11 years ago my wife and I were flying from Detroit to Miami. It was a snowy icy day and they had to de-ice the plane before take off. As we were taking off the plane started to lift then slammed back down on the runway. The alarms were going off and people were panicing. The little old lady beside me had her nails dug into my arm and the very feminine male stewardess was yelling "thtay in theats and keep your head down!!! thtay in your theats and keep your head down"
All I could think of was the plane 20 years earlier than that which took off from detroit and hit the bridge on I-94 and no one survived. Anyways we went off the end of the runway and finally came to a stop and people were popping the emergency exits and smoke came billowing into the plane (later figured out it was from the brakes) and of course the exit closest to me was another little old lady who couldn't get it open. We finally got out, slid down the slide from the wing into about a 4' deep rut the wheels had made and were standing in a snow storm in the middle of a feild far from the terminal dressed for florida
They sent busses for us and took us to the VIP lounge and had us fill out paperwork describing what we remembered happened. I remember the security gard handing out the papers telling everyone "your pilot did a great job of recovering that plane". They shut down the airport so the FAA could investigate and about 2 or 3 hours later they they had our new plane ready so we walked out of the lounge to about 10 reporters from the news asking about what had happened (I talked to one reporter and after I got back I was talking to one of my friends and he was telling me " I was in my kitchen making breakfast with the news on and all the sudden I hear old man h in my living room")
The half of the people that were left got on the flight. The other half decided to drive or just went home saying I will never fly again. When we took off this time it was dead silent until we leveled off. When we landed it was dead silent until we were taxiing then everybody cheered. They had the VIP treatment waiting for us in Miami including vouchers for a round trip any where in the US.
A couple months later I was watching the news and they said it was pilot error that caused it. They had the elevators set too high and when we took off it was at such a steep angle the tail hit the ground slamming us back onto the ground.
I have flown round trip twice since then and my anxiety is through the roof every time. I'm sure they have to replace the seat I sat in from my a$$hole biting holes in it the whole time.
Re: Fear Of Flying
Member #: 33904
Registered: 10/18/2004
Posted:
163
Name:
Dave H
Occupation:
Design,Sweep,Splice,Lineman
Location:
Michigan
Experience:
~38 years
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