Being an airline pilot for just over 30 years and logging over 20,000 flight hours, I think that I can speak with some authority and knowledge of the good and bad with airline travel. Today, traveling by air is safer more now than it has ever been. There has not been a fatal accident here in the U.S. involving a U.S. carrier since 2001. Back when I started my career as a First Officer (FO), I was so excited that I had trouble sleeping. I wanted the stick and to be given the command by the Captain, "Your plane," which means I have the controls. And even though I was tremendously excited, I knew that I had a great responsibility. So many people were depending on me to do my job without error. The passengers, the company, my flight crew all depended on me not to make a mistake. Because when a commercial pilot does err, he may have only seconds to fix the problem and recover. This is one reason why I never stopped reading about the planes that I flew. I wanted to know everything possible to the point that I may be able to assemble the aircraft.
After I graduated flight school, I got my first job with Air Wisconsin, a regional carrier that flew between cities that the larger companies did not. My favorite route was Detroit to New York. Flying at 22-25,000 feet above the shoreline of the Great Lakes was an awesome adventure. In the summertime, it was beautiful to look down and see all the boats in the water and in the winter, it was very calming to see the waters frozen and the ice fishers with their little huts doing what they loved to do. After almost 4 years of that type of flying, I decided that it was time to step up and so I found myself back at ATP Flight School learning the Boeing 737. It took me about 6 months to become rated as a B-737 pilot and then I applied for jobs at various airlines. Finally, United called me for several interviews. I went through three interviews and after my third, it was almost a month until I received the call to come to Denver to go into the simulator for testing and a possible job. Everything went well and I found myself being hired to fly the B-737, which lasted for almost five years when again, I needed more out of my job and decided to bid on flying the bigger aircraft, the B-757 and 767. I had to wait in line until my seniority allowed me to go into training and receive my rating. I was a Captain on the B-737 when I left that fleet, but as a B-757-767 pilot, I was once again an FO, which lasted another 7 years until I was advanced to Captain.
One thing to keep in mind is that not every pilot wants to be a Captain. Along with the rank comes a huge amount of responsibility. The Captain has complete say over the aircraft by making 'all' final decisions. It is not unusual to see an FO with more flight hours than his Captain because that is what he has chosen. After the crash in the Everglades of an Eastern Airlines plane, the industry instituted a new policy called CRM (Crew Resource Management). I applauded the policy, which some of the older Captains took exception to. CRM is a program that allows any member of the crew, including Flight Attendants (FA) and Air Traffic Controllers (ATC) to make the pilot aware of any issue that they believe is or may be a dangerous situation for the aircraft. Until that time, no person was permitted to speak with the Captain regarding any issue once the plane's doors were closed. I and others already would ask the FO their opinion of issues that may arise while in flight just to make certain that I was making the correct decisions during times of bad weather, hard turbulence and so on. I once had an FA tell me that the outlets were not working in the galley and if let go and not fixed, the people in Business and First Classes would not be getting any hot meals on the flight from Washington, D.C. to San Francisco. Well, we can't have that, so I called maintenance to come and look at it. All they had to do was to reset the breaker. But, that's an example of CRM. Even though that incident wasn't going to bring the plane down, it was important to me to find out why that outlet was not working. I had encountered more serious issues, but obviously, between my crew and myself, we made the right decisions.
I want to briefly address airplane accidents because we do have many nervous and even scared passengers on-board every flight. I have a few horror stories of some terrified flyers, but will pass on those. It is a fact that most accidents are credited to human error. In fact, about 75% of all accidents are caused by mistakes in judgment. This is the number one reason why I read any and all material about the Boeing 757 and 767 that I could get my hands on. I was offered a job by the NTSB after retirement to help investigate accidents, which I turned down because I knew that I could never have gone to a disaster site and seen the carnage of the passengers, not to mention the wreckage of the aircraft. When an unplanned event happens on the aircraft, Captains must immediately rely on the checklist of things to do to fix the problem. Sometimes, we have a few minutes and have time to even call corporate maintenance for help, but if the problem is with one of the main flying instruments or functions, those minutes may be reduced to seconds to react and fix the problem before losing control of the aircraft. I never, NEVER took chances by bypassing my checklists as some pilots will, if they are running late. If we were late, so-be-it and I knew that I would have a few upset passengers, mostly business clients that were late for an appointment, but they got there and they were safe. The downside to that was that they never knew that they may have been at risk because we were dealing with an issue or that we were late only because I took the time to do my checks. It is just something that we do not announce to the passengers on-board, unless we make an announcement that goes something like, "Sorry for the delay, Ladies and Gentlemen. We are just finishing up some paperwork and getting a few pieces of late luggage stowed and then we'll be on our way." That generally translates into the pilot is dealing with a faulty lamp, or a fuel gauge or a hydraulic switch, or maybe something else. Again, safety is always a main concern. Even if a bulb is burned out, we ask ourselves, "Is it?" or do we really have a problem. We need to know before we push back from the gate.
Filing our flight plans have now become much less of a task that it was when I started when we would do most of it by typing up forms or hand-writing the forms. Today, most everything is typed into the flight data computer. By entering our flight plan of airspeed, course and elevation, the Auto Pilot (AP) has become a terrific tool for the pilots. The B-757 and 767 almost fly themselves. While we are airborn and if we encounter none or very little turbulence and no weather issues, the AP flies the plane, while the pilot may need to make some minor adjustments or corrections, if the ATC should request that we do so. If we have a weather or heavy turbulence issues, most Captains will decide to hand fly the aircraft by turning off the AP. Some pilots will allow the AP to takeover the minute they are airborn. By putting the wind velocity and direction and the length of the runway and direction, plus our weight, including fuel weight for takeoff into the computer, it will give us our takeoff speed, instead of back when we had to use the formula to convert it, which for some pilots were a challenge. I always hand flew the aircraft for takeoffs until we reached cruising altitude and speed.
That's a small look at what pilots do to earn their money. There is a ton of other stuff, but I wanted to give everyone a glimpse into what a pilot does to keep their passengers safe.. I have often been asked where the safest seat is when flying and of course, the punchline to this little joke is, "inside the terminal." Seriously, there is no safest seat. Being near an exit may be helpful and when getting on the plane and finding your closest exit may also be helpful. If an emergency arises, follow the directions of the FA's. They are trained to deal with emergency events and if there is a possibility of being a survivor, we must follow their instructions. Also, don't be shy, if you notice something amiss while on-board, bring it to the attention of an FA. Did you hear a strange or unusual noise? If you are near a window and before takeoff and you can see the wings, are the flaps tilted slightly down? (This is what brought the Northwest flight down in Detroit some years ago. The pilots were rushing and carelessly avoided their takeoff checklist and did not have the flaps configured properly for takeoff. The plane failed to gain lift and crashed into a bridge overpass killing all but a 4-year old girl on-board.) Also, do you smell smoke or see cloudiness when looking down the aisle? Is there an increase in vibration while gaining altitude? Sometimes when the FA's are walking up and down the aisle they cannot feel the vibration, but if you are sitting in the rear of the plane and feel vibration and can see the Coke on your tray table shaking inside the cup, just ask the FA to take a look at ask her if that is common. She will tell you yes and then go to the phone and call the flight deck to tell the officer who is not flying that they have severe vibration in the tail. It may be nothing, but then again.....
I know that this was a long post and probably not many read it or all of it, but if you did, I hope that I have given you some knowledge and confidence for your next trip. Hopefully, it wasn't too boring . I tried to keep it simple and understandable without using a lot of aviation language.
Happy Travels.
After I graduated flight school, I got my first job with Air Wisconsin, a regional carrier that flew between cities that the larger companies did not. My favorite route was Detroit to New York. Flying at 22-25,000 feet above the shoreline of the Great Lakes was an awesome adventure. In the summertime, it was beautiful to look down and see all the boats in the water and in the winter, it was very calming to see the waters frozen and the ice fishers with their little huts doing what they loved to do. After almost 4 years of that type of flying, I decided that it was time to step up and so I found myself back at ATP Flight School learning the Boeing 737. It took me about 6 months to become rated as a B-737 pilot and then I applied for jobs at various airlines. Finally, United called me for several interviews. I went through three interviews and after my third, it was almost a month until I received the call to come to Denver to go into the simulator for testing and a possible job. Everything went well and I found myself being hired to fly the B-737, which lasted for almost five years when again, I needed more out of my job and decided to bid on flying the bigger aircraft, the B-757 and 767. I had to wait in line until my seniority allowed me to go into training and receive my rating. I was a Captain on the B-737 when I left that fleet, but as a B-757-767 pilot, I was once again an FO, which lasted another 7 years until I was advanced to Captain.
One thing to keep in mind is that not every pilot wants to be a Captain. Along with the rank comes a huge amount of responsibility. The Captain has complete say over the aircraft by making 'all' final decisions. It is not unusual to see an FO with more flight hours than his Captain because that is what he has chosen. After the crash in the Everglades of an Eastern Airlines plane, the industry instituted a new policy called CRM (Crew Resource Management). I applauded the policy, which some of the older Captains took exception to. CRM is a program that allows any member of the crew, including Flight Attendants (FA) and Air Traffic Controllers (ATC) to make the pilot aware of any issue that they believe is or may be a dangerous situation for the aircraft. Until that time, no person was permitted to speak with the Captain regarding any issue once the plane's doors were closed. I and others already would ask the FO their opinion of issues that may arise while in flight just to make certain that I was making the correct decisions during times of bad weather, hard turbulence and so on. I once had an FA tell me that the outlets were not working in the galley and if let go and not fixed, the people in Business and First Classes would not be getting any hot meals on the flight from Washington, D.C. to San Francisco. Well, we can't have that, so I called maintenance to come and look at it. All they had to do was to reset the breaker. But, that's an example of CRM. Even though that incident wasn't going to bring the plane down, it was important to me to find out why that outlet was not working. I had encountered more serious issues, but obviously, between my crew and myself, we made the right decisions.
