

Here’s one for av8rmike, it’s not my story, but I don’t think my buddy will mind me telling it, but it is definitely not “normal occurences”. I do not know all the terms, so you will have to forgive me if I butcher them.

He was flying into Kuwait, to transfer to another plan to get to Bahrain, for the Dubai Airshow. Unfortunately, this would’ve been back when that little scuffle erupted called Desert Storm. All of a sudden it seemed like the airport was under attack. With numerous explosions occurring at the airport the pilot had to make a sudden change in flight plan. The British Airways flight attendants went running down the aisles yelling at people to “assume the position” and smacking them on the backs of the heads to get them to listen.

Brian said he didn’t think a 747 could make that steep a turn, but they managed. (A lot of the overheads opened, showering them with luggage and personal belongings). They ended up landing in Bahrain (at least he didn’t have to transfer now). They deplaned onto that slide. He joined everyone else in kissing the ground after arrival.

25

I think I posed an abbervated version of this in the ‘do you clap after landing’ thread, but there’s the full tale (a bit long):

Location: Kansas City Airport (MCI, I dunno why they use that.)
Time: Dec., 2000, early morning.

Well, I was going from MCI --> CAE, via U.S. Airways. It was early in the morning, so only a handful (at most) of flights had left before us and most of those flights had been cargo, not passenger. What made the situation sticky is that a good-sized blizzard was bearing down on the area, and bearing down fast. We knew the weather was iffy, so my Dad (who was dropping me off) and I had gone out to my Sis’s place since it was approx. 15 mintues (max) from the airport. It took us almost twice the usual amount of time to get to the airport, because the roads were in sad shape and getting worsel. Along the way, the interstate goes alongside the runway area: we could see the airport ground crews scrambling to clear off the runways. They looked kinda like chickens with their heads cut off with the way they were dashing to and fro. Needless to say, this did not bode well, however since we hadn’t heard anything yet about the airport shutting down, we pressed on.

Get into the terminal, and see lots of the airlines having ‘CANCELLED’ or ‘DELAYED’ next to their flights. Ut-oh. Go to look out the windows, and see the de-icers working overtime: most of the planes had been sitting outside overnight and there was too much ice buildup to contend with, add to that they were running low on working de-icers and the fluids for 'em… some of the stuff I overheard was the various airlines asking the others if they had any spares. The plane I was getting on looked fine: apparently it had been undercover for the night, plus they had started the de-icing as soon as they could. So, they were able to keep well ahead of the ice. Lot of passengers milling about, looking nervous: lots of airport people dashing to and fro to keep on top of the situation. Some discussion takes place at the gate’s counter area, then an announcement is made for us to board, the usual routine.

Get onto the plane, lucky me with a window seat right in front of the wing. I’m watching the de-icer work on the plane next to us, spraying green goop all over, and everyone generally scrambling like they normally don’t. Pilot comes on PA system to inform us of the situation, and explains that since the planes that were ahead of us in the take-off queue were having problems de-icing that we get to go as soon we’re ready and the runway checks out as clear. A few moments, de-icer comes around and goes over our plane again, then we pull away from the gate.

So now, we’re finally heading to the runway, and there are no other planes about: I can see some being taken away from the gates and heading back to wherever they store them. We didn’t even do the usual pauses along the way to the runway, we just went. As we start heading down, I notice that a) we’re getting ice on the wings again, and b) we’re starting to shimmy. Not the normal type of movement you get if a cross-breeze hits the plane: this is the hydroplane kind of shimmy… and I got that ‘not connected to the ground’ feeling when we made the turn onto the runway. :eek: Once I notice this, the engines suddenly kick up into overdrive: not what normally happens on take-off. (Sure, they kick in the throttle, but it’s normally more gentle, and not normally at that point in the runway!) Now the shimmy is at the point that there’s no way anyone couldn’t notice it: we started bouncing a bit as the pilots pushed the plane as much as they could to get the plane off the ground ASAP, since at this point there was no way in hell we could have stopped safely. (We would have probably slid onto the interstate!) Once we got up off the ground, the landing wheels went up a heck of a lot sooner than they normally do, and we were still full-throttle to get the hell out of Dodge, so to speak.

:eek: :eek: Now, I’m a fairly seasoned passenger and this was the only time I’ve ever been nervous on a flight.

