What Have Been Your Best And Worst Flights To Date?

Best

First flying lesson out of Barton and my first experience of a grass runway. Weather was fantastic (even though it was Friday 13th). 😀

Worst

Dan Air flight where we were scheduled for a stop for refueling, pilot decided against it and press on for Manchester. On arrival an emergency landing was announced as we had effectively no fuel remaining. I was only 11 and thought my time had already come. :rolleyes:

BEST
Difficult, but I’ll put three together.
On 39 in Egypt, the powers that be were concerned that the W—Sorry Egyptian Air Force would try sneak low levels attck on us. So some extra ground radar sets were installed and we had the job of flying low level set routes to calibrate them. The squadron was short of navs, as usual, and I was a confident low level nav (some would say over confident). The joy was we were allowed to fly as low as we liked and I did three, totalling 2.05 in one morning, each with a different pilot.
An instance springs to mind, one route crossed the Suez Cairo road and then straight over the Jebel Ataqa. We saw a big road tanker going along this road and I was sure I was looking straight into his windscreen. We then had to climb like mad to clear the Jebel, all the way up I could still see the ridge above the pilots head, but we just made it, to drop down a gulley on the other side.

WORST
Again difficult
On 152 at Whatashame the squadron took part in a BoB display. the task was simple, 12 aircraft formation take off in pairs, and “stream” landing. The object of a stream landing was to finish with all 12 aircraft, still in motion, on the runway at once.
I was flying with one of the keen young Fg Offs at No.2 to the CO, and he was determined to do his bit. Luckily this was only the rehearsal, on the day before the big event. Mr Keen kept too close turning finals when the boss was going as slow as he could to allow everyone to bunch up. Result we hit the slipstream whilst almost at touchdown. I watched the grass hurtling past the wingtip so close I couldn’t see it and really thought we’d had it. However a big handful of power and a jerk on the stick and we were bang on the runway. However that had put our speed up and we went sailing past the boss — BIG NO NO
Still he got it right next day and it all went well.

BEST- my first powered flight as a 13 year old Air Cadet, 15 minutes flying in Chipmunk WP840 from Hurn in June 1991. 😀

WORST- again as an Air Cadet but 2 years later, a 20 minute flight from Old Sarum as a front seat passenger in Tobago G-TOBA. The flight was OK but as it was a private plane there was no chance of taking control, I felt like a spare part for the whole flight although the views of Salisbury Cathedral from 1500ft up made up for that a bit. 🙁

http://www.airliners.net/photo/De-Havilland-DHC-1/0981792/&sid=f2bd0551ae2ceae28d19db6efeca7303

http://www.airliners.net/photo/Socata-TB-10-Tobago/0427639/&sid=722775cd933f8d878f827ed8b6700b58

Forgot to mention my “Top Gun” flights with the Ultimate High Guys 🙂 Steve Hicks and “Nitro” 2003 & 2004.:)

BEST – Heading into Goodwood ahead of the 2007 Revival meeting, in the Tipsy Trainer. Turning finals behind a Spitfire and Mustang, then having the Mew Gull G-AEXF on the wing tip as it lined up for a run-in and break.

WORST – Fuel vapourisation at the moment of take-off on the hottest day this year! Luckily there was plenty of room at White Waltham, but its a bl**dy long way to push the aeroplane back to the hangars!

Best – Venture glider flight out of Kinloss over the surrounding area just prior to sunset. View over the Moray Firth and Findhorn bay outstanding. U2’s With or Without you was in the charts, and the intro to that song was going through my head the whole time. Permanently cemented into memory now… halcyon days…

Worst mmmm, tie for that one – Landing on the vessel CSO Alliance in a crowded Super Puma with 16 other pax in it – and I was nowhere near a door or a window, when the helideck unexpectedly came up to meet us as the boat pitched, and the helicopter was coming down. I think 20 pairs of under wear needed changing that day (pax, crew and deck HLO!)

OR

Landing at Aberdeen Airport after a flight from London in an old BA 737-200 (that’s historic now, right??;) ) when upon a turbulent approach in severe crosswinds, the stbd wing dipped just before touchdown, and a one-wheel landing occured. As we hurtled down the runway, we were still going at some speed going past Bond Helicopters base .Being familiar with ABZ, I knew there wasn’t a lot of runway left for the speed we were doing… suffice to say we did stop in time, then on the taxi back the 1st officer came on the tannoy to explain that the captain was too busy to speak, but he’d like to apologise for the rough landing….

Was he too busy wiping his keks clean like the 80 or so passengers behind him?? heh heh heh! 😉

the only person to get Spitfire and Hurricane into the same post!:D

I’m jealous :p

Baz

😀 It’s called lucky 😉

Best – travelling to Ostend from Southend in a BAF Carvair (G-ASKN) in 1973. Although it was only a short flight, it left an impression on me, watching those big piston engines coming to life and taking in the sights and smells you only seem to get with old aircraft. The return flight in a Viscount was less memorable at the time, but compared to the Boeings and Airbusses I travel in these days it was wonderful.

