Podcast: What’s it like to be a Boeing-777 Captain?

Ever wonder what it would be like to be a Boeing 777 captain for a major airline?

Want to know how the 777 stacks up against the DC-10 and MD-11 from a guy who’s flown all three?

Here it is:

 To use your own player: click here to listen (or right click and “save” to download).

Don’t have an audio player?  Click here to listen on Pod-o-Matic!

(running time approximately 28 minutes)

Wednesday:

From flying low-level fighters in the Royal Dutch Air Force to the captain’s seat at KLM,

Captain Martin Leeuwis shares his flying stories on JetHead Live!

Also Coming Soon:

What’s it like to fly the space shuttle: my interview with 3 time shuttle astronaut Mike Mullane. Subscribe now!

Airline Flying 101: Anatomy of a Take-off.

Take-off? That’s easy, right? You fasten your safety belt, move your seat fully upright and stow your tray table. Ready. Right?

Not even.

But if that’s the full extent you prefer to be aware of, fine. Otherwise, read on as we take apart this very complex, important maneuver.

The planning starts long before you strap yourself into your seat in the back of the plane, and here’s why.

Take-offs come in all sizes and shapes because of several variables–so there’s no “one size fits all” logic or protocol. What are the variables? Well, aircraft weight, runway length, winds, runway surface condition and temperature are the basics, and each has an effect on performance.

You might think runway length is the great reliever, right? Miles of runway, like at DFW or Denver mean simple, low-risk performance, right?

And you might think a short runway or nasty weather are the “problem children” of take-off performance. But let me give you the pilot answers: no, no, and furthermore, no.

Throw out what you’ve been thinking about take-offs as a passenger, and strap in tight (is that tray table up? is Alec Baldwin playing “Words” in the lav while we all wait for His Highness to finish?) because you’re about to test drive some “pilot think:”

I don’t worry about taking off–I worry about stopping.

Why? This sounds so simple that when you think about it, you’ll have to agree: aircraft are made to fly–not drag race.

Huh?

Look, accelerating 85 tons to nearly 200 miles per hour builds tremendous kinetic energy. Not a problem for the landing gear if you take off because it’s simply rolling. But if you must stop, the brakes and wing-located speed brakes have to dissipate that energy within the length of the asphalt ahead.  The runway length is finite, the aircraft weight is unchangeable once you’re rolling. So where is the point of no return, the point after which there’s not enough runway to stop?

Brakes are key--and checked visually before EVERY take-off.

As a pilot–particularly as the captain who makes every go-no go decision no matter which pilot is actually flying–you must know when that instant occurs. That magic point is not a distance down the runway but rather, a maximum speed: “Refusal Speed.” In other words, the maximum speed to which we can accelerate and still stop within the confines of the runway if we choose to abort the take-off.

But there’s a catch, of course.

Refusal Speed is only half of the go-no go decision. Part Two is just as critical: what is the minimum speed I must have in order to take-off if one engine fails, continuing on the other. I can hear this already: why the hell would you want to continue the take-off on one engine?

To which I’d answer back, what if the failure happens above Refusal Speed? In other words, there’s not enough runway ahead to stop your high-speed tricycle.

Okay, that minimum speed–the speed you must have in order to continue the take-off in the remaining runway on one engine–is called “Critical Engine Failure Speed.”

All of the performance numbers for each unique take-off are computed, with corrections for the many variables to be made by the pilots.

Now you have the two controllers of the go-no go decision; one a minimum speed (you must have Critical Engine failure Speed achieved to continue safely into the air) and one a maximum (if you attempt to abort in excess of Refusal Speed–you ain’t stopping on the runway).

So which is the deciding factor? Well, in modern day jets under average circumstances, the “max” speed is normally way in excess of the “min” speed. In other words, you normally achieve the min required for single-engine continued take-off before you reach the max allowed for stopping. So, in ordinary circumstances, Decision Speed–which we call V1–is Refusal Speed.

In other words, we know we’ll secure adequate flying speed for a single-engine take-off before we hit the max abort speed. So we use the max abort speed–Refusal Speed–for V1.

Pilot-think lesson one: it’s easier to deal with a single-engine aircraft in the air than it is to stop a freight train on the runway. Which goes back to my earlier point: airliners fly great but make only adequate drag racers, stopping on the drag strip remaining being the challenge.

Add to that the wild card: the captain must decide in a split second as you’re rolling toward V1 if any malfunction that occurs will affect the ability to stop the jet: did an electrical system failure kill the anti-skid system required for max braking? Did a hydraulic failure eliminate the wing spoilers figured into the stopping distance?

Some jets require very little system support to fly–but a lot of factors to stop: the MD80 will fly all day without hydraulics, electrics or pneumatics–but it ain’t stopping on a “balanced field” without electrics and hydraulics.

Get my pilot-prespective regarding my preference to take a wounded jet into the air rather than wrestle it to a stop on a runway?

And remember, those speeds are “perfect world” scenarios. But on your flight–like every flight–despite the engineering numbers from which the stopping distance is computed, there are the real life factors which screw them up: wet or icy runway, tailwind, old tires, old brakes, rubber on the runway because of aircraft touchdown on landings.

Not a problem on an average day, but corrections to the numbers and your pilot-think must be made if any of those variables are present.

Now, have you deduced the worst-case scenario with the two controlling speeds, Critical Engine failure Speed and Refusal Speed? That is, you will exceed the max speed for stopping before you attain the minimum speed for single-engine flight?

That’s simple: you can’t take-off. In practice, we adjust the flap setting or even reduce the gross weight: back to the gate–some cargo and/or passengers must come off. Hardly ever happens that we return to the gate because we plan ahead–and that’s why you hear of a flight being “weight restricted,” meaning some seats will be empty by requirement before you even board. Now you know why.

But really, that’s not even the worst case scenario from a pilot’s perspective (sorry about your trip, if you’re one of the passengers left behind on a weight restricted flight–but you probably got some compensation for it). Rather, it’s when the two numbers are the same.