A bit of follow up: they closed down the airport after we took off, since with our takeoff it was very apparent they couldn’t keep up with the runway anymore. And, since I got to hang around a bit after landning at my transfer point, I overheard the crew talking about the take off and why they didn’t abort as soon as they noticed the lack of traction in the turn: they went with the split second decision to power out of the skid they felt was impending. :eek:!!!

<< Up up and away! >>

26

Amazingly, I wasn’t all that scared in the following story, but when I think about what could have happened – it makes me a bit nervous:

My brother had gotten his pilot’s license about a year or so before this happened. This story takes place about 8-9 years ago.

My second oldest sister had a baby and my brother and my third oldest sister decided we wanted to see her. The sister who had the baby lives in Shawano, WI and my brother lives in Janesville, which is where we took off from. (The other mentioned sister and myself live in Illinois).

We were on our way back from Shawano and came into a rain storm (it was now dark outside). We were in a Cessna single engine (model unknown) and the rain wasn’t bad, but when we came up to Lake Koshakong (sp?) we hit an air pocket and plunged 200 feet faster than you could blink. When the plane “hit bottom” (for lack of a better, more accurate phrase), all three of us were thrown forward and you could hear the whoosh of air as it was forced from our lungs.

Shortly thereafter, the turbulence started. We were buffeted around for about 10-20 minutes (maybe less, but I seemed like an eternity). The first three minutes were the worst. The plane only rocked once to the side and my brother quickly regained control and kept it level the rest of the time. We were just treated to the ups and downs of the turbulence. I’d been in minor turbulence before and wasn’t that bothered with it once I got used to it. What we were in was just awful!

I wasn’t really all that worried about him handling the plane. My biggest fear was either injury from the unintentional back bends I was doing over the back seat due to the buffeting we were getting, or the loss of my dinner that had been consumed shortly before takeoff.

My sister was really freaked out. She kept telling me that it was going to be ok (I probably looked green from the nausea) I couldn’t really hear what she was saying due to the thunderous noise of the rain hitting the plane.

At one point, my brother told my sister that if we had to make an emergency landing, he’d set down on 94.

Just as he was thinking this would have to be the case, we saw the lights of the Janesville airport and the turbulence ceased.

After my brother brought the plane down, and we were all once again on Terra Firma, he shook his fist at the sky and exclaimed “I beat cha!!” It was then when we realized my brother had never been in this kind of turbulence.

He looked up what we’d been through and, as far as he can reckon, we were in severe turbulence for those first three minutes, followed by moderate turbulence to the end.

If he hadn’t been as good a pilot as he had been we could have crashed into the lake and none of us would be here anymore!!

All three of us refer to this day as “The Bonding Experience.”

27

I agree with Av8rmike. Many of the stories in this thread describe fairly routine stuff in avaiation. I’ve done a lot of flying, and frankly, the most extreme situations I’ve encountered pale to my experiences while driving a car.

However, my two-cents for this thread would be when an instructor crashed our plane on landing during a lesson. It happened very quickly, and ended without injury to us. Almost anticlimactic. The instructor simply sighed, apoligized, and said, “I really shouldn’t have tried that…”

I went about my normal business later in the day, sometimes marvelling, “Hey, I was in a plane crash this morning!”

But as I say, I’ve been in far worse car accidents. And normal driving will always scare me more than flying, General Aviation or Commercial. The way I see it, there are just far few fewer morons up there than there are on the roads. :slight_smile:

28

This is probably my scariest flight incident:

The plant I was on was coming in for a landing in St. Louis. It was a nice, sunny day and we were coming in from the east on a normal landing approach. I was on the right side of the airplane in a window seat.

As we get close to the airport (and low to the ground), all of a sudden I hear the power to the engines increase and we begin to climb and bank to the left. Hard.

Just as the ground leaves my window view to leave me looking at a beautiful blue sky, I see another passenger airline, very close, climbing hard and banking right…

29

I should’ve never read this thread!! I’m 27 years old and have never flown in a plane. I’m taking my first plane ride in February (Vegas baybee!) and I was already scared shitless… these stories didn’t help. Good thing I don’t have a good long-term memory. I’ll have forgotten all about this thread by February.

[sub]I hope[/sub]

30

We’ll bump it for ya, Kiki. :wink:

I love this thread.

