Commuter aircraft get a bad rap for a wide variety of reasons. I've long disliked prop planes, and I'm sure I can trace this back to the Roselawn ATR accident. I know they're as inherently safe as any other tube of metal hurtling through the air, but they sure are noisy and cramped, and to be honest, I generally prefer to divorce myself from the operation of my aircraft as much as possible. Contrast a shaky takeoff in winter in a turboprop with an impossibly smooth climb out of a tropical airport in a 767. (It's nice to have a home airport at which I have more choices than commuter planes.)
Still, I know that air travel is really safe. Really safe. I have lived and used to work for years right next to airports where hundreds of planes operate without incident each day. I can rationally examine the statistics - and my brain acknowledges it readily, as I sit here on the sofa. Surprisingly, despite all my frequent-flier miles, I can be a bit of a panicky flier if I'm not otherwise distracted. Even a clear-sky approach into Orlando with rising thermals and wake turbulence from other inbound aircraft makes me hold on to my seatbelt a little tighter and start praying. Again, even though I KNOW (far more than the average flier) the reasons for the turbulence we encounter at the top of the boundary layer, I often have to consciously unclench. It's irrational fear and I know it. It smacks of a larger issue I've been wrestling with lately - that of trust between me and God. I guess it's easier to trust when your feet are on solid earth, but we have no more control here on the ground than in the air. I ROUTINELY put myself in exponentially greater danger during my 1.5-h daily commute by car. And yet, some days, it takes a boarding pass to get me to pray?
I was on a commuter plane a couple summers ago from EWR-DCA. It was a smooth summer-evening flight; midway through the final turn to line up with the runway, the gear came down and it felt like all hell broke loose on this plane. Okay, maybe not all - we felt under control after what was likely just a few seconds and most likely always under control. The NTSB today released FDR information from 3407's final moments, which made me think of that flight. The gear dropped and the flaps lowered and, apparently, all hell broke loose. Popular speculation is that a combination of icing and interrupted airflow from the lowered flaps caused a tail stall. What's interesting is that procedures for recovering from a wing stall are exactly opposite to those for recovering from a tail stall. So in an instant, a pilot has to determine what's gone wrong and correct it, with the wrong choice ending in disaster. I make a ton of mistakes in the course of my career, so I have a lot of respect for pilots (consummate problem-solvers), who, bearing out the statistics, get it right almost all the time.
In reference to a passenger whose flight from MSY-EWR was delayed, keeping him off the crashed plane, a contributor on an aviation forum said an experience like that would change your life forever.
I missed a flight from London this summer, with 27 students on a tour. Surrounded by a lot of panic and upset, I was relatively calm. Part of it was my comfort with commercial aviation procedures. Maybe it's because I'm on the ground, but I don't usually sweat delays or missed flights, though, and I attach a lot of baggage (pun intended. would "gravity" have been any more acceptable?) to the deliberation when opting to switch flights or stand by for another. To know why, rewind to 25 May 1979.
Right before my third birthday, my parents and I flew to Los Angeles for my aunt's wedding. We were going to take United ORD-DEN-LAX, but United pilots were talking about going on strike, so my parents booked American ORD-LAX instead. We were originally ticketed on AA191 on the day before it became the deadliest crash on US soil (prior to 2001), but then my parents decided we would fly the next day. They figured that if we were going a day later, we should take an earlier flight. That was to put us in the air on the flight right before 191 crashed on takeoff. That morning, we all overslept, had a 90-minute drive to Chicago, and had to return a rental car. By the time we got to O'Hare, we had to run through the terminal in a flat-out sprint (my parents carrying me) the whole length of the concourse to make the flight. Otherwise, we'd have been on 191, which was our back-up reservation. Our tickets had 191 printed on it, but crossed out and our flight number written under it - I think my parents still have it.
He's right. It does change your life forever.
Believe what you will about your gods. Mine kept me off that plane.
Look, I know I'm just one in a sea of people whose planes don't crash on any given day. But I can trust a God who orchestrates infinite events, of which I'm not even aware, to put me where I need to be. And I don't. I've been bought at a price and have purpose. And I let a little fluid dynamics freak me out?
I have a wrestling match to get back to...
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