This is kind of a long story and if nobody reads it, that's fine. I am writing it to help relieve myself of the stress that I feel when it comes to mind. Last evening, I was watching "Air Disasters" on the Smithsonian Channel and the new episode was about an Airbus A-340 with 309 passengers and crew on-board going off the runway during a violent thunderstorm. The plane then caught fire, however, all of the passengers and crew were able to get off the aircraft in the 90 second time frame, so there were no fatalities. As is usual, the TV version did not report all of the facts. The final analysis of why the accident happened was due to a multitude of factors. You may read about it here.......https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_France_Flight_358
I was flying a similar plane at the time. It was a Boeing 767, which is a two aisle, wide body. I believe we also had about 300 passengers and crew on-board the day that this story is about. It was the day after Christmas. I had flown an earlier flight from Washington, D.C. to Chicago-O'Hare very early in the a.m. I believe that we had landed in Chicago at around 8:00 a.m. Our next and last flight of the day was to fly down to Miami and lay-over. We had a lot of very excited and happy tourists on-board. They were glad to be leaving cold, windy, snowy Chicago for hopefully, warmer, sunny weather, which it was. Temperatures out of Miami were reporting mid 70's. We were also alerted of impending thunderstorms about arrival time which was mid-afternoon. The thing about Florida is that it never just 'drizzles' there. When it rains along the coast, either side, it puts it down in buckets.
As I remember it, the flight down was very typical for that time of year, meaning that we had some light chop as we passed through the middle states. We had just entered Georgia when the weather forecast was updated and again, we were notified of rain was beginning to fall around the Miami airport with an expected increase in winds and heavy downpours with the possibility of some lightning. The "L" word is never good for a pilot. My First Officer had handled the takeoff back in Chicago and I was going to do the landing in Miami. We were about 80 miles from the airport when we began our initial descent. As we got closer and closer to Miami the winds and rain were picking up. Miami is a strange place to land sometimes during t'storms. A pilot can go from landing into a headwind to landing into a tailwind in just seconds, so caution and being alert to wind direction change is always advised.
It was very bumpy as we were descending through the clouds and we had warned the F/A's (Flight Attendants) to make sure everyone was belted tightly. We had been flying under IFR (Instrument Flight Rules). I wanted to land as near as possible to the start of the runway, so to allow the plane plenty of distance to slow and stop. This would, hopefully, prevent any skidding or hydroplaning. I was very happy with the touchdown when all of a sudden the plane wanted to run left for me. I held on tight to the wheel, but I could feel that we were about to go into the grass on the left side of the runway. We may have drifted about 2-3 feet off center, but thankfully, the thrust reversers and spoilers slowed the plane enough that I was able to gain additional control of the plane. I did pass my intended taxiway and I had to explain to the tower what had happened. The lady in the tower told me to check my tires when I exited the plane because she was seeing smoke come off of the undercarriage (landing gear).
After I had exited the airplane, I looked underneath and there it was. I had blown not one, but two tires on the left side of the plane. The passengers never knew how close we had come to being on a TV show that afternoon. A couple of older ladies wanted to see the Captain as they were exiting the plane, so I went to the door and they were telling me how scared they were, but they knew that God had the controls and we would be OK. I thought to myself that maybe he did, but I wished that he would have told me. It would have saved me from sweating bullets. And, that's the second closest time that I ever came to having an accident.
If you read this story, thank you. If you are one of the millions of nervous fliers, I hope that it instills some additional confidence into you as to how safe flying really is.
I was flying a similar plane at the time. It was a Boeing 767, which is a two aisle, wide body. I believe we also had about 300 passengers and crew on-board the day that this story is about. It was the day after Christmas. I had flown an earlier flight from Washington, D.C. to Chicago-O'Hare very early in the a.m. I believe that we had landed in Chicago at around 8:00 a.m. Our next and last flight of the day was to fly down to Miami and lay-over. We had a lot of very excited and happy tourists on-board. They were glad to be leaving cold, windy, snowy Chicago for hopefully, warmer, sunny weather, which it was. Temperatures out of Miami were reporting mid 70's. We were also alerted of impending thunderstorms about arrival time which was mid-afternoon. The thing about Florida is that it never just 'drizzles' there. When it rains along the coast, either side, it puts it down in buckets.
As I remember it, the flight down was very typical for that time of year, meaning that we had some light chop as we passed through the middle states. We had just entered Georgia when the weather forecast was updated and again, we were notified of rain was beginning to fall around the Miami airport with an expected increase in winds and heavy downpours with the possibility of some lightning. The "L" word is never good for a pilot. My First Officer had handled the takeoff back in Chicago and I was going to do the landing in Miami. We were about 80 miles from the airport when we began our initial descent. As we got closer and closer to Miami the winds and rain were picking up. Miami is a strange place to land sometimes during t'storms. A pilot can go from landing into a headwind to landing into a tailwind in just seconds, so caution and being alert to wind direction change is always advised.
It was very bumpy as we were descending through the clouds and we had warned the F/A's (Flight Attendants) to make sure everyone was belted tightly. We had been flying under IFR (Instrument Flight Rules). I wanted to land as near as possible to the start of the runway, so to allow the plane plenty of distance to slow and stop. This would, hopefully, prevent any skidding or hydroplaning. I was very happy with the touchdown when all of a sudden the plane wanted to run left for me. I held on tight to the wheel, but I could feel that we were about to go into the grass on the left side of the runway. We may have drifted about 2-3 feet off center, but thankfully, the thrust reversers and spoilers slowed the plane enough that I was able to gain additional control of the plane. I did pass my intended taxiway and I had to explain to the tower what had happened. The lady in the tower told me to check my tires when I exited the plane because she was seeing smoke come off of the undercarriage (landing gear).
After I had exited the airplane, I looked underneath and there it was. I had blown not one, but two tires on the left side of the plane. The passengers never knew how close we had come to being on a TV show that afternoon. A couple of older ladies wanted to see the Captain as they were exiting the plane, so I went to the door and they were telling me how scared they were, but they knew that God had the controls and we would be OK. I thought to myself that maybe he did, but I wished that he would have told me. It would have saved me from sweating bullets. And, that's the second closest time that I ever came to having an accident.
If you read this story, thank you. If you are one of the millions of nervous fliers, I hope that it instills some additional confidence into you as to how safe flying really is.
