A coworker missed a flight after checking in. His baggage made the flight, however. He claims he was was taken off the plane after boarding because of weight and balance, and that he was chosen because he was the last passenger to board. We suspect he was either asleep or smoking and never boarded. Could he be telling the truth?

You'll be fine.

It's funny. I used to be like you but these days I'm on my way to becoming a professional pilot.

Couple tips things you can do to make it easier.

1) Don't death grip the arm rest. Try putting your palms face up on your thighs and open. Grabbing onto the arm rests tended to stress me out even more.

2) Don't sweat every small sound you hear.

3) When you bank one way... you're going to come back. I promise. :d
I always thought we were going to bank one way and keep on going. If the plane is on autopilot (and it most likely is), there is a set degree that the plane will bank. Pilots can choose this degree but I don't believe it really ever goes past 30?

4) If the person next to you is friendly and wants to chat, chat it up. Helps to pass the time and remove your mind from the flying.

5) Realize that flying is an incredibly safe form of transportation. Once you become less afraid of it, you just might be requesting window seats to check out the awesome views.

Have fun!

No doubt about it (unless you've just got a boatload of money to throw at training). Of course, you have to consider the commitment in years of service that the military requires of pilots. It's increased significantly over the years and I think you owe them about 7 years of your life after pilot training.

I've worn glasses from age 7, the only one of 6 siblings who needed them. They've always been correctable to 20/20, but that wasn't good enough for the military and for a long time the airlines wanted 20/20 uncorrected, but that seemed to change as a consequence of supply and demand, I think. I honestly thought I'd never have a chance at an airline job, but my AME Aero Medical Examiner) told me I could get a first class medical and that gave me hope.

They fascinate me and if money wasn't a consideration, I'd definitely get that rating. I had one lesson as a birthday present and I love the sense of pure flight in 3 dimensions. That probably doesn't come across right, since an airplane obviously flies in 3 dimensions, but what I mean is the ability to fly left, right, forward and backwards (not to mention hovering!). And the potential to land in any open space...I love it!

I would encourage you to take this route. I wish you luck.

That route has been flown by the 767-400 for the last several months, but it comes back to my plane (767-300ER) starting next month, so I'm hoping to see Nice again. But it goes pretty senior, so I can only get an occasional weekend trip there.

The likelihood of you seeing me on a Nice flight is low. If I do get a trip, it's probably going to be a Friday departure from JFK with a Sunday return (those weekend trips go slightly less senior) and I'd probably only get one a month. So it would be the odds of you traveling on the days I fly.

I do love that city.

As promised, here's a picture of my Nav display as we cross France on the morning of August 22 (that airport symbol at our 11 o'clock is LFRB, Brest Bretagne Airport). Our track (117°) is shown at the top of the display and our heading is indicated by the triangle on the compass rose (about 121°). The wind vector is shown at the bottom left: 68 knots from our 5 o'clock position, which is consistent with the track vs. heading indication.



Other indications on the Nav display include: the estimated time we will cross the next fix (TERPO at 0848.7 Z...0448 EDT) and distance to next fix (143 nm).

That's Paris (Orly Field, LFPO) up by the "9" digit on the compass (hard to read with another airport overlaying it).

Thanks again for another detailed reply, this really has to be one of the best threads I've ever followed. If I could just put on you again for one more answer... if we're talking about a smaller aircraft like twin turboprop such as a Piper Seneca or King Air or similar (with glass cockpit) would you still get a display of both track and heading? I'm guessing in something like a C172 you wouldn't.

I'm almost positive you'd get an indication of both, but when I flew a Seneca (I got my ATP in a Seneca) it had the basic "steam gauges" and just showed heading. You can find glass cockpits even on small, single-engine GA planes these days, so even a C172 might show track.

Regardless of the display, we deal in magnetic heading. ATC never says "fly a track of 115." They issue a heading and they're pretty good at estimating the effect of the prevailing winds so they get the track they want.

Thanks again for another speedy and informative reply. I did of course mean to write "without glass cockpit" but you managed to compensate for my error I note your comment about ATC but how about if you're flying between VORs or if you're flying a SID? I assume the directions stipulated on your charts are bearings rather than headings. In this case, the pilot of an aircraft which has no indication of both would have to guesstimate the correct heading to fly. Would I be right?

Yes, you are absolutely right. When I used to fly the J-32, we just had basic gauges and no RNAV capability, so we navigated using VORs. We also didn't have any direct indication of the winds aloft, so you'd get a sense of how much wind drift correction you needed as you flew. You'd do this by bracketing the heading.

For example: if I'm flying V-188 into the Sparta (SAX) VOR, I need to track 131° inbound. If flying a heading of 131° caused me to drift south of course, I make a correction to the north, say 121°. If this brings me back to course centerline, I'd take out a few degrees as the needle centers so that I don't continue to the north side of the course. Maybe I'd come back to 125°.

I should be able to find a heading that holds the constant track inbound. Of course, winds change so I might need to adjust a little as we fly.

Staying on V-188, we need to track 093° outbound from SAX, so I'd take a guess on the wind correction based on what I established inbound. In this case, I'd probably start with 088° and see how that works out. That's a change of 37° and thus the wind vector in relation to our heading will be different, so I'd expect to have to make a minor adjustment to this heading as we fly outbound.

VOR navigation is interesting because the indicator shows degrees of deviation from course centerline, not distance from centerline. Thus, the needle is much more sensitive in close to the VOR. At 60 miles from the VOR, 1° of needle movement is 1 nm. Within 0-5 miles of the VOR, it's only a few hundred feet, so you don't want to be chasing the needle in close. Instead, pick a heading and hold it to see the effect on the course deviation indicator.

I'm flying on a propeller airplane tomorrow. The flight is one hour. I'm an extremely nervous passanger and forgot to go to the doc to get my usual dose of xanax. I'm pretty freaking out and thought of this thread...anything to tell me to make me feel better, just some nice statistic about propeller planes - I've never travelled on one and am very anxious! (I'm serious)

What kind of propeller plane? I'll assume it's a turboprop and not a piston plane (the only passenger operations that I know of that still use piston planes are the island hopping planes and bush planes in Alaska).

I can tell you that turboprops are extremely reliable. The engine is essentially a jet engine which drives a propeller. The reason a turbine (or jet) engine is so much more reliable than a piston engine is that all the components are just spinning; they're not slamming up and down like pistons. As long as the parts are lubricated and kept within normal temperature limits, there's little to go wrong.

You might ask: if the engine is like a jet engine, why use a prop at all? Well, the thrust from this "jet" is minimal and it's much more fuel efficient to turn a prop to generate thrust, especially for these short, low-altitude flights.

I can think of at least one advantage to having a prop: the power response is much quicker if it's needed during approach and landing. On the negative side, the props are noisier and, if they're not synched, they can produce an annoying thrumming, beat sound. But this isn't a safety consideration, just a comfort one.

To throw statistics at you, here's a an interesting web site I found with some accident data:

http://www.airdisaster.com/statistics/

Of the twenty rated aircraft types in the first table shown, there is only one turboprop in the bunch, the SAAB 340, and it ranks as the best of the lot. I can't defend (or even explain) the basis of these rankings, because I can't find the explanation of what they mean by "rate" in this table. But it's pretty impressive that the Saab was #1...not just somewhere in the middle of the pack.

What makes the safety record of turboprops even more impressive to me is that they are usually flown more legs per day than jets and at lower altitudes (i.e. often flying in the weather rather than topping it).

I was flying on the 777 (my favorite plane) the other day towards the back of the plane and I couldn't help notice the power of those engines on takeoff! Maybe it's mental, but do all jet engines produce the same thrust for the size of the plane? In order words, do you get the same "power" relative to the size of the aircraft? Hope this makes sense. Do you know difference in power or thurst a 777 produces as opposed to your 767-300ER?

Also on the same flight we were about an hour late leaving the gate and I have some questions:

1. When does the crew time start? When the door is closed or as soon as you report for duty, say an hour before the scheduled flight?
2. Since we were late, I noticed on taxi to the runway, we must have passed 8 jets that were there before us and proceeded to take off ahead of them. Was that because we were already late or just luck?

777 depends on the variant of the plane. I think most, if not all, have some variant of the GE90. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Electric_GE90. The most powerful GE90 is the GE90-115B and it's the most powerful turbofan jet engine ever (AFAIK). I flew on a 777-200LR with the GE90-115B and the takeoff was so sick, you could really feel it.

The other stuff I'm sure he'll answer very well...

edit... sick picture of the 115B mounted on a 747. It kept the plane in the air all by itself. The engine is sooooo much bigger than the normal 747 engines.

What's the deal with pilots adjusting their sleep schedules for red-eyes? Are some pilots always night pilots or does it vary all the time? If it varies all the time, how do you think this affects the safety of flights?

I just started taking lessons and seem to be catching on to things pretty quick including the approach but am pretty horrible when i get about 10 ft from the ground. How long did it take for you to get confident in landings when you first started flying? Did it just click with you at some point? How many landings did you have before your first solo? As far as youve heard how many landings and hours do most people have before their first solo?

Sorry if this has been asked before...

The thrust-to-weight ratio can definitely vary from one aircraft type to another. I fly both the 767 and 757 (just flew a 767 to Cairo and tomorrow I fly the 757 to Copenhagen), and there's a very noticeable difference between the two. The 757 has some great performance and also handles more like a sports car compared to the station wagon feel of the 767.

The 777's engines are so powerful that if you have an engine failure after takeoff, you actually have to reduce thrust on the good engine due to the tremendous asymmetric thrust. I've never flown a plane where you pull back the power on the one remaining engine.

Our duty clock starts one hour prior to the first pushback for domestic flying; 1.5 hours prior to pushback for international. That's not an FAA specified time...it was probably negotiated between the company and the pilot union and based on the amount of time required to review the flight plan and otherwise prepare for the flight.

The block time, which is the time which would go in the pilot's logbook, is the time from which the airplane first moves for the purpose of flight (i.e. does not include simply repositioning the plane on the field) until it comes to its final stop.

Because block time limits are strictly governed by FARs, it's important for us to have some way of marking these times. Different airlines do it different ways. I think I remember hearing that American has something that starts the clock when the nosewheel tire moves. At Delta, the clock starts when the main entry door is closed and the rotating beacon is on. At the other end, the clock stops when either the beacon is turned off or the main entry door is opened.

There are a couple reasons why this may have happened. One of them is that somehow the company worked out with ATC that priority handling was needed for this flight due to duty time limits for the crew. The other is that the airplanes you passed were heading in a direction that was currently shutdown for departures.

I've seen this 2nd case often at JFK. There may be thunderstorms to the west of NY, shutting down the departure fixes which ATC uses to funnel JFK traffic out of the NY area. Meanwhile, it's clear to the east, so all the international departures are cleared to go.

At La Guardia, they operate strictly on a first-come, first-served basis, with takeoff clearances issued in the order that the planes called ground control for taxi clearance. Thus, we might taxi out from the Marine Air Terminal right next to runway 4 and be the first plane in line and then watch 10 airplanes on the opposite side of the runway takeoff before us because they were already in the pipeline.

Great shot. Thanks.

A pilot's schedule depends on their seniority and what they bid for. I don't know anyone who loves red-eyes, but it might work for some people's schedules. A schedule can have any mix of flying you can imagine and this has been a hot topic for study and debate for many years. It's the F-word of aviation: Fatigue.

It's a pilot's responsibility to show up for their duty day rested and, although the time prior to report for duty is consider "rest" by the FAA, there are no rules or regulations governing what a pilot actually does with that time. In fact, I recently witnessed what I consider an example which I could scarcely believe. We gave a ride to a pilot (I won't say what airline) on our red-eye flight from Las Vegas to JFK. Our scheduled arrival time was 0600 and he had a 0640 report time for work. Both the Captain and I were amazed at (1) cutting it so close and (2) flying a full day after a red-eye. Of course, he could sleep on our flight, but I don't think he'll be on his best game.

A pilot is supposed to pre-flight himself as he would his airplane and it's up to the pilot to decide if he's not ready, physically or mentally, for a flight. For example, take a pilot who has a sick child at home which kept him up all night, or another pilot whose wife just told him she wants a divorce. In either case, they might not be the guys you want at the controls that day.

I waited to post this until after your safe uneventful flight.

Propellers are used to keep the pilot cool and comfortable. You should see him sweat when the propellers stop.

Thanks for the reply. Given this is how it works, I'm pretty surprised there aren't more accidents.

According to Newton's third law, for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. A propeller plane gains forward thrust when the propeller is pushed forward by the air it's pushing backward, right?

What portion of the jet engine is being pushed forward reacting to it's backward thrust?

Both are generating thrust the same way, one just moves a whole lot more air

i'll let w0x0f handle the other questions but i just wanted to say that i'm a little further along than you (first cross country today!) and i can definitely empathize. one way to think about it is the approach is like a science while the flare and touchdown are like an art. science just takes practice and logic, but art takes time and experience.

i also did my first night flight this week and my touchdowns were not pretty .

^^^
Well said.

Just like other people in other jobs, most pilots tough it out if they're not 100%. And before you point out that the flying job is different (lives in the balance and all that stuff) it's not like the job takes super-human abilities. And we fly as a crew, so if things are starting to even approach an unsafe situation, there's another guy to point it out.

A single-seat fighter pilot...now that would be a different story. That pilot should probably be much more strict on his personal "pre-flight".

This is true: they both propel masses of air backward and, as a consequence, the airplane moves forward. nolimitfiend, you seem to be hung up on the part of the plane that's doing the pushing of air (propeller or jet engine). Instead, think of the plane as a point of mass propelling another mass (air) backward and thus the plane moves forward. If you're in space and you throw a ball, you will move in the opposite direction; it won't just be your hand (which propelled the ball) that's affected.