That is, the minimum speed required for flight is equal to the max speed for stopping.

That’s called a “Balanced Field:” the runway distance required to accelerate to minimum single-engine take-off speed is also the maximum velocity from which you can safely abort and stop on the runway.

That’s a “short runway” problem, like in LaGuardia, Burbank, Washington National or Orange County, right?

Wrong–it’s everywhere, like Denver’s 14,000 feet of runway (compared to LaGuardia’s 7,000) on a hot summer day; ditto DFW; also Mexico City even on a cool day because it’s at 7,500 feet elevation. And it can occur anywhere due to rain, ice or snow.

So here’s your plan, and as pilot-in-command, you’d better have this tattooed into your brain on every take-off: once you enter the high-speed abort regime (by definition, above 90 knots), know what you will abort for–or continue the take-off. Be ready for both–without hesitation.

LaGuardia: 7,000' between you and Flushing Bay.

It’s easier to decide what you will abort for than won’t–because the “must stops” outnumber the “can stops” and remember your pilot think: it’s often safer to continue than stop. And here are my Big Four Must Stops: engine fire, engine failure, windshear or structural failure.

So rolling past 90, I’m thinking over and over, “engines, engines, engines,” zeroing in on any malfunction in order to assess if it’s an engine problem–if not, it’s likely not a “must stop” situation; I’m aware of windshear but don’t even start the take-off roll with any of the conditions present; structural damage we’ll deal with as necessary. Otherwise, we’re flying, folks.

Got all that? Good deal: now you understand the important interrelationship between Critical Engine Failure Speed, Refusal Speed and the all important concept of V1.

And now that you understand the complex, split-second conditions surrounding the go-no go decision on your next take-off, you can relax and just put all of those crucial factors out of your mind.

Because rest assured, they’re at the forefront of mine, or that of whatever crew into whose hands you’ve entrusted your life.

Special Note:

Coming in 2012–The JetHead Podcast! Interviews with real pilots, hands-on first-person  descriptions of airline piloting and aircraft flying from the folks on the front lines of commercial aviation!

Subscribe to JetHead to receive notice of podcasts now in production!

Why you should NEVER fly into Washington National Airport

There are many, many good reasons why you should NEVER fly into Reagan National Airport in Washington DC. And I’ll tell you why you shouldn’t, and I mean fly–not sit on your butt in the back of the plane. Of course, it goes without saying that if pilots shouldn’t fly there, neither should passengers. And here’s why.

1. The Postage Stamp Effect: like LaGuardia in NYC, the airport was built in the early days of commercial aviation, when the defining factors in aircraft design were slow air speeds, light weights, agile propeller aircraft. Fine.

Maneuvering this thick-winged, lumbering prop job on final was routine at a relative crawl compared to today’s heavier swept wing jets, which need lots of room in the air and on the ground to operate safely. But Washington National is a postage-stamp sized airport from a bygone era, and the serpentine “approach” hasn’t changed:

Look closely at the approach and notice the approach course–145 degrees, right? The runway heading is 194, so do the math: there’s an almost 50 degree heading change on final–and look at where that occurs. It’s at 424 feet above the ground. Which brings up my next point:

2. Extraordinary low-altitude maneuvering: The wingspan of the 737-800 is over 130 feet long, and the jet is normally sinking at a rate of 700 feet per minute on short final. Thirty degrees of bank at 400 feet with seconds to touchdown, with each wingtip dipping up to 50′ in a turn less than 200′ above the ground? And while a 20 degree offset is considered a challenge, the final alignment on such a typical offset approach happens early–but this turn is after the minimum descent altitude, and you get to finalize the crosswind correction at the last second landing on a marginally adequate runway length:

Look at the runway length of the “long” runway: that’s right, 6,800 feet–200′ shorter than LaGuardia’s aircraft carrier deck, and often on final approach, the tower will ask you to sidestep to the 5,200 foot runway instead. So before you even start the approach, you’d better figure and memorize your gross weight and stopping distance corrected for wind and in most cases, you’ll note that the total is within a couple hundred feet of the shorter runway’s length.

Then figure in the winds and the runway condition (wet? look at the numbers: fuggeddabout it) So the answer is usually “unable”–but at least half of the time I hear even full-sized (not just commuter sized) jets accepting the clearance. I accepted the clearance (had a small stopping distance margin and the long runway was closed for repairs) to transition visually to the short runway one night and at 500 feet, that seat-of-the-pants feel that says get the hell out of town took over and I diverted to Dulles instead.

“Do you fell lucky today, punk?”

If that wasn’t hairy enough (get the pun? “hairy,” “Harry?”) from the north, approaching from the south, you’ll also get the hairpin turns induced because they need more spacing to allow a take-off. Either way you get last second close-in maneuvering that would at any other airport induce you to abandon the approach–but that’s just standard at Washington Reagan. And once you’re on the ground, stopping is key because there’s no overrun: you’re in the drink on both ends. Is the runway ever wet when they say it’s dry? Icy when they say “braking action good?”

And with the inherent challenges at the capitol’s flagship airport, you’d expect topnotch navaids, wouldn’t you? Well not only do they not have runway centerline lights or visual approach slope indicators (VASI) from the south, plenty of the equipment that is installed doesn’t work on any given day. Here’s the airport’s automated arrival information for Thursday night:

Just a couple things to add to the experience, right?

So let’s review. If you’re flying into Reagan–and I’ve been doing it all month–to stay out of the headlines and the lagoon, calculate those landing distances conservatively. The airport tries to sell the added advantage of a “porous friction overlay” on the short runway that multiplies the normal coefficient of friction, but accept zero tailwind (and “light and variable” is a tailwind) and if there’s not at least 700 feet to spare–I’m going to Dulles (several deplaning passengers actually cursed at me for diverting) without even considering reentering the Potomac Approach traffic mix for a second try at National.