Worst – flight back to Las Vegas from the Grand Canyon in a small Beech twin, afternoon flight. High temperatures and lots of ‘all you can eat’ buffet food meant that 5 out of the 6 passengers spent the flight filling bags. I somehow managed to hold mine in, despite having to hold 2 of my wifes used bags!

The Best:- Despite having many hours in Dakotas, Lancaster, Hawks, and more to boot (all as a “Flying Spanner” and worthy of a story sometime), my best flying experience was going solo in a Glider at Bicester in 2000. It was an 8 minute flight in worsening weather, but felt fabulously free of restriction. It was all over in a flash, but the feeling has helped prompt me to finally start flying lessons at Waddington this year…

…The Worst:- In a RAFAT Hawk at low level in Scotland with ZERO viz as it was ten tenths pea soup. After what seemed like an age twisting around in the valleys and only just being able to see the vague outline of the Glenns above us, we entered a complete grey mass of fog/cloud/mist and stayed there for more seconds than I was comfortable with before pulling up and zooming to 22,000 feet. At the top of the climb all I thought was “I’m hot and I feel sick”, before we descended into Scampton. Upon arrival, one of my colleagues said “Are you OK, your skin is green?!” It was and I managed to keep everything down. Yeugh.

C6

Certainly was along time ago. 🙂

Lets just say we tracked Comet Hale-Bopp! might be 96!

That would have been 1997.

Well as this is my 1st post here it’s pretty appropriate. Best flight was a P51 out of Chino California, the wife got it for my birthday! after 20 min’s of blasting around in the Chino foothills the pilot tells me he has to go off and do an air to air shoot with a P38 and he say’s do you want me to take you back to the airport 1st? or stay up to do the shoot, what a bloody silly question I say! so there I was 2 feet off the wing of a P38 in a mustang thinking it’s OK I can die now……………………

Worst flight LA to Oakland 737 apparently we touched down in the dirt at the head of the runway I thought my time really had come……..

Oh the P38 in the story above crashed at Duxford I understand after a low roll. Shame she was a beautiful airplane…………

Best ever flight was in a Spitfire.

Worst

Flying into the eye of a hurricane in 1995 .

the only person to get Spitfire and Hurricane into the same post!:D

I’m jealous :p

Baz

Difficult to choose…possibly my first 300km goal O/R in my std Libelle… Old Sarum/Halfpenny Green/OS,the day switched off at HG (cheshire gap effect ?) and I really never thought I would get home,scratched all the way down to Pewsey and then got the highest climb of the day from the only cloud left in the sky anywhere near enroute.Took the climb for every foot (wasnt going to fail then :D) and flew at vne all the way home and ‘beat up’ the club caravan :D:D

Worst…3yrs later landed the same glider with wheel retracted in front of prospective buyers :D.Cause – Type B ie forgot I didnt put wheel up on very short flight and when I did my downwind checks I put the damn thing up :o.
Or was it when I landed on a village cricket ground ?? LOL 😀

Best was Toronto to Calgary with a Canadian airline,can’t remember which,BUSINESS class, with the MOD paying.:cool:

Look, no one really minds you getting the perks, just don’t gloat

Two bad ones. RAF Andover from Northolt to BAOR in a howling gale.:eek:

There, serves you right

Best- Low level in a Yak11, tearing down the Essex coast at 50 feet

Worst- Tiger Moth, Abbeville to Headcorn, June 1997. Crashed on landing, hit a sheep, hurt my neck after undoing strap and falling out of inverted aeroplane. Insurance write-off.

All sorted out though, and aeroplane better than ever now.:)

Best:
March 2008 as a pax in a Chinook from LKG in Helmand to Kandahar then, after a mortar attack from Terry, (never heard any incoming though) getting on to the TriStar back to Blighty in time for my tourex on my 53rd birthday!

Worst:

I could count the flight out to Kandahar in November 2007 but it wasn’t bad really – I was just a little nervous (!)

Worst with me in charge:

Running out of runway at Bodmin in an old Cessna 150 (well it is a tiny grass field and the wind had dropped and the grass was wet and I didn’t select full flap when I should have and…. I learned about flying from that.) I just managed to stop with the prop touching the hedge. One of the resident instructors afterwards remarked something about people usually flying through the hedge!

We looked like a couple of snowmen sat in a deck chair
Baz

lol, excellent:D But tell me, what was your worst flight?!

Best was a (very) low level trip around Hamshire in a Puma with some confined space landings in woodland. Looking up to see the tops of electricity plylons as we flew alongside before hopping over them was quite a thrill.

The worst – circuit bashing in a Hercules, I forget how many sick bags I filled, and the Loadmaster was none too impressed when he sat on one!

Best: Getting my Gold and Diamond height gains in a Discus glider at Aboyne in 1998 23.000feet max -40C on oxygen climbing straight and level at 500 feet per minute smooth as a babies bum in mountain wave over Balmoral. It felt like a different world.:D

Worst: Coming back Menorca to Birmingham on a Monarch airliner at night listening to screaming kids for over two hours. I was so stressed I nearly had an accident on the M6 going home.:mad: