The news media!

[AES]

Following on from the recent thread about the new royal baby (where I heartily agreed with the OP), and to a lesser extent, re the thread about "Handmade" (unfortunately I missed last night's episode about chairs), I thought that readers would be pleased to know that at least the news people have got the aviation scene well covered:

Wow! I wonder if this applies to all other Boeing models? How about Airbus, ATR, Bombardier/Canadair, Embraer, Fokker, et al? Come to think of it, how about ALL aeroplanes?

Reminds me of a sad crash we had just outside Zurich a few years back, when the aircraft hit a hill just short of the runway. The (Swiss) news reporter asked the airline spokesman "Was he too low?". I was just waiting for the spokesman to answer "No, of course not, the hill jumped up and hit him!" (+ "daft cow" under the breath).

In many such situations, the media of all stripes generally asks deliberately "inflammatory" questions and/or are clearly just plain dumb.

Purely personally I'm of the opinion that there's just too much news on all radio & TV channels, and in a big race to beat all the others, they have to fill the space somehow, whether or not there's actually something to say - hence the "interviews" with (example) the Aunt of the bloke who once cut the claws of the perpetrator's poodle. (hammer)

AES

 

[doorframe]

Cheers for the 'heads-up'. I'd better ask for the fuel tanks to be dipped next time I board a plane. I didn't realize planes could be that susceptible to altitude issues when they run out of fuel.

But, if this guy is in the co-pilots seat I should be ok......

 

[RossJarvis]

Crumbs, I'd always assumed that if it ran out of fuel "up there' it wouldn't be able to get down, how wrong you can be. I'm glad the news people are keeping us informed of the facts!

 

[DrPhill]

I remember (vaguely) about a plane whose navigation equipment was faulty. It was landing at Heathrow and got quite low before the pilots realised that they were above a road (A4) . They aborted the landing, and went round again. They got it right second time as I recall so all is well, and we can laugh about it.

What I remember most vividly is that most reporters seemed astounded by how low it was. "It was only 50ft above the ground!" I thought getting down low was a required part of landing. I was more surprised about it being 200yds north. In fact, if I were on the plane I would prefer it to land less than fifty feet up. Maybe at ground level?

But what do I know........

 

[Eric The Viking]

We've had pilots confuse Cardiff and Bristol airports. IIRC, both are on 270 bearing, and the flightpaths are close to each other, but really!

I remain amused that by convention airports only charge aircraft fees to land. Take-offs are free, apparently.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

There was a great letter in the Reader's Digest some years ago. Someone had been held up at a small airport in the Middle East. An announcement came over the tannoy - "Ladies and gentlemen we apologise for the delay, it's because your pilot doesn't like the sound of one of the engines. We're trying our best to find a pilot who does."

 

[Racers]

My first flight the pilot announced "some of you might notice a slight smell of burning, we have has a small fire in the cockpit and will be tuning back"
We landed far away from the airport surrounded by fire engines! I thought this flying is fun!
So after the first delay of 4 hours then the fire and the next 5 hour delay we finally took off in the same plane!

Pete