Think through the last minute alignment maneuver and never mind what the tower says the winds are, go to school on the drift that’s skewing your track over the river and compensate early: better to roll out on final inside the intercept angle (right of course) because from outside (left of course) there’s no safe way to realign because of the excessive offset and low altitude. A rudder kick will drag the nose back to the left inside the offset, but from too far left, you’re screwed.

Once you’ve landed, now you face reason number 3:

3: The northbound departure procedure. Noise abatement in places like Orange County-John Wayne are insanity off of a short runway with steep climb angles and drastic power cuts for noise sensitive areas. But DCA has an even better driving forces: the runway is aimed at the national mall which is strictly prohibited airspace.

Again, no problem in a lumbering prop job–but serious maneuvering is required in a 160,000 pound jet crossing the departure end at nearly 200 mph: the prohibited airspace starts 1.9 miles from the end of the runway. We’re usually configured at a high degree of flaps (5-15 versus the normal 1) so you’re climbing steeply as it is–in order to prevent violating the prohibited airspace, you must maintain the minimum maneuvering speed which means the nose is pitched abnormally high–then you must use maximum bank to turn left 45 degrees at only 400 feet above the ground.

What do you think will happen with the nose high and the left wing low if you take a bird or two in that engine? Are there any waterfowl in the bird sanctuary surrounding the airport? Would the situation be any different with a normal climb angle with wings straight and level?

So what’s the payoff for this complicated, difficult operation?

It’s a nice terminal. Congressmen like their free parking at National. And they’re way too busy to ride the Metro to Dulles, despite the bazillion dollars appropriated to extend the metro line from the Capitol to Dulles, adding another twenty minutes to the airport travel time is too much for our very sensitive congressmen to endure.

I think that’s about it as far as pluses and minuses. Fair trade, considering all the factors?

That’s for you to decide for yourself, but hang on–we’re going anyway. Just don’t chew my ass when I land the jet at Dulles instead of Washington Reagan National. Because for all of the above reasons, you probably shouldn’t have been going there anyway.

More insider info? Step into the cockpit:

These 25 short essays in the best tradition of JetHead put YOU in the cockpit and at the controls of the jet.

Some you’ve read here, many have yet to appear and the last essay, unpublished and several years in the writing,  I consider to be my best writing effort yet.

Own a piece of JetHead, from Amazon Books and also on Kindle.

Pilot Report: Boeing 737 vs. McDonnell-Douglas MD-80

Now that I have nearly a thousand hours in the left seat of the Boeing 737-800, and having as well over 15,000 in the MD-80, I feel qualified to make some judgments about how the two stack up against each other.

For me, there’s one hands-down winner. I’ll get to that.

But first, looking at it from a hands-on pilot perspective, let me say what I think are the crucial factors in both jets, then compare them. And I’ll do it in order of importance from my line-swine pilot view:

1. Power: never mind the technology difference between the General Electric JT8D turbo fans on the Maddog and the CFM-56 high-bypass fans on the 737. It’s the thrust difference I want in my right hand when I’m trying to lift 170,000 pounds off a runway. And technology aside (I’ll get to that), the three full power options (22,000, 24,000, and 26,000 pounds of thrust) plus the bonus kick up to 27,000 pounds per engine on the 737 for special use beats the snot out of the 19,000 flat rated and standard de-rated engines on the MD-80. Yes, the -80 weighs less than the 737 (max of 150,000 vs. 174,000 pounds), and no, I don’t have each plane makers’ specs, but the thrust-to-weight performance from the left seat feels substantially more secure and significant from the 737.

You notice that right away when you do a static takeoff with the 737 at all weights: you’ve got buttloads of giddyup (I think engineers call it “acceleration,” but then they don’t actually feel it on paper versus in the cockpit blasting forward–that’s “a buttload of giddyup”) shortening  those critical moments of vulnerability between brake release and V1.

I have no idea what engineers think of when they look at thrust and take-off advantages, but any pilot with experience knows that those seconds before reaching flying speed are the most vulnerable, particularly close to max abort speed, because I’d rather take any problems into the air than have to wrestle them to a stop on a runway. The MD-80 has good smash at mid to light weights, but in crucial situations (Mexico City, for example, or on a short runway on a hot day) the 737’s CFM56’s rule. I need the shortest possible period of on-runway vulnerability; I know engine hot-section limits and longterm life are important too, but the CFM56 achieves better on-wing engine endurance in operation than the JT8Ds, year over year.

Ditto for a go-around or windshear options: the MD-80 is famous for it’s slow acceleration–I’ve been there MANY times–and when you’re escaping from windshear or terrain, I can promise you the pucker factor of the “one, Mississippi, two Mississippi” on up to six to eight seconds will have your butt chewing up the seat cushion like horse’s lips. Not sure if that’s due to the neanderthal 1970’s vintage hydro-mechanical fuel control (reliably simple–but painstakingly slow to spool) or the natural limitation of so many rotor stages. But the 737’s solid state EICAS computers reading seventy-teen parameters and trimming the CFMs accordingly seem to give the performance a clear edge. And a fistful of 737-800 throttles beats the same deal on the Maddog, period. Advantage, Boeing.

2. Wing: let me go back in time. I also flew the F-100 for a couple years as captain. That was a great jet, with a simple wing: no leading edge devices. Coming from jets with slats the feel was clearly different on take-off, where there was a distinct (if you’re a seat-of-the-pants guy, and that’s all I’ve ever been) translational period between rotate and lift-off due to the hard wing. Ditto in the flare and in some reversals in flight like on a go-around. Not a bad thing, just something you had to anticipate, but not a warm-fuzzy in the seat of your aerodynamic pants.

Stretched jet, stretched wing.

That’s a good analogy between the Boeing versus the Douglas wing: you feel the generous lift margin in the 737. That’s because when Boeing stretched the jet to the -800 length, they expanded the wing as well. That wing was already loaded much lighter than the DC-9 wing which Douglas didn’t enlarge when they added to two fuselage plugs plus about 15,000 pounds to the MD-80. Longer and with better cambered  (look at the DC-10, and no dihedral) airfoil is the Boeing design and I’m grateful for their foresight and superior engineering–especially at the top end of the performance envelope: you need anti-ice? No problem–turn it on. The Maddog? Better be 2,000 feet below optimum, or prepare for stall recovery–and anyone on the -80 fleet knows I’m not exagerating. Wing performance? No contest: Boeing.

3. Handling: again let me go back in time. Flew the T-37 like every new Air Force pilot up until recently–then moved on to the T-38. Using standard Tweet inputs on The Rocket would bang your helmet off the canopy because of the boosted flight controls, giving you 720 degrees of roll in a second at full deflection.

That’s the 737 compared to the MD-80: no aileron boost on the -80, and little help from the powered rudder–because of the long fuselage length and relatively short moment arm between the vertical fin and the MAC (Mean Aerodynamic Chord), the rudder seems to only impart a twisting moment that’s pretty useless. So it’s a wrestling match for roll control, in and out of turns with the -80.

I still tend to over control the 737 in acute roll situations (e.g., the 30 degree offset final at 300′ AGL required in and out of DCA) due to previous brain damage caused by years of arm wrestling the MD-80 around tight corners. But with the 737, the seat-of-the-pants security of that generous wing is apparent at all speed and altitudes and the hydraulic aileron boost gives you the muscle to command a smooth and prompt response. Handling? It’s all 737 for me, including on the ground: new MD-80 captains will need Ibuprofen to counter the wrist strain of the nosewheel steering, two-handed in tight spots. I don’t miss that at all.

4. Cockpit layout: okay, give the -80 its due–that was one comfortable nest once you got settled. But that’s as far as it goes for me. Yes, I know the 737 kitbag position is inaccessible. But American Airlines is the first airline certified by the FAA for iPad use from the ground to altitude. Kitbag, what’s a kitbag?

MD-80 left seat–HSI? Where is it?

Trade-off? The MD-80 HSI is obscured by the control yoke. Are you kidding me? Like you might need lateral situational awareness for trivia like, navigating? Flying an approach? I spent 20+ years working around that human factors engineering failure–I’m grateful for the Boeing engineers who gave me seven 9″ CRT flat plate displays with every parameter I could want displayed digitally and God bless them all–a Heads Up Display! Lord have mercy, even a simpleton has a crosscheck in that jet thanks to the God of HUD.

The 737 doesn’t have the elbow room you might like and everyone who I fly with who has come off the big Boeings (757, 767, 777) gripes about that. Fine. I’m all about performance and the flight displays, computers, communications and advanced Flight Management Systems in the 737 avionics suite beat the pants off of the 75 and 76–and the HUD tops the 777 as well. Nuff said: gimme the Guppy cockpit over the Maddog. Boeing put everything I need at my fingertips, and it’s all state-of-the-art, whereas Douglas engineers threw everything they could everywhere in the cockpit and slammed the door.

My 737 home.

So there you have it: power, wing, handling and even by a narrow margin, the cockpit too. I’m a Boeing guy, back from wayward days flying Douglas metal from the DC-10 to the MD-80. In my experience as a pilot, in my hours in both Boeing and Douglas jets, I’m grateful to be flying the best jets in the sky. Now you know which are which.

Captain New, Captain You.

First trip of a new month, settling into the cockpit. You’ve flown with this guy before, but after so many years and so many flights, it’s hard to recall exactly when.

The obligatory small talk as you plug in comm connectors and visually scan switch positions, watching the clock, setting the pace for what needs to happen and when.

“Is this your trip all month?” you ask. Next will be where do you live, any kids . . .

He’s got a smile trying to bust loose. “First part of the month,” he says. “Then I go to captain school.”

Now you’re smiling too. “Congrats, amigo,” you say. “I think I’m going to start calling you captain right now. Has a nice ring to it–and you might as well get used to it.”

You let that ride, let him have his moment of pride. And if he’s smart, a moment of well-justified trepidation. Of course, until he actually qualifies and then in the real world sweats bullets in real time at 500 knots with options shrinking . . .

If anyone ever knew ahead of time, they’d walk away, wouldn’t they?

Your smile stays, wishing in your heart the best for him and for the thousands who’ll rely on him once he takes a seat in the “buck stops here” position.

He deserves that, he’s waited twenty years for that fourth stripe. And never mind that he’ll have to earn it, fight for it actually, to prove to instructors, evaluators and the FAA that he deserves it.

Try to think back . . . twenty some years ago, you’re a happy-go-lucky (okay, maybe too much so) DC-10 First Officer, cruising around, loving the senior First Officer schedule–then you get the notice: “You will report to captain upgrade ground school on August 15th . . .”

Ahh, how the world changed in an instant: finally at long last, you reach the top, recognized for who you are and how you fly.

Well, not so fast.

It’s a gauntlet of classes, exams and certifications. Systems to understand, procedures to master and more than anything else, a mindset to claim: what the hell are we doing and why? And if it doesn’t contribute to the safe carriage of our passengers, to the successful, competent and correct touchdown and taxi in for your $60 million dollar jet and the souls on board–you’re the guy to raise the bullshit flag, to stop the freight train and make it work like you want it to, like it’s supposed to. No one else can or will.

If only he knew; if only you’d known.

Hours of study, memorize those litanies, understand the systems behind the procedures; cough up the spectrum of limit numbers on demand: temperatures, pressures (climb? cruise? max?); fuel limits; climb, icing, stopping–more: electrical bypasses; backups, legality and oh god, stay on the right side of the battalion of lawyers looking for your survivors’ assets if you falter.

Remember the checkride? Double-teamed by two Check Airman, but so what? Bring it on: a great first officer on my right, moving from the engineer’s panel to his first window seat, both of us studying, drilling, practicing in the simulator for engine fires and failures and hydraulic leaks and electrical fires and god-knows-what–bring it on.

