Just a Fun Story...maybe a diversion.

Related to some other posts here, but off-topic for them...

I was used to getting on the last ride out on Friday night. I'd done it every Friday night for 3 years. Most times it was a crash program to get into my monkey suit for the flight (we all had to wear suits and ties then).

Every Sunday night I took the last flight to DEN, and every Friday I took the very last flight to DTW. Sometimes I'd do it twice a week, but for sure I'd do it once. I was based at DTW then (after 15 years of being based at DEN).

Nobody in their right mind wanted to go to Detroit on a Friday night, but I did. That was home (then, temporarily).

The flight was cancelled (happened many times at the old Stapleton Airport). I was heading back to my apartment in Aurora. Then there was the call on the paging system, calling my name. What??

As I walked back up to the gate podium, gave them my ID and my "ticket". They said..."You are free to board." When I got down the jetway to the aircraft the PIC greeted me at the door and said I was welcome to fly 'jump seat', but it would be much more comfortable in back. There was nearly no crew. The airplane was empty. The gate agent had sat me in seat "1A" (a seat I really detest). I chose "2B" (best seat on the airplane!)

I expected some crew, I expected some mechanics, but no...it was just me. I couldn't even believe it. Had a whole 737 to myself (and a couple FA's).

They had the full complement of hot meals for 1st. Filet mignon, asparagus, cheese sauce, rolls, wine...the whole bit. It was wonderful, and I shared it all with the crew.

You see, I learned that day that flights operated the exact same way they do with, or without, people on them. They fly the aircraft, and if the food goes in the garbage, or in a consumer...no matter, it's all good.

After that, I've spent many years flying on lonely, empty, aircraft. Gets me where I need to go always. I don't get "re-accommodated" on a commercial flight...I get "re-accommodated' on the next ride...and that might be a cargo flight to Minneapolis. (but hey, they have even better food, and all the seats are Business Class!). Though, most people couldn't stand a Cargo flight...because they don't avoid the weather. They just blow through it!

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Flyingclaydisk

I enjoyed your story, thank you.... and how unnerving to be on the cargo flights... ugh

A wicked story....(terrifying actually)....

In the late 90's and early 2000's I was flying between MSP and DTW on a daily basis. I was living on an airplane. I would show up for work at 6am and find tickets on my desk telling me to go to MSP on the 7am flight. Never missed a one.

The MSP to DTW run for NWA was done on an hourly basis. Millions of passengers flew between those two hubs every day on NWA (which is no longer).

By the time we got to the airport the weather was bad. Severe thunderstorms over Lake Michigan. We missed the first flight, but there were way too many NWA employees stuck in MSP. So, they added an old 74-200 which was due for a heavy "D" check (full disassembly). It was an old airplane. Really old. (I love old airplanes).

We got into it over the lake. We were getting slammed around like nothing I'd ever seen. The hail was HUGE.

Every single person on that airplane that night were NWA employees.

First approach we got waved off. Second approach, we didn't get waved off, bur aborted. Third approach, emergency declared. We flew out wide to the 17/35 and got a straight-in approach. Hit the ground harder than I ever thought an aircraft could, braked and stopped. ARFF was everywhere.

When I got off, the windscreen was completely smashed beyond recognition. You couldn't see it. The "composite" in the wing roots had been beaten off. The airframe was completely trashed.

That airplane left Detroit in pieces. It never flew again.

Yeah...I've been there!

We boarded onto a DC-9 that night (not an MD-80, but an original DC-9). I wasn't real happy about that because I never liked the DC-9. Skeery airplane. "They" said it was because of capacity. The pilots said..."SCREW THIS!!" (we were happy the pilots said that).

We got up out of "Minnie" and got out over the lake and started getting pounded. First it was severe turbulence, then it was hail. Climbed up out of the hail and got back into severe turbulence (not the kind of stuff any commercial passenger is exposed to...we're talking "SEVERE" here!). Went up to FL410 and it calmed out for a minute, but then we got into CAT.

Just brutalized. If you weren't belted in, you'd have been bounced off the ceiling and the floor 50 times! It was rough.

The storm moved as fast, or faster than we did, across the lake. Approach into DTW was even worse. We were getting seriously banged up! Hail sounded like rocks hitting the skin at 500 mph. It was crazy!

Not an experience I ever want to go through again!!