I want to briefly address airplane accidents because we do have many nervous and even scared passengers on-board every flight. I have a few horror stories of some terrified flyers, but will pass on those. It is a fact that most accidents are credited to human error. In fact, about 75% of all accidents are caused by mistakes in judgment. This is the number one reason why I read any and all material about the Boeing 757 and 767 that I could get my hands on. I was offered a job by the NTSB after retirement to help investigate accidents, which I turned down because I knew that I could never have gone to a disaster site and seen the carnage of the passengers, not to mention the wreckage of the aircraft. When an unplanned event happens on the aircraft, Captains must immediately rely on the checklist of things to do to fix the problem. Sometimes, we have a few minutes and have time to even call corporate maintenance for help, but if the problem is with one of the main flying instruments or functions, those minutes may be reduced to seconds to react and fix the problem before losing control of the aircraft. I never, NEVER took chances by bypassing my checklists as some pilots will, if they are running late. If we were late, so-be-it and I knew that I would have a few upset passengers, mostly business clients that were late for an appointment, but they got there and they were safe. The downside to that was that they never knew that they may have been at risk because we were dealing with an issue or that we were late only because I took the time to do my checks. It is just something that we do not announce to the passengers on-board, unless we make an announcement that goes something like, "Sorry for the delay, Ladies and Gentlemen. We are just finishing up some paperwork and getting a few pieces of late luggage stowed and then we'll be on our way." That generally translates into the pilot is dealing with a faulty lamp, or a fuel gauge or a hydraulic switch, or maybe something else. Again, safety is always a main concern. Even if a bulb is burned out, we ask ourselves, "Is it?" or do we really have a problem. We need to know before we push back from the gate.
Filing our flight plans have now become much less of a task that it was when I started when we would do most of it by typing up forms or hand-writing the forms. Today, most everything is typed into the flight data computer. By entering our flight plan of airspeed, course and elevation, the Auto Pilot (AP) has become a terrific tool for the pilots. The B-757 and 767 almost fly themselves. While we are airborn and if we encounter none or very little turbulence and no weather issues, the AP flies the plane, while the pilot may need to make some minor adjustments or corrections, if the ATC should request that we do so. If we have a weather or heavy turbulence issues, most Captains will decide to hand fly the aircraft by turning off the AP. Some pilots will allow the AP to takeover the minute they are airborn. By putting the wind velocity and direction and the length of the runway and direction, plus our weight, including fuel weight for takeoff into the computer, it will give us our takeoff speed, instead of back when we had to use the formula to convert it, which for some pilots were a challenge. I always hand flew the aircraft for takeoffs until we reached cruising altitude and speed.
That's a small look at what pilots do to earn their money. There is a ton of other stuff, but I wanted to give everyone a glimpse into what a pilot does to keep their passengers safe.. I have often been asked where the safest seat is when flying and of course, the punchline to this little joke is, "inside the terminal." Seriously, there is no safest seat. Being near an exit may be helpful and when getting on the plane and finding your closest exit may also be helpful. If an emergency arises, follow the directions of the FA's. They are trained to deal with emergency events and if there is a possibility of being a survivor, we must follow their instructions. Also, don't be shy, if you notice something amiss while on-board, bring it to the attention of an FA. Did you hear a strange or unusual noise? If you are near a window and before takeoff and you can see the wings, are the flaps tilted slightly down? (This is what brought the Northwest flight down in Detroit some years ago. The pilots were rushing and carelessly avoided their takeoff checklist and did not have the flaps configured properly for takeoff. The plane failed to gain lift and crashed into a bridge overpass killing all but a 4-year old girl on-board.) Also, do you smell smoke or see cloudiness when looking down the aisle? Is there an increase in vibration while gaining altitude? Sometimes when the FA's are walking up and down the aisle they cannot feel the vibration, but if you are sitting in the rear of the plane and feel vibration and can see the Coke on your tray table shaking inside the cup, just ask the FA to take a look at ask her if that is common. She will tell you yes and then go to the phone and call the flight deck to tell the officer who is not flying that they have severe vibration in the tail. It may be nothing, but then again.....
I know that this was a long post and probably not many read it or all of it, but if you did, I hope that I have given you some knowledge and confidence for your next trip. Hopefully, it wasn't too boring . I tried to keep it simple and understandable without using a lot of aviation language.
Happy Travels.