Yeah, most of the things described here are probably controlled incidents with a very low chance of a bad outcome. But even the most rational person (well, OK, me :)) has this tiny nagging feeling in the back of his head: what if?

A car crash is far more likely to occur - trust me, I know. But with a plane crash, the chance of survival is pretty low. Add to that the fact that you’re not in control, and there you have it: an instinctual aprehensiveness about flying. Well, that’s how I would describe my attitude, anyway. Never really scared, but always aprehensive.

31

The scariest thing that has ever happened to me while flying was in Pensacola, FL at the Naval Air Base. That is where they teach pilots to fly and every time you climb into the cockpit there is a good chance you will get a flight instructor that likes to yell. Very scary and it happened several times. Getting lost once was very scary, but again mostly because I knew I was going to get chewed out. I thought that hitting the carrier was going to be scary, but you are so busy that you don’t notice.

32

Scariest? Maybe because no other passenger noticed:

In a passenger jet 2 years ago I was resting with the seat at the low position and looking out the window near the tail section. Bright day, suddenly, I felt the plane decelerating… then going up… decelerating, going up… about 3 times very quick, and I think it was hard to differentiate the feeling form normal turbulence . . .
But then, I saw it: a propeller commuter or private plane passing RIGHT under us with about 1000 feet of separation, heading in the other direction. I lifted my head to see if anybody else noticed… No one else did. I decided not to worry anybody, and the flight ended without any more incidents.

33

The first time the door opened on a C-130, and I had door position, on my first jump. That was scary, but I learned to love it.

34

Actually, your chances of surviving a plane crash are quite good. Remember, only the very horrific incidents are widely reported, and these are quite rare.

Believe it or not, pilots are trained in how to crash. There are a few techniques that can dramatically improve your chances. One thing they teach you is to “fly the plane to the crash”, rather than letting the wing stall. It’s much better for the kinetic energy to be spent on tearing the wing from the fuselage, than to have it spent on going splat straight down.

Quick story: An airplane mechanic I know was called to the scene of a crash near here a few years ago. A small twin-engine Cessna had run out of gas just short of the airport and crashed in a wooded area.

He found the fuselage ripped open, the wings torn off, and the tail still hanging in the trees. All six people on board walked away without a scratch.

Well, one lady did sprain her ankle climbing out.

This accident wasn’t widely reported, but you can bet it would have been if they had all been killed.

35

Yeah, but I bet all six sets of underwear were ruined as well. . .

:wink:

36

Icelandic Airlines was cheap at the time.
Flew from NY to Iceland (pretty country, stayed two nights) and then from Iceland to Luxembourg.
Half way there, I noticed the right engine on fire. The stewardess was called over and hightailed it to the captain.
Next thing I know, ALL engines were turned off and the plane started to go straight DOWN, nose first.
I was so calm, I could have served drinks as I knew these were the last minutes of my life.
Then, suddenly there was a chug, chug…and after a few more tries, I noticed the other engines came back on (except the one that had been on fire.).
We landed safely, but I had to be helped off the plane…seems I was fine when I thought I was going to die, but I was a physical wreck when I found out we weren’t and realized how close…
I found out later that turning off all engines in a fire is normal, but apparently there is no “ignition” for jet airliners, so in such a case, the only way to restart engines is to to dive fast enough to kick start them.
It worked.
I read in the Herald Tribune the next day that there was an “incident” reported on an Icelandic flight.

37

I don’t know DMark, I think you’re wrong about the lack of ignition. I mean, how the hell do they start the plane in the morning then? Throw it off the hangar and hope it fires up? :slight_smile:

Then again, this may have been a long time ago, with different technology.

38

When I was little, my family was going to Disney World. Right before take-off, the plane started to get really hot. Then, we saw smoke coming out of the air conditioners, while they made us sit there for 10 minutes while they assessed the situation. Did they REALLY think they were actually going to fly that thing?

39

There ain’t no such beast. What there is is turbulence, wind shear, vertical gusts, rotor, downbursts, etc. than cany make a plane gain or lose large amounts of altitude quickly.

None of these are “pockets”. That’s just a whuffo’s name for something he doesn’t understand.

40

Mine would be a mid-air collision while flying a glider. Lost about 5’ of my right wing.

I was wearing a parachute and decided to use it. Bailed out at about 2500’. Worked out fine.