Then the coup-de-gras: double engine failure, land it safely, ace. And you do.

Smart on their part, as you learn later when after years and over 5,000 captain hours you become the evaluator, the Check Airman, for other pilots upgrading to captain and First Officer: burn it into their minds–you can handle anything and everything. Because they’ll have to; and they’ll know that they can when they must.

And the proud, ultimate moment after engine shutdown on a flight with a hundred forty passengers on board and an FAA evaluator in the jumpseat. New captain candidate wrung out, put through his paces, scrutinized and graded. You as Check Airman in the right seat, acting as copilot but still pilot-in-command for the new guy’s FAA check. The FAA guy gives you a nod (you never lost a captain, ever) and you know.

You ask the FAA evaluator, “Critique?” Usually, if we’ve all done our jobs right–and I never lost a captain–there are some minor critique items. Then he leaves. The silence is big as we gather our flight gear.

“I only have one thing for you,” I say. “You wear these now,” I tell him, handing over the captain’s wings literally and figuratively forged in fire. And from then on, they’re his to wear and earn again every day.

And after years as captain and thousands of hours and more hurdles of selection, training and evaluations, a few of those new captains will become instructors and evaluators themselves–like you did. Passing on the lessons, looking for the awareness, the competence, and the willingness in those who want captains wings to earn the right to wear them. And we all aspire to exactly that–but not everyone makes it.

“Well captain,” I say, back to the present, “how about we run that Before Starting Engines Checklist? Let’s get outta town.” I know he’s pleased at the sound of that “Captain” title, as well he should be.

And soon, if he works very hard and does well, he’ll find out exactly why.

“Jetiquette:” Manners for the Refined Flyer.

A few years back, I was flying a charter from Acapulco to DFW. On board were 130-some passengers who had just disembarked from a cruise ship there in the Acapulco harbor. On climb out, I had the passenger address system audio feed in my headset mix just low enough to hear it, but high enough to understand what was going on in back. And I was so shocked I had to take a look for myself.

“I want all of the hitting, pushing and name calling stopped right now,” a flight attendant said firmly, as if talking to a kindergarten class on a field trip. But I saw it with my own eyes: 130 senior citizens, cranky and bickering about god-knows-what. Which proves my main point.

That is, the main hassle for air travelers is other air travelers. Seriously.

And the most important thing for you to remember about your own air travel is that for other air travelers–you are the other air traveler.

Still with me? That was a roundabout way to say that if everyone on board worried about their own behavior, everyone on board would have a better travel experience.  What I’m talking about is “Jetiquette,” or proper manners on a jet. This it would seem is a lost art, but we can resurrect the basics and thereby rescue air travel from the cattle car experience it has devolved into.

Let’s start simple. Here is your on-board world.

Now looking at the spatial dimensions of this area designed for three butts, if you have one of these

don’t even ask, “Do you mind if I put the armrest up?” The answer is “Yes, I mind–I do not want your buttocks flowing over me like hail-damaged Naugahyde for the entire flight.”

Now, continuing with basic Jetiquette, how do you politely get out of your seat? Please tell me you use one or both of those armrests you see there. Because if you’re using the seatback in front of you to hoist your carcass out of your seat, you’re that rude guy on the plane.

The seat in front of you is not your handhold–somebody’s sitting in it and you disturb them rudely if you mess with their seat. Get it? Push yourself up using any part of your seat, don’t pull yourself up using someone else’s. It’s really not that hard–you just have to think about someone else for a change.

Seriously?

Face it, there isn’t much space but what little there is doesn’t all belong to you. So here’s a thought that seemingly doesn’t occur to many folks on-board the jet:

YOU’RE NOT AT HOME.

So basically, keep all of your clothing on–including your shoes. Nothing gets the galley mafia pissed off faster than seeing some slob with his or her feet up against the bulkhead. You will be “that guy,” the one they view with silent but distinct disgust, the one who will only get attention as a revolting example of poor public manners. And while we’re on the subject of bare or stocking feet:

Why do you suppose this guy is wearing layers of protective clothing? It’s because he’s servicing the lavatory where for some unknown reason, supposedly rational people are walking around without shoes. Now, we don’t mind you mopping up the lav floor for us, but it gags everyone on the crew to know you’re doing it.

Would you walk around barefoot here?

That’s pretty much what you’re doing in an airline lav in flight. So don’t.

Finally, let’s talk about personal space. Well, there isn’t any in coach. So Jetiquette demands that you at least keep your bodily smells–especially your breath–either inside at all times, or at least wash before you board and not incidentally, brush your teeth. Those seated next to you will appreciate your basic hygiene–or especially, the lack thereof.

Okay, that’s the basics of Jetiquette and if you’re planning to be aboard for any flight, you need to consider at least this much of the fundamentals.  If we all remember our manners, we can bring back the good old days of air travel that never really were–but the fable gives us all something to gripe about now.

And when all else fails:

FlyJinks: Well that was really stupid.

Mimi has always been one of my favorite flight attendants: self-assured, smart, and a real sharp tongue coupled with a very sarcastic sense of humor. Rewinding to my DC-10 First Officer days, (okay, I’ve been a captain for 20 years now, do the math), I recall Mimi’s dedicated enthusiasm for a practical joke on a new flight engineer, an old tradition back in the days when we had new pilots and flight attendants joining our ranks literally by the thousands.

Although I usually took no part, I always got a laugh anyway. For instance, I can’t recall how many times I watched a captain send a new flight attendant back to the cabin to get some “air samples” in a barf bag. The passengers must have thought they were nuts.

Mimi’s plan involved luring  the engineer into the cabin to deal with a problem in the lav. Yes, the engineer wasn’t called “the plumber” for nothing. He’d put all of the hydraulic pumps to high pressure (hey, I was a DC-10 engineer way back), then all the fuel boost pumps back on, grab his hat and a few tools and head for the cabin.

DC-10 plumber's station. I did a year there . . .

Mimi was an expert in creating certain particularly vulgar sculptures from bran muffins and apple jelly, two items in the breakfast pastry stock in First Class. What she–and other flight attendants–would sculpt looked like the output of a German shepherd after digesting five pounds of raw meat, then squatting on your lawn.

The plan was to lay the sculpture next to the seat or on the seat in the lav, then call the engineer: “Look what someone did . . .” When he shrank away in revulsion, the flight attendant would scold him, then with her bare hands pick up the reshaped bran muffin  and wave it around like it was nothing, freaking out the engineer who was visualizing German shepherd output the whole time.

Funny. So Mimi creates her masterpiece, then slips it gingerly into a side pocket on her uniform dress (fragile! don’t spoil the shape!) and walks up the aisle through First Class toward one of the forward lavs.

She told me later she wasn’t exactly sure what happened, but on the way to the forward lav, a bump of turbulence jolted her sideways and her hip hit the credenza below the TV screen in First Class. The end result was her standing before the first row of First Class, and the oblong sculpture had flopped out of her dress and plopped down between her legs on the carpet. As if she’d just done the nasty deed right there.

Despite the gawking, the horrified passenger looks, other flight attendants told me Mimi just reached down as if it were nothing, snatched up the offending torpedo, and walked forward, eventually ending up in the cockpit.

“The deal’s off,” she told me, a finger to her lips. The Flight Engineer was off the hook–at least on that leg. Pretty sure she got him later.

While we’re on the DC-10–my second favorite jet to fly, behind the 737-800–maybe I could relate the tale that involved a half dozen flight attendants in the lower galley in their nightgowns calling me and one of my favorite pilots (we still see each other and back up the facts to whomever else has trouble believing the true story) from the cockpit one at a time for a “slumber party,” with 275 passengers upstairs clueless except for the fact that so many flight attendants seemed to have vanished.

Well, maybe next time.

Captain Who? Captain YOU.

You’re the captain: try it on like a pair of pants (Waist a little tight? Lay off the brownie sundaes the flight attendants sometimes offer) and walk around. Four big ol’ stripes, hat too with the scrambled eggs elaboration on the hat bill. You’ve arrived.

So, what’s the first thing you do when you get to the airport? Check the weather? The jet? Right?

Hell no. You sign in and get your per diem started, as cash flow is key. So, check the weather? Stupid. If you’re just now “checking the weather” you might as well be one of the passengers with the glazed doughnut look noticing with reasonable consternation that they will arrive into different weather many miles away.

Of course you checked it–departure, enroute and destination–as soon as you got up this morning, then probably an hour ago, so that now you can see the trend. You might have picked up a thing or two about the behavior of air masses after spending 30-some years working aloft, plus you’ve learned the peculiarities of particular destinations, how the topography casts an orographic effect on the winds and the weather. Where’s the weather data from: National Weather Service? NOAA? Nah–from “My Radar” on your iPhone where you get a complete depiction of the radar picture in realtime of the entire route of flight; back it up with the radar picture from FltPlan.com which also shows the full route and destination regional radar.

Okay, now the flight plan. What’s the most important thing there, the route, the altitude, the jet? Again, hell no.

The motion lotion: the fuel, the burn, the reserve, the loiter time. The rest of the junk? What evs–we’ll get airborne and see what’s what. You know from experience at every destination what kind of bingo fuel you’re going to be comfortable with. The route changes with traffic flow and Air traffic Control’s best guess at managing the crowd crisscrossing the national airspace. But unlike the old Air Force days, you can’t just fly up to a tanker, hold position, get plugged and tank a few thousand pounds. You sure miss that, don’t you?

Anyway, add your years of air sense to the weather trending you’ve determined is going on today, add in the time of day for traffic flow (how are the lines at the grocery store right around lunch time? get it?) and you get an idea of what’s the minimum fuel required.

So you make sure you have what you need and if not, a quick call to Flight Dispatch: “Could you add 2,000 pounds to the release, please?” Don’t know about other airlines, but never have had a dispatcher balk at my request. Once we agree, sign the flight plan electronically and print all ten yards worth of dead tree. Shame about the trees–all this information is being electronically uploaded to the flight management system on board via data link anyway.

Origami: fold that up in components–Take-Off Plan (speeds, weights, distances), Flight Plan (points, times, distances, winds, temps, ground speed, true airspeed, Mach, fuel burn) and the Other Ten Yards (temporary airspace notes, changes, aircraft systems notes, procedural changes, temporary restrictions) of stuff you might need to know and that a battery of attorneys after any incident will want to use as ammo to say, “You should have known this.” Now you do.

Next? The jet? Time for the jet? Yes and no.

You want to get there as the last passengers deplane so as to meet the pilots who flew it in for a quick, “Good jet” (you do the same when you pass a jet to another crew) or, an explanation of maintenance issues they may have noted in the logbook.

Fine. Once the other pilots and flight attendants leave, what? Stow your gear? Read the maintenance logbook? Start the preflight?

Not so fast. First, scrounge the outgoing catering for an unopened bottle–maybe two!–of water. Stash that (it’s just getting removed by the caterers anyway) in the cockpit first. Dehydration is a major physical stress of a career at altitude which affects a pilot’s ability to work as efficiently and smartly as possible. Can’t do much about jetlag or hotel sleep interruptions, but this is one issue you can influence directly.

Okay then, switch both inertial reference unit to “align” so that they can engage all three independent GPS systems on board to interrogate a dozen or two satellites and pinpoint our navigation starting point as accurately and as soon as possible. Stow your stuff–take your hat off first, because the Heads Up Display projector over your seat will knock it off your head for the thousandth time if you don’t, then lock the cockpit door behind you when you leave–don’t need any wayward caterers or cabin cleaners or passenger entertainment system techs milling about in the cockpit where they have no business.

