Ditched in the river.

I was on a plane once that took off in London and made it all the way to Denver without incident - what a miracle!

I was traveling to Kirksville, MO to the main campus of the school where I work a few years ago, and I decided to try and take the little puddle-jumper flight from KC to the Kirksville Airport and Feed Store.

In KC I got my ticket for the small plane and boarded with the other 10 passengers - and we filled the plane up.

The flight was about an hour, all-told. We took off and got about 20 minutes from landing in K-Ville when the pilot gets on the little PA system and tells us that due to an oil leak in one of the engines, they would be returning to KC. (No repair facilities or airplane mechanics in K-Ville, apparently.)

We got back to KC and I was trying to line up another flight. It was proving to be very difficult - because there are only so many puddle-jumpers to go around I guess - so I took a refund on my ticket, rented a car and drove there instead.

About a year later, one of those little planes flying the KC - K-Ville run went down and killed everyone on board - quite a few of whom were employees and their family members of the school I work for. Very, very sad.

I *always* drive from KC now.

Flying into Ruby-Patrick Seeds Memorial runway at Kansas City Municipal in the 1970's. The plane was zig-zagging through nighttime clouds. Finally emerged from the cloud cover, could see the runway--then the pilot goosed it and went back up. Apparently he wasn't lined up properly with the runway when he popped out.
The pilot came on the intercom and said (approximately) "Well, we wern't lined up real well there. There are a couple more planes in the pattern somewhere ahead of us, and if they make it we'll take another shot at it." Meanwhile I was getting more and more airsick, but I was sitting next to a pretty woman and didn't want to lose it in her presence. The pilot got it down just in time, and the girl was met by her boyfriend.

(the elevator for the seed company was higher than the runway)

I was flying with my family for a vacation in Hawaii in 1968. PanAm Boeing 707, the biggest passenger plane at the time I think. Partway through the movie, somewhere over the Pacific, various staff people began moving about the cabin quite a lot. As soon as the movie ended (I no longer remember what it was) the captain came on and told us that there was some sort of malfunction and, since they were not sure what exactly was the problem, they had to take it seriously. To be safe, we would be landing at Hilo airport on the big island, instead of going all the way to Honolulu. Then they went through the explanations of how it would work. We would land at the airport and stop out away from everything else. We would evacuate the plane using the inflatable slides and leaving everything behind, including our shoes. For that last point, they simply came through the cabin, taking our shoes away.

Now, as it happens, my older brother was sitting with my father. Larry was what they call "spastic, quadriplegic" - which means he couldn't control the motions of his limbs much. And during the flight, he had rubbed a raw place on his foot, which meant he needed to keep his shoe on. So they put some sock things over the shoes. It also meant he couldn't get up and walk to the exits like everyone else; Dad would have to carry him. To keep from slowing the other passengers down, Dad and Larry would go last, with only the last of the crew after them.

We landed. I kept looking out the window as we approached and seeing the water coming closer and closer then, finally, when I though we couldn't get much lower, there was the tarmac. We rolled to a stop almost immediately, surrounded by fire trucks and ground crew in asbestos fire suits. They popped the exits and inflated the slides and we all headed out. If you've never done that, you get to the top and they give you a little push so you can't help but jump out and slide down. At the bottom they have a couple of crew to grab your hands and pull you out of the way of the next passenger. I got to the bottom in my stockings and turned around just in time to see Dad and Larry sliding down the slide. Dad had thrown Larry over his shoulder and grabbed him around the legs. Larry was so tense that he was ramrod straight, up above Dad's shoulder. They directed us all to shuttle busses and took us to the terminal.

We all wandered around the terminal for a long time, it seemed, while they took care of the plane. Apparently the problem had been a faulty sensor, but they couldn't have told that from the cockpit. It kept telling them that an engine was on fire. They would speed up and it would appear to go out, then they would slow down and it would appear to start up again. That's why they had the fire trucks, etc. But there was no fire so, eventually, when they were sure it was safe, they let us back on the plane to reclaim the belongings we had left at our seats, and gave us our shoes back. Then they put us on other planes, from the local "Hawaiian Airlines" for the hop to Honolulu. It seemed ironic to me that all the publicity stuff for the airline - napkins, barf bags, safety instructions, etc. - included under the name of the airline the tag line: "Holder of the world safety record."

When we read the stories in the papers the next day, we found out that we had emptied a completely full 707 in 72 seconds flat, crew and all.

William Shatner does Twilight Zone

combined with consummate flying skills and insight into aircraft disasters (the pilot is also an air accident investigator) results in "all OK." Except the plane. Maybe someone will turn it into a restaurant or a hotel or bordello or something else useful.

A very cold day means the air is denser than usual and therefore allows the wings to provide extra lift, even at slow speed.

The av gas in the wing tanks is less dense than water. The tanks were holding a significant amount of fuel, enough to get to NC and then some as is common practice. This buoyancy was critical; time critical.

The river was right there, man. And there was neither sufficient altitude or airspeed to make the closest runway.

Hundreds of witnesses and 911 calls which resulted in the immediate notification of rescue personnel as well as many skippers of boats in the area, resulting in assistance on the scene within minutes.

Passengers who reacted intelligently and purposefully, and the stews must have been professional and insistent. I hear they all got out in ninety seconds.

But mostly the pilot who pulled off a way to get an airplane out of the air that is very difficult and frequently unsuccessful.

All hail human talent and resource which were in attendance throughout the episode and did indeed carry the day!

*Why didn't the maximum creator of the whole shebang not simply delay the departure of either the plane or the flock of geese for, say, fifteen seconds? Given that he is reputed to have such ability and he chose not to, would one then conclude that his failure qualifies as a "miracle?" I have the slightly sick feeling that if the plane had crashed, and if a single person was plucked alive from the wreakage, the claims of "Dog did a miracle right there!" would be cacophonous.*

I have a good story, but it would take a while to tell it well. So here's the short version:

I was flying over the Sierra Nevada mountain range in a single-engine Cessna with a guy who was a military pilot and a bit of a risk-taker (and the brother of a friend). We got low on fuel. Way low. And it was getting dark. We finally started looking for the closest place to land, but couldn't get a radio contact because we were in the mountains. We discovered the distant light we thought was a small airport was instead a military reserve and weapons testing range. When we saw tracer fire in the sky ahead of us, we both went "Oh shit!" and he turned hastily away. The needles of both tanks were totally over on the Empty side, although one of them was still quivering a little, when my pilot finally decided to go for altitude so he could pick up a control tower on the coast. We got up to about 15,000 feet, made radio contact, and someone gave us a vector to the nearest airport with fuel. We landed on fumes. Filled up. Lived. A year or so later, he died in a helicopter crash with several other soldiers. He was the pilot.

"We had a miracle on 34th Street"?! Really? Does Gov. Patterson know that was just a movie?

I was flying back to Germany, and being all weepy and emo because of the girl I was leaving behind. I finally calmed down enough to sleep, and woke up to everyone in the cheap-seats applauding, and a few of them even whooping. I didn't know what was going on, but when I looked out the window there was about 8 inches of snow on the runway. Maybe that had something to do with it.

Rob Miles
--
There are only 10 types of people in the world;
those who understand binary and those who don't.

... in a thunderstorm in a Boeing 737. I and 15 passengers and the crew were battered about like it was a paper plane; we got hit by lightning at least once (I was too scared to look out the window). I thought to myself that I was going to die like this, when the pilot came on and in the calmest voice I ever heard noted that we were experiencing a bit of turbulence but we'd be landing in a few minutes. I think he did a great job of acting.

The storm cleared as soon as we were taxiing to the terminals. Of course.