Most memorable flights

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digits_
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Most memorable flights

Post by digits_ »

After all the negativity caused by COVID, I thought it would be nice to have a topic in which people could list their personal top 3/5/10/99+ of their most memorable flights.

Bragging is encouraged!
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photofly
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Re: Most memorable flights

Post by photofly »

You start.
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digits_
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Re: Most memorable flights

Post by digits_ »

Sure. I'll start with my nr 9, just because my nr 10 is a bit of a sadder story.

This one isn't super exciting, but memorable for me.

Anyway. A few years ago, I got hired for my first Real Pilot Job. I was super happy, as one would imagine. It was right before the recent Big Pilot Shortage. Jobs were getting easier to find, but a certain amount of luck was still involved. I got hired at a small operator, who did pretty much everything you could, operating single pilot airplanes.

We had one floatplane in the company. Having only acquired my basic float rating, I was quite interested and eager to fly that plane whenever I could. After a few maintenance flights and sight seeing flights, we had a bit of a longer trip coming up. Fly 2 hours to the lake, hop around a cluster of lakes for a few hours, and fly back home. Sounded like fun.

Before I left, the customer called me and told me, in the interest of saving time, he would just meet the plane with his boat, wherever I landed. I load up the plane with some jerry cans and took off. I show up almost right on time and fly over the lake. There was no boat on the lake. Damn. I started wondering if I was at the correct lake, if I was lake, if I was just going blind... While I was contemplating my next move, I saw some waves in the lake, and behold, a little boat appeared. I plunked the plane down in the area of the boat, and finally got to meet our new customer.

He hands me a few bags of water with little fishies in them. Supposedly a few hundred thousand fishies per bag. Cool. He sends a colleague with me and we visit the lakes. Landing that little float plane in quite a strong wind, and getting exactly where they wanted me to go, was pretty challenging at the time. After a few hops, the plane needed to refuel. We tied the plane to the boat while I climbed on the wing. While I was sitting there, waiting for the fuel to drip through my filter, I took in the scenery for the first time. It was gorgeous. The kind of view that you'd see on pictures in flying schools and flying trip brochures. Realizing at that moment that I was actually getting paid, albeit not much, created a fond memory.

I finished the trip uneventfully, and headed back home. And while I didn't stay in the float world, I did manage to get quite a few more trips on that plane. And without exception, they were all wonderful or exciting trips.
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As an AvCanada discussion grows longer:
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-one will be accused of using bad airmanship
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RedAndWhiteBaron
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Re: Most memorable flights

Post by RedAndWhiteBaron »

My most memorable flight...

Aviation was not yet a twinkle in my eye, but I understood the very basics of flight. I was flying from Toronto to Amsterdam to visit family, on a Martinair DC10, sometime I would hazard in the mid 80s.

Somewhere around the halfway point, the flight crew became preoccupied with the front port door. Attendants started regularly checking and wiggling that door. I remember seeing ice inside the plane around the door. It got to the point where even my mother confided in me, as a ten year old, "something isn't right". Eventually we made a very low pass over the Scottish Highlands and landed safely at Amsterdam.

Several months later, my mother received a letter from Martinair, informing her that after that flight, that plane was declared unsafe to fly, and never flew again. I later learned it was sold to the Dutch air force.

Yeah, that was a scary flight.
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montado
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Re: Most memorable flights

Post by montado »

My first flight on an airplane was aboard a NWA NB heading out to the west coast from Toronto. I remember things so vividly it’s strange. At one point I had just gotten back from the lavatory, sat down and a flight attendant was passing through the cabin. She stopped at my seat, leaned in, smiled, and said “is everything okay?”. At that moment, my 11 year old self was certain she had been watching me on camera while I took a pee.

Since then I have definitely had what you would think as more memorable flights, like taking family up in gliders and 172’s, or ending up in situations you would not want to experience again. But something about the very first time flying, on a routine flight, etched a memory as deep as any.
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