Shots Across The Bow

I'm Back!

A day early, and I may never fly again.

The additional security didn't bother me, even though I was selected for a ful search.

Twice.

I didn't mind having to take off my shoes, or having strangers paw through my luggage. I did find it silly that I wasn't allowed to put my address tag on my bag once they were through inspecting it. It bugged me that I walked up to the counter, gave them my name, and got my ticket without ever showing ID, but I knew I wasn't a terrorist, so I wasn't worried.

I wasn't worried when they said my flight would be delayed, as they found an electrical problem on the plane, but maintenance was taking care of it.

I didn't mind waiting 30 minutes while they checked out the plane, before we were allowed to board.

I didn't mind when I saw the plane, and realized it was a Pontiac Aztec with wings and jet engines bolted on. Fairchild 328 JET

I got a litttle concerned when they said the aux power unit had failed, and they had to jump start the jets. (where's a lawn mower when you need it?)

I began to get more concerned when the pilot said that there were some abnormal indications, so they were going to power down the plane, and turn it back on again, as directed by maintenance, sort of like when I reboot the computer when it locks up. I just didn't know that airplanes were also subject to the blue screeen of death.

Well, they powered down the plane, and started bring the systems back up again. Meanwhile one lady was complaining that the airline should do something because it was getting hot in the plane. I guess she just couldn't grasp the whole "shutting down all power" thing. I bet she was one of those people who try to turn on the lights when the power goes out so they can see where they left the candles. The woman behind me started talking about the plane. She said she was a former flight attendent and she always hated this plane because it spent more time grounded for mechanical failures than flying.

OK, now I was nervous.

Then the pilot came on and said the problem ahad fixed itself and we were going to take off. They started it once, and it didn't work. They started it again, and it did. In my mind, this is not fixed. It could come back as quickly as it went away.

Now I'm more than nervous. The former flight attendent behind me is going on about all times she's been grounded by mechanical failures on this type of plane. We taxi out to the runwway, while the real flight attendent walked the cabin to make sure we were all strapped in place. Two rows in front of me, she ducked over a passenger to look out the window.

"Did you see that?" she asked the passenger, an older gentleman who said he did see it. What was it? Nothing much, just blue flames shooting out of the engine for a few seconds.

She called up to the pilot, to let him know that the engine was on fire. He must not have believed her, because he cranked up the engine. She repeated that she had seen actual flames coming out of the engine. Before he throttled back, I saw more flames coming out for about 5 seconds.

OK, now I had a slight laundry problem.

The pilot throttled back, and called maintenance. meanwhile, the flight attendent got on the PA, and reassured us by saying, "I just wanted you all to know that the pilot is aware that the left engine is on fire." We weren't feeling particularly reassured, especially those who were unaware anything was going on.

Now, a truck came rolling up next to the plane, and Cooter from The Dukes of Hazzard got out, followed by a clone of Junior Samples. They looked at the engine a few minutes, then Cooter pulled out a walky talky to talk to the pilot. He talked for a few seconds, then without ever touching the engine, they left. The pilot got back on the PA, and told us that Cooter told him that because of the jump start that the flames were most likely caused by excessive fuel built up in the drip pan in the jet cowling, and that we would be taking off momentarily.

I'm seriously unhappy at this point, but I don't have time to protest before we are making our run down the run way. You're reading this, so you know everything came out OK. No more fires or electrical problems, and we were only an hour late getting in.

All the same, next time, I think I'll take a bus.

Posted by Rich at January 9, 2003 12:03 AM