I was looking at it when I remembered being in an Allegheny Airlines BAC111 years ago when we hit a goose on one wing's leading edge on approach into TRI-CITIES. The BAC111 was well known to be underpowered and the thought of having impeded airflow over the wing was attention getting.
But the pilot merely announced he would be landing a little faster than normal and slicked it in without even a bump.
That stirred the ole memory pods up a bit.
The above is a French Caravelle. I think it was like the third or so commercial jetliner. I don't know how many airlines flew them, but United did for sure.
Back in the late 60's or maybe it was the early 70's, UAL flew them from Newark. The old Newark with low laying concrete terminals, no Jetways and questionable air conditioning.
During that time frame they had what they called "Smokers." Based on the old "Smoker Boxing Matches," "Men Only" nights at the club... in theory no women were allowed except for the flight attendants... I can't remember for sure but I "think" they passed out free cigars...on the flight which departed around 5PM to Chicago.
That thumping sound was the PC Police Person hitting the floor............
On one fine day I was strapped into a window seat in the first row... I think everything was single class... On take off a piece of plastic fell off the overhead and cut a very small gash in my forehead. The Flight Attendant gave me a cold compress and when we got to Chicago a Customer Service rep apologized and gave me a free ticket for a flight from/to any place in the continental US.
And I didn't even think about suing and United didn't engage two law firms in the matter.
My Lord how times have changed!
Doing business back then was a little different than now... I always stayed at a Holiday Inn not too far from the airport. I wouldn't say that the security was high, but they actually had guards on each floor. I asked one of the guys on the front desk if that had solved their problems and he said it had cut the TV's being stolen down to one or two a week...
Now days TV's are so cheap no self respecting thief would hoist one.. well, maybe a flat screen...
No comments:
Post a Comment