Airplane Emergency
We were several thousand feet above the Strait of Georgia when trouble hit.It's funny. I was composing a blog in my head during the flight, because it was too bumpy to read. But it wasn't going to this one.
I fly a lot for work, mostly in Twin Otter floatplanes to Vancouver and back. I was thinking the flights were a metaphor for marriage: fabulously exotic at first, then routine and comfortable. But if you look for it or if something out of the ordinary happens, you realize that flying amongst the mountains and islands is pretty magical.
Anyway, smoke wafting from the instrument panel put an end to that line of thought. I was sitting right behind the pilot and co-pilot, alone in the first row. I was hoping that no one behind me could see the smoke. I didn't want them to worry unnecessarily. Turns out they could all see it.
The flight crew were pretty calm. Actually, they always have a really laid back, but professional air about them. But I could see that they were trying to figure out what was up.
The smoke abated. I decided it must have been condensation in the heaters. And the sun was sparkling off the water. It was breathtakingly beautiful, especially after the freezing rain and turbulence we'd just flown out of.
The crew were still watching the gauges pretty closely, though. I don't know much about flying, but I can read as well as anyone. And several gauges had gone from green to yellow.
Just as we hit Active Pass, things got scary. The smoke started again. We flew into more rain, with slushy ice building up on the edges of the windscreen. It was bumpy and you could hear the wind howling outside, which you can't normally. The co-pilot throttled back on the port engine and it slowed then stopped. It was such a sinking feeling.
Worse was the whine from the other engine as they went to full throttle. I couldn't help wondering how long it could run on full. I hoped it had to be hours and we only needed 20 minutes.
You feel so exposed when something goes wrong in a plane. I kept thinking about World War II aircrews, flying without the safety regimes and emergency crews and GPS and advanced weather forecasting and radar. I especially thought of the guys who had trained in this very area, many of whom died in planes that hit mountainsides during nighttime missions or storms.
The last time I was in an incident on one of the planes (last week, believe it or not), it was over before it began. We aborted take off after being airborne for about two feet.
This was different... we had lots of time to worry.
to be continued...
posted by Heather and Dan @ 7:05 AM
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