Quote:
Originally Posted by ArcticKnight
Have you ever had a rough one where the controller says... "Delta1465, check you down at 1506, 07 and 08".......lol
Also, sorry to hear about your Dad, and wish your transition to retirement was in better times.
This thread has been great.
I don't think I've ever had a controller comment on a landing, but I wouldn't put it past the guys at JFK. They can be pretty amusing. I remember one time a plane snugged up uncomfortably close to the plane ahead of it on the taxiway and the Ground controller said "Hey American, no pushing!"
If a pilot bounces a plane on landing, the other pilot might say something like "Hey, you can log two landings on that one." But usually, pilots don't comment on another guy's bad landing. This is partly out of not wanting to pile on, because a bad landing is its own punishment and embarrassing to any of us, and partly because we all know that our next one might not be one we're proud of. In other words, we've all been there.
Passengers, on the other hand, seem delighted to comment on a bad landing. The comment I hear most often from passengers after a hard landing is "Former Navy pilot?"
I know I've told the story of my worst landing as a Delta pilot before, but I'll mention it again here. I was finishing my IOE as a new FO on the MD-88. Things had been going great on our 4-day trip. The IOE check airman, Rick Perez, had commented several times that I was doing great. Then came the last leg of the trip, ATL-LGA. It was my leg and I flew the Expressway Visual approach to runway 31 at LGA. It was night and the winds were strong and gusty. I was on speed and glidepath throughout the approach but there was a good deal of control movement in the rough air. The 88 doesn't have hydraulically actuated controls; it's all pushrods and cables...strictly mechanical linkages...that move control tabs on the ailerons and elevators. This produces an inertial lag in the response that results in a lot control movement during an approach like this.
Just coming over the fence, and preparing to flare for landing, the gusty winds resulted in a loss of headwind component and the plane began to sink to the surface. My inexperience in this plane resulted in me being late with power and control movement and the plane dropped in from probably 3 or 4 feet. It was...horrible. And humiliating. A controlled crash.
Once at the gate, our custom at Delta is for the flying pilot to stand and say goodby to passengers. Rick told me I didn't have to do that for this leg, but I said I'd take my medicine, so I got up to say goodby. This was three weeks after 9/11 and one woman getting off was nearly hysterical. "First the towers come down! And now this!" Passengers behind her were rolling their eyes at her histrionics. I could only apologize. Most passengers, especially frequent flyers, were pretty sympathetic to me.
Then one of our first class passengers was getting off. It was Dan Marino and I said to him as he approached me "Well, you can't win 'em all" and he replied "You don't have to tell
me that!"