The Quiet Man

Once you see the field, you don't look down at your instruments- The first officer gives you the airspeed, sets the flaps and lowers the gear.

SultanOfSwing

Unless the first officer is flying the landing

The Quiet Man

One time I was just getting off the ground at O'hare and a large flock of geese came under the starboard side of the aircraft and all the bells an whistles went off- We lost an engine...There are two big red lights telling you which engine is out and the procedure is to verify which engine is out and pull all the power off that engine because when its spinning it's always trying to restart and with all the fuel pouring into it, it could blow up..So my first officer just assumed its the starboard engine out since we saw the geese on that side of the aircraft and she pulled the throttle back on it..While what really happened was that the geese came under the aircraft and took out the port engine, so she pulled the power on the only engine keeping the plane airborne. I felt the aircraft lurch, yelled wrong engine and I fire walled the throttles as fast as I could ....We were mushing in as we went over Irving Park road..We were 10 feet above the street lights and I remember we were lower than the Howard Johnsons that was off to the port side on manhiem road... I came around landed the plane safely and I chewed her beautiful ass out, but never told the company.

later that same day in new equipment, when she landed in Billings they told her to get off on the high speed taxiway and she blew right by it...

My point is, sometimes you have a bad day, maybe it was that time of the month for her, I don't know, but if nobody dies, its all good.

markonline1

How long ago was this? I accept things are different in the US than the UK, but in the UK every bird strike (and every suspected bird strike) has to be reported to the CAA. I can't imagine it's too much different here. More importantly, what bloomin airline were you flying for where something like that could happen yet you didn't make any sort of mention of it??

The Quiet Man

Mmmmmmm 93?

She was crying and I reached up an erased the tape- You could do that back then..It wasn't investigated or anything- We each wrote it up and got right back in another plane..I still get Christmas cards from her

markonline1

I am literally sat here shaking my head in disbelief. Then again, 93, half of my old unit were driving round the airfield pissed, so I guess I shouldn't be too surprised

The Quiet Man

It's a commercial flight, its not the space shuttle.. Its very mundain and there's a hundred ways to make an approach

The Quiet Man

Even in the early 90's we went into small places where we called the ticket agent and he looked out the window and said "it looks clear to me"...

SultanOfSwing

What kind of airliner were you flying?

SultanOfSwing

Yeah, thought as much ...

civilservant

The Quiet Man

I'm type rated in a dozen aircraft and hauled mail and frieght on weekends during the 80's, 90's..

civilservant

So... what were you flying during this alleged bridstrike/engineflameout/neardeathexperiance?

The Quiet Man

"alleged"? I don't want to talk about me or my life story...

737-100

civilservant

You already did!

Since you have no proof, and we don't really believe you, I think alleged is a perfectly reasonable word to use.