Now what? Get lost. You’ve checked out the maintenance status of the jet on the computer, you’ve familiarized yourself with the Take Off Plan and the Flight Plan and are satisfied with both–so stay out of everyone’s hair. They all–cabin cleaners, flight attendants, copilot–have lots of stuff to do and they know what they’re doing, so let them.

Now’s your time to swing through Flight Ops to check your mailbox for any vital info stuffed there, but most of that you’re aware of from various electronic sources anyway. But always best to check.

By now we’re 30 minutes to pushback. Take your seat in the cockpit? Nah–first things first, or maybe better said, last things: coffee. Needs to be too hot to drink now, which means just right for taxi out, take-off and climb. There’s just something righteous about sipping a good cup during the early phases of flight that sets the upbeat tone, and even the upbeat heartbeat during a busy time.

Where do you get such a cup?

Mac D’s, honestly. The best–not the gourmet battery acid of Starbucks or “Whomever’s Best” (though you gotta love “Pike’s Perk” in Denver and “Brioche” in LAX) but good old, down to earth full taste McDonald’s coffee.

You sniff derisively at that? Fine, drink whatever you want in your cockpit on climbout. Okay, now you head for the cockpit. As the Big Cheese? El Hefe? Numero Uno?

Heck no–as invisible as possible. No eye contact, no glad handing. You have enough to do on the flight deck, so get it done. Just leave the marketing and PR for the departments getting paid to look after such things.

You wish.

Slide by the passengers on the jetbridge carefully, quietly. Introduce yourself to the #1 flight attendant–just your first name, they already know you’re the captain. Offer to help them in any way you can throughout the flight.

On the flight deck, thread your way into the fleece-covered left seat. Adjust the lumbar and thigh pads, the seat height, which needs to be just right to get all of the info on the HUD (“Heads Up Display”) projected on the glass before you. Comm cords and headset hooked up.

Set up your comm panel: flight interphone monitor and transmit, speaker on so the ground crew can contact you. All VHF radios off–no distraction between you and the ground crew during pushback.

Test the quickdon oxygen mask–clean it out with a Sani-Comm swab, set 100% oxygen flow, test the communications function. You want that thing working at altitude where your time of useful consciousness in a depressurization is limited to second without it.

Now your air sense check, start right above your head, yaw damper engaged (means it’s getting valid attitude info from the inertial reference units), switches normal on map display and nav functions; over to the pneumatics and pressurization, proper cruise and landing altitudes set;  the window heat on, probe heat off; turn on one electrically driven hydraulic pump to send 3,000 psi of pressure to the flight controls so a wind gust doesn’t yank the elevator column back into your gut. Switch to onboard electric power, assure airflow, decide which fuel boost pumps will go on before engine start based on the correct fuel loading–now’s the time to find a discrepancy there.

The office.

Then the challenge and response litany of preflight. Then the all-important (it damn well is) route check of every waypoint in the navigation system.

Finally, the ticket agent manning the jetbridge will step into the cockpit and say, “All bags stowed, all bins are closed, we’re ready to pull the jetbridge when you give the okay.”

“Is everyone down,” you ask in mock seriousness; the agent knows all passengers must be seated before the jetbridge is pulled away.

“Yes, they’re all down.” He walked right into that one.

“Well try to cheer them up,” you say, because you are such a smart ass. In a moment, you hear the main cabin door whomp shut and the door warning light panel indicates that now your jet’s buttoned up.

Ground power and air are gone. We pressurize hydraulic and pneumatic systems. The number one flight attendant checks in, “we have 16 up front, 144 in back, five working crewmembers, we’re ready,” then seals the cockpit door shut. At last .

Your headset comes to life as the Crew Chief below, seated on the pushback tug, notes the jetbridge clear of the aircraft and calls, “Ground checks complete, cholks removed, steering  bypass pin installed, cleared to release brakes and call for push.”

The F/O is on it, calling ramp. As we ease back, the Crew Chief calls, “Clear to start engines.”

Love it. Hack the clock to time the start sequence, then hit the Engine Start Switch and say, “Turning number two.” High pressure air whooshes through ducting and into the big hi-bypass fanjet and engine instrument depictions on both large CRT’s come to life.

Once both engines are humming along at idle, the ground crew signs off and gives you a salute, meaning they’ve cleared out and you can now roll the 80 ton jet without squishing anyone or anything .

You salute back, then nudge the 54,000 pounds of thrust gathered in your right hand and she begins to inch forward. Another sip of coffee as we taxi out, an inward smile through the litany of pre-takeoff checklist.

This is going to be a blast.

Early dusk, the latter dawn.

“So soon as early Dawn the rosy fingered shone forth at the island, we roamed over the length thereof .”

The Odyssey, Book XII

It sneaks up on you: one moment it’s full afternoon daylight on the west coast; climb to 41,000 feet and blast into the eastern sky at 500 knots across the ground–then here she comes. The sky tires, breathes out, dismisses the brilliance and in it’s place a striation like a sideways rainbow drapes the earth.

You know from the basics of atmospherics and sunlight that the thickest layer of atmosphere hugging the earth carries the ball for the entire sky: thick, dense air, roiled up with moisture and heat and particulate pollutants and ash and the crud of the day sit fat atop the earth and reflect the sunset behind you in the layered band ahead and below.

The day doesn’t necessarily go down without a fight. From above, the glowering of the day’s heat on broad expanses of badlands lifts whatever moisture there is in the swirl of adiabatic and orographic torture of the air and turns it violent, raking the earth–a sideshow from way up top where we sit. Here the air is at -50C and whatever moisture exists is such wispy-thin lenticular gauze that we don’t even use the engine anti-ice: the ice crystals are too fine to accumulate.

And even the towering violence below yields to the encroaching dusk, losing the heat of the retreating sun and collapsing like colossal waterfall over the tired landscape below.

Seems there’s always that notch in the middle of the sky, the sinking vee as if we were a boat cutting a wake, backlit by the sinking sun. Almost pointing the way ahead: here’s where you go, here’s where you sink into the darkness. Remember it; you don’t stay aloft forever any more than that towering storm that fell apart and returned to earth in a torrent. And you’ll do it in the dark–so remember the colors.

Behind, it’s an angry passage, a red lip drawn thin and tight, black above indigo, descending on the horizon as the sun races off to the west dragging the day with it.

Nothing easy in this leave taking, in fact it’s a raging morality play: go big, go horizon to horizon with a broad brush and a flaming palette but in the end, as always, darkness wins.

And here’s where the cockpit lights come up and the warm instrument glow emerges from the shadow of the the sun’s brilliance spilling into the windowed gazebo, the light fleeing west with the rest of the day. The widowed earth makes do, light reduced to a scattered carpet of jeweled arteries, the highways, the traffic so far below you can’t see it in the day, but long beaded strands at night connect the towns like spindly glowing veins creeping along, relentless.

Fair enough: can’t see the ground, nor can anyone seven miles below see us chalking the sky with a miles-long contrail of white vapor spun out like cotton candy in one long strand, pointing to where we’re going, showing where we came from. Guess we’ll do our thing separately, earth and sky, because the light’s gone but the spirit’s still flying. We’ll find our way back, find our way back  to the earth, all soon enough–that much is written in stone.

But for now, darkness or dawn, we sail on.

The Annual Pilot Beating: A Love-Hate Thing.

On take-off roll, a few knots past (of course!) maximum stopping speed, the left engine started to surge and compressor stall. I knew it as much from feel as from the engine instrument stack, although I glanced at it anyway. Trip the autothrottles off–don’t want them screwing with the power setting, chasing the N1– “Continue” I say to the First Officer who is making the take-off.

Without a word, he continues the climbout profile, even as I tell him, based on the gages, “Left engine failure.” We wait; no rushing, although I did call the tower, “Flight 914 declaring an emergency, we’re going straight ahead and will need a downwind at 4,000 feet.”

“Climb and maintain 8,000 feet if you can,” comes the answer. Shrug. Why eight? I think I know.

Sure enough, just prior to the base turn, lights flicker out, then emergency power shows a Christmas tree of warnings. Double engine failure. Flight 914 is now a 139,000 pound metal glider.

I’d started the Auxiliary Power Unit right after the first failure–kind of a reflex–having it ready to cover the lost generator once we reached a safe altitude. Good fortune; I connected both electrical distribution buses to the spun-up APU, then executed the rote memory items for double engine failure.

But what’s not a memory item is hard to forget: a windmill start is not likely at pattern speed. Descending at best glide angle means a slow speed and shallow descent, windmilling start requires more smash and a steep descent–not really comfortable at eight thousand–but necessary to get at least one engine running. Do it.

Sure, the APU is running, but what are the chances of pulling off that bleed configuration switcheroo correctly while attempting the double restart (hack the clock each time, remember?) and watching the ground come up to meet us?

My F/O is a Marine–you can always count on them, solid in every situation, and he’s no different–and it’s clear he doesn’t like trading the altitude for restart speed. I don’t either, but I’m doing the three dimensional geometry just as I know he is: about three times the altitude is the glide range. We’re good for way more than we need and in fact, gauging the distance and altitude I bet we’ll need some drag to get down to the runway. But trading off the altitude for restart leaves you no options. The Boeing is an energy miser–flies all day with that big wingleted wing and only grudgingly slows or descends.

“Give me at least 250,” I say, going through the restart procedure on both engines. Sure, the left one failed and might have internal damage, but it’s better than nothing. F/O lowers the nose a little more. Rotation on the dead engines picks up.

Over my left shoulder I’ve got the runway in sight. I want to say screw the restart, I’ll take it and deadstick it in. I have great faith in this excellent Boeing wing, with or without engines.

“I’m getting some N2 on two,” I say. Grudgingly, it’s coming back to life. Anything’s better than nothing.

Minutes later, we touch down and I brake us to a stop. “Excellent,” says the evaluator, one of two on board in the full motion simulator.

Yes, I know it’s a sim; but I also want to know how the jet flies under all conditions and what the timing, control feel and workload is like. Nobody’s willing–me included–to try this in the $60-million dollar jet, so we practice in the $5-million dollar simulator.

This is the second half of my every nine month beating. The first half is an evaluation: a line flight with various problems (mechanical, weather, legality, performance) thrown in. Prior to the two hour sim is a two hour “briefing,” which is one part information and two parts oral exam for you–and don’t stumble on any of the three full pages of memory items, never mind the hundreds of operating limitations numbers. Do it all  correctly and the two hours the flight examination portion is complete–then on to the second half, advanced flight maneuvers. In total, it’s a very slow-creeping six hour oral and flight exam.

The Inquisition: the oral exam before the simulator checkride.

And if you screw it up–which is to say, below standard in any area of standard procedure, emergency procedure or regulation; botch any maneuver, and your license is suspended.

We progress on to the final two hours of vital practice with windshear escape, mountainous terrain escape, inflight upset (pitch up, invert, recover without ripping any parts off the jet) and various fires and failures.

Every nine months, an airline pilot’s license and virtually, his career, is on the line. Every six months, the flight physical adds more jeopardy: beyond just the physical exam itself there’s the EKG that is data-linked directly to FAA Headquarters for analysis–they’ll make a determination as to whether you retain your medical certificate or not for another year.

Can’t worry about that stuff. Can’t do anything but dread the every nine month simulator beating and exam–but also, you have to welcome the opportunity: I want to practice the emergency procedures in real time, sharpen my reactions, test my judgment under pressure, my ability to problem-solve with complex and multiple problems. It’s a confidence builder, a necessary beating in order to lift an eighty-ton jet off the runway with 167 souls on board with complete confidence in my ability to get the jet and the folks back on the ground safely come whatever challenge.

That’s the price and the privilege of being an airline pilot. The smart pilots know you can’t have the latter without the former and though it never makes the ordeal easier, it does make the privilege all the better in every way.