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WARNING!
This is a comedic take on air travel safety. If you are about to fly do not read this.
[ 4 minute read ]
Let me have a go
I discovered, a few days ago, that much of the landing of an airliner at airports is handled by the autopilot. This is even when passengers are onboard. For example the approach speed is monitored and the autopilot makes sure it stays within safe parameters; too slow and the plane drops out of the sky unflyable and too fast and it won't stop on the runway. Autopilot also finds a homing beacon to align the plane with the runway. You can imagine a radio signal extending at a perfect angle from the runway and the plane flies down the strongest part of it. There have been crashes because the pilots were not trained to fight the autopilot or work with it when something went wrong.
Across the sky a privately chartered Gulfstream G650ER streaked.
'Right. Autopilot is on and we have seven hours of tedium to fill.' said Mark the captain.
'What shall we do?' Crumbs sprayed from Mark's mouth and fell to his bloated belly. He eyed his co-pilot, Bill, as he munched another Custard Cream. 'Well?' brushing the crumbs from his shirt.
'I-Spy?' suggested Bill. His eyebrows formed a quizzical arch on his flushed face. Once again he had had too much too drink before boarding, and it showed in his wavering hand movements as he stabbed a fat finger at a button. 'Music anyone?'
'C', called the flight engineer laconically.
'Would that be clouds, Brian?' asked the captain humourlessly.
'Sod this!' Brian blurted. 'I'm going to string one up.' He quickly rolled a joint. 'Mark? It's Lebanese.'
Nah, I'm good. I got this', brandishing a half-emptied bottle of Black Label Whisky. Air ascended as he swigged and swallowed, swigged and swallowed. He closed his eyes as the sweet aroma of cannabis met his pitted nose, masking the smell of hot metal and melting plastic.
Bill's head was already nodding and drool was forming at the corner of his mouth. He mindlessly rummaged down his trousers.
In the passenger cabin Sandy Shaw, world-renown author of twenty-six thrillers, pulled her laptop from her bag and began to type, sure in the knowledge that there were several hours of relative peace now and the plane was in safe hands.
Several hours later she addressed her Personal Assistant, Theresa Green, 'How about a snack, Theresa? Hungry?'
'Ravenous!'
Sandy closed her laptop and left Theresa playing Royal Kingdom but pretending to be applying herself to her spreadsheets, and made her way to the galley. She returned with sandwiches on a tray. Theresa eyed them thoughtfully, took one, bit into it, and looked thoughtful again. 'What's in them?'
'Tinned mackerel, cheese and Marmite.'
'All in one sandwich?'
'Yup.'
'Riiiight!'
Sandy smiled. 'They're for the lads up front. I expect they are hungry.' She made for the cockpit, while Theresa jealously admired her long, slim legs. 'Money' she thought.
'Sandwiches!' cried Brian, the navigator. He put down the spoon he had been admiring his face in, grabbed a sandwich and wolfed it down. Snatching another he spoke around it. 'They're great!'
Sandy gave the tray to Brian who kicked Mark's chair and then Bill's to wake them up.
'Something is burning.' murmured Bill suspiciously.
'It's fine. Have a sandwich.' said Brian.
- End
Of course, pilots are tested for drugs and alcohol in their blood before they fly but I am not sure if they are tested after the flight. Sometimes things go wrong with the autopilot because information it receives is somehow corrupted and it tries to make the plane ascend when it should be descending, and that is when the pilots can turn off some areas of control that the autopilot has. It is then that the pilots can find themselves fighting against the mighty hydraulic forces that are available to the plane's computers. Thankfully, most pilots haven't blagged their qualifications and are in fact real and certified.
I am aware of the problems that Customs and Border control personnel have at airports when passengers have unusual items in their suitcases and they have to discover the reason for the passenger's quirky habits.
'Mr Cadwell, whenever you come to New Zealand from Australia you never have any clothes with you and only have a single suitcase with an inflatable dinghy in it. Yet, whenever you make an internal flight you have hand-luggage with fire extinguishers and a crash helmet in it. Can you tell me why?'
I might just as well pack my clown outfit with the big shoes instead of the safety devices because they are equally indicative of my paranoia. There is no person more foolish than I when it comes to safety. In order to learn to sail I bought a sailing boat in Kent (UK), motored out of the Medway River and then ran out of petrol so I had to sail off the Southend coast, in enough wind to heel my boat so far over that water spilled over the side a bit. I had never sailed one bit before then. If I can do that, we might all just get on a plane and hope for the best. Sometimes it works.