Repost.
I could see the city of Winnipeg from Tamara’s window and so I knew we were about to begin our adventure in earnest. No more practicing the positioning for a rough landing, we were close to the real deal. I’m not sure why, but I was calm. I wasn’t experiencing any tendency toward panic or even anxiety. It was kind of surreal so maybe with all the pre-landing activity I still wasn’t grasping the gravity of the situation.
Actually, I understood the gravity portion of things very well. We were currently defying the actions of gravity with thrust and lift and we were about to make certain that option was no longer available by dumping our thrust providing fuel over a canola field in Eastern Manitoba. For some reason the flight crew felt it was necessary to inform the passengers that the jettisoned fuel would dissipate from altitude and wouldn’t cause an environmental problem on the ground. I had a mental image of some Steinbach farmer standing outside his tractor lighting up a smoke as a cloud of aviation fuel rained down on him. I thought the image was amusing and so I shared it with Tamara. I think she was a bit surprised at where my mind had wandered but she laughed. I told her that we might as well dump the lavatories too so that same farmer would be surrounded by the heat and smell of biblical hell. The image of flaming turds and urine falling from the heavens seemed irreverently biblical to me, but probably not so much to the guy across from us that was mumbling while he handled his crucifix.
I was fine with the quietly praying guy. He was quiet as I mentioned and so there wasn’t any need to tell him to shut the fuck up. Also, because he kept his superstitions to himself I didn’t feel the need to point out to him