Only had one flight on Saturday, and that was a near-run thing. There was a low overcast over the field, and right around 5 miles visibility – pretty close to personal minimums for SoCal operations, especially in the VFR-only Vargas. Your correspondent and his co-worker surveyed the skies with pursed lips for several minutes before dialing up the local weather service: 2400 overcast. It’d do.
Your man was driven down from Riverside for his birthday, his wife and 20ish daughters having bought him a go-fly ticket. No other paying passengers having presented themselves, I was on my way to dead-heading it as the target, or failing that flying one of the ground personnel that works for the firm in the trunk. But himself offered our paying customer’s wife the ride for a nominal fee, and she was courage personified, opting to strap right in with God-knows-who that feller is in the front. Sure, she was trepidated, but I re-assured her that it was in my best interest to bring the both of us back successfully and that if she stayed with me everything ought to work out for the best.
Kick the tires and light the fires, and off we pooted to the operating area. I knew it might be a problem when she asked if the bars holding my seat to the bulkhead wouldn’t make a perfect place to grip with white-knuckled intensity.
Came time for her to get comfortable with flying the machine she turned as eagerly as your next man into a 45 degree angle of bank turn. That takes a bit of back stick to keep the nose from falling through, which lesson she quickly apprised. On the reversal from a left turn to a right though, she neglected to reduce the back stick pressure, causing the aircraft’s nose to climb well above the horizon. Before I could talk her through lowering the nose back to the horizon the stall horn had gone off and we had a wee bit of a stall break, causing me to ask for the controls again.
“Ooh!” she said, and the machine was mine to fly from that moment thereafter. Nothing I could say to talk her out of it.
We toodled around for another few minutes while her man got comfortable in his machine. Talking about the weather in general terms. Which truth be told, really wasn’t all that nice. A gray sky against a gray sea, the line between indistinct, faded, overlapping. What we’d have called a “varsity” day, back in the day – hard to tell up from down.
We got it done when all was said and done, and she held on gamely back in the trunk. Even though I could tell we were up against the stops there, towards the end. I took the lead and headed back to the field, my passenger struggling mightily to maintain her composure, not to mention breakfast. Which is when a Cessna reported a seven mile ILS final, and tower told us to “keep it tight.” From the initial to landing was a continuous, 450 degree turn to a very short final, losing 1500 feet through a descending, skidded turn to short final. To keep the airspeed down. Fun for half of us.
Herself was pleased as punch to be back on terra firma. Opened the canopy ret quick to for to let the breeze blow over. Thinking that best.
A wee bit green at the gills upon clambering out. The daughters laughing and himself inordinately pleased, having won two out of three hacks. Which he was paying for it, wasn’t he?
He was.
She had a glass or two of water once we’d hangared the planes. Sat down heavily. Said that it was getting worse rather than better over time, against all sense of truth, justice and the American way. Cheer up, said I, and look at the horizon. Think of the flag.
They left three quarters happy and one quarter unsteady on the pins. A couple of minutes later your man came running back into the hangar, asking for a spare air sickness bag. For the ride home. In the car.
I felt a little guilty about the whole thing truth be told. Not that I’d done anything a-purpose, like. But still, that’s two weeks in a row.
Best not to make a habit out of it.
Poor thing! My mother flew with my dad once and that was enough for her! She had the same “green” effect! Not fun!
I can relate to this (or at least to your daughter’s perspective). All the while we kids were chuckling and cracking the jokes with her. (or should I say at her expense) Although funny to we kids. Not fun for mom!
Lex,
I’ve got a question for you. What happens if while you’re in the air the conditions go from borderline VFR to IFR? I mean, it’s not like you’ve got a whole lot of choice at that point. The plane, she’s going to land somewhere… whether you want to or not.
Do you try for an alternate field, or do you land at the home field and hope things go according to plan… the plan being that you end up on the ground in one piece and with the same number of appendages as when you left.
(and yes, this is a serious question)
Jim C
My first A-4 hop with Sparky in the front seat. Got the expected bag-filling, no surprise. But I held my arms out and grabbed onto that instrument visor like it was all that was holding me in, beat the crap out of me. Helluva upper body workout. Life got better when I finally relaxed. I feel for that lady.
Lex, what’s with the reference to think of the flag? That’s twice now, so how is that suppose to help make that feeling go away?
Extreme patriotism, perhaps?
Just joking. But seriously???
At least mom was not as bad as the Sports Illustrated writer who was given a demo ride in a Tomcat. Said writer questioned the pilot the night before as to what to eat for breakfast and the response was “bananas”. Why, asked the writer, for the potassium? Nope, responded the pilot, because they taste about the same coming up as they did going down.
During the flight, the writer claims to have barfed so hard that he up-chucked the Milk Duds he had at a movie when he was in fifth grade.
Geeze Lex, what an amazing part time job you have. Thanks for sharing but, I would agree, best not to make a habit of the sick customers.
Maybe stock up on some ginger gum and/or ginger supplement capsules. Stuff really does work if you’re new to flying, 1 capsule about an hour before takeoff…might be something worth offering a customer if they’re feeling nervous (even if it’s just placebo).
~Ens Tim
Jim C, we’re scarcely more than 10 miles from the airfield at any given time, and can scamper back pretty quickly if conditions are going south. Fortunately for us, the dominant trend is for the weather to close in over the ocean and then move landward. Since we do most of our work over the coast or just feet wet, the weather would tend to push us towards the field. We do have alternates inland and around four hours of flight time on a full tank, but as of yet I haven’t had to use any of them or all of that.
Ens Tim,
Heh! With my luck, I’d get busted for practicing medicine without a license.
Lex,
That’s good to hear. I always wondered what would happen if weather conditions went downhill.
Thanks,
Jim C
Michelle -
“Think of the flag” was advice given to ladies in Victorian England to distract themselves during, um, the act of conjugal unpleasantness.
LOLOL
Um, thanks. I think. Really??
Learn something new every day, I suppose.
Note to self – Include gallon ziplock baggie in flight bag.
For my wife.
Just in case.
And maybe the candied ginger.
Several pieces of advice…
First, it helps a little to have plenty of fresh air.
Second, tell the passenger to let you know the moment they feel queasy. When they do, have them take the controls and fly straight & level. It helps a fair amount.
Third, the passenger should strap in tightly, especially in the hips.
Fourth, forget the regular airsickness bags. Ziplock bags work well, in the quart size or more. Carry two.
Finally, remember that anyone can be made airsick. Try being head-down in the back seat taking data while doing 7 G wind-up turns in a TA-4…and having an asymmetric slat deployment. Very Bad News.
xairboss, the pilot of that Sports Illustrated story is someone I knew “back in the day.” I get airsick easy, but after 20 hops I stopped hurling and actually became semi-useful (not as useful as another 200 lbs of gas, but semi). I flew one time with that same pilot, barfed three times in the air, once more on rollout, could barely drive for three days because of nausea and dizziness. I talked to two of his RIOs later, they both agreed he was a “rough stick.” Under the circumstances, I thought the SI writer did a helluva job.
Just the other day I took the wife over the Harbour for a scenic – it was bumpy as hell and for a queasy minute or two I honestly thought I was going to upchuck. In controlled airpace right under the Sydney ILS. Luckily it passed. Missus none the wiser.
Zane, I agree. The SI writer not only did a heck of a job but he also wrote a very funny account of his flight. To set the record straight; yours truly vividly remembers his first flight in the back seat of a T1-A. Overheads were fine but rolls and reversals got to me. While I was busy tossing my cookies, the Marine pilot merrilly hummed some god awful song to me on “hot mike”.