I think commercial aviation is ultrasafe. Given the number of passengers we deliver safely to their destinations each day, and the relatively low risk associated with flying, our record so far is commendable. But airline companies must remain diligent, especially in the face of all the economic cutbacks plaguing the industry, or our good record could be compromised.
One of the books I had with me on that trip was
As I sat in my middle seat on the way to Charlotte, I found myself reading and taking notes for my consulting business. I don’t recall trading too many words with the passengers on either side of me.
When I’m a passenger in the back of a plane, though I’m reading or trying to nap or worrying about the shuttered Jiffy Lube, I still have a general awareness of how the flight is going and what the pilots are doing. I can feel the movements of the airplane. Most of my fellow passengers are engaged with their own books or are tapping away on their laptops, and they don’t realize subtle things. But even when I’m not trying, I can tell when the plane is climbing or descending, or when the pilots are changing the flap setting or the engine thrust. For pilots, that general awareness comes with the territory.
The flight I was on had left San Francisco at 7:30 A.M. Pacific time, and arrived in Charlotte at 3:15 P.M. Eastern time. I got something to eat at the airport in Charlotte and then made my way to the gate for my first piloted flight of the four-day trip. I’d be going right back to San Francisco, flying an Airbus A321, carrying about 180 passengers.
Once I got to the gate, I smiled at some of the passengers and greeted the three flight attendants—Sheila Dail, Donna Dent, and Doreen Welsh. I had flown with Sheila and Donna before. I’m guessing I had shared trips with Doreen, too, some years ago, when we were both based in Pittsburgh. Because US Airways hasn’t hired new flight attendants in years, all our crews are veterans. Doreen, now fifty-eight, joined the company in 1970 when it was Allegheny Airlines. That’s thirty-eight years of experience. Both Sheila, fifty-seven, and Donna, fifty-one, have more than twenty-six years with the airline.
At the gate, I also shook hands with Jeff Skiles, the first officer who’d be flying with me. He and I had never met before, so we introduced ourselves. Along with Sheila, Donna, and Doreen, we’d be a team for the next four days.
Despite all my years as a pilot, it’s common for me to have a first officer or flight attendants I’ve never met. Even after some serious downsizing, US Airways still has about 5,000 pilots and 6,600 flight attendants. It’s impossible to know them all.
It is standard at our airline for a crew to have a brief meeting together at the start of a trip. It’s vital to make individuals feel like a team quickly so that they can work almost as well together on the first flight as they naturally would after having flown several flights together. So before the passengers boarded we stood—Jeff, Sheila, Donna, Doreen, and I—in the aisle of the empty first-class cabin for a couple minutes, and I said a few words.
As the captain, it’s up to me to set the tone. I want to be approachable. I asked the flight attendants to be my eyes and ears during the days ahead, to tell me about anything important that I couldn’t observe from the cockpit. I asked them to let me know what they needed to do their jobs—catering, cleaning, whatever—and told them I’d try to help. I wanted them to know I was looking out for them. “I can’t get you your retirement plans back, but I can do a few things that will make your quality of life better. One of them is, when we arrive at our destination on the last flight of a day, I’ll call the hotel and make sure that they’ve sent the van so we’re not waiting for twenty minutes.”
Jeff, forty-nine years old, was very friendly from the moment we said hello, and in the days to follow I’d learn more about him. Like me, he had earned his private pilot license at sixteen. But he came from an aviation family; both his parents were also pilots. He had worked for US Airways for twenty-three years, with twenty thousand flight hours, and had risen to be a captain. But due to cutbacks in flights and planes, and the effect on the pilots’ seniority list, he was now flying as a first officer. I have twenty-nine years under my belt, so these days, I’m among the most senior of pilots at my airline.
Jeff had been flying the Boeing 737 for eight years, and had just completed training to fly the Airbus. These seven flights over four days with me actually would be his first trip on the Airbus without an instructor. As Jeff put it, “It’s my first trip without training wheels.”
When I meet other pilots, I don’t try to pigeonhole them. I figure I’ll learn about them and their flying style in the cockpit. There’s no need to rush to judgment. Still, my first impressions of Jeff were good ones.
From our initial moments together in the cockpit, for that flight to San Francisco, I found him to be conscientious and very well versed in everything about the Airbus. If he hadn’t told me this was his first trip since being trained, I wouldn’t have known.
Once pilots push back from the gate, and until we are above ten thousand feet in the air, cockpit crews aren’t allowed to talk to each other about anything except the details of the flight. But after we were well on our way to San Francisco, Jeff and I were able to learn about each other. He told me he had three children, seventeen, fifteen, and twelve, and so we talked about our kids for a bit.
Somewhere over the snow-covered Rocky Mountains, I thought about that thrill I often get when I’m in the air, just taking in the majesty below, and the stars and planets around me, and appreciating all of it. It feels like we’re floating through an invisible ocean of air, dotted with stars.
There’s a poem I love, “Sea Fever,” by John Masefield, which includes the line: “All I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by.” I often think of that line when I see the planet Venus in the southwest corner of the sky as I head to the West Coast at certain times of the year. If I’m ever unable to access the global positioning system or use the compass in the cockpit, I know I’ll be OK. I could just keep Venus in the left front corner of the windshield and we would reach California.
I mentioned to Jeff that I wished I could have my daughters take a flight with me in the cockpit of a commercial airliner, to see the pilot’s-eye view of such scenes. In long-ago eras of aviation, that would have been possible. But in the wake of September 11, of course, restrictions on cockpit access were only increased. My girls will never see the skies through my eyes.
We also talked about our side jobs. Like a lot of pilots, Jeff also sees the need to supplement his income. He lives in Madison, Wisconsin, and has a business as a general contractor, building new homes.
Jeff said he’d Googled me before the trip because he was looking for my e-mail address. He wanted to share some scheduling information with me. Before the landing in the Hudson, of course, there wasn’t much about me on the Internet. So the first thing he came upon was the Web site for my consulting business.
“I read all about your company,” he said, and then he just grinned. “Man, I thought I was a good bullshitter, but you take the cake!”
I was intrigued that he had Googled me—I don’t ever recall flying with another pilot who had—and I was also amused by how direct he was. “I consider myself a connoisseur of bullshit,” he told me, “and you make that company of yours sound like it’s this big operation. But then I read it more closely and I realized it’s just you. You’re the company. Good for you! I admire people who can take an acorn, and with a little bit of bullshit, make it into an oak.”
I know my business isn’t a Fortune 500 empire, but I’d argue a bit with his characterization. I really am passionate about safety issues, and about what the airline industry can teach the world. I’m proud of my work, and told Jeff that. Still, I got a kick out of his straight-shooting style. We had a good laugh about my fledgling consulting operation as we made our way to San Francisco.
Jeff was at the controls for a lot of the trip, and I was impressed by the ease with which he was handling things. We were aware, of course, that because he had fewer than a hundred hours on the Airbus, there were restrictions we had to follow. He couldn’t land or take off where runways might be contaminated by snow or ice. And certain airports—because of high terrain or complicated takeoff or landing procedures—were off-limits to him. San Francisco was one of these airports, so I needed to land the plane there.
When we finally touched down on the runway at 8:35 P.M., I was back exactly where I’d started at seven- thirty that morning. But the good news was there were no flight delays; it was still early enough. There was time for me to get to my car in the airport parking lot, and drive fifty minutes northeast to Danville, so I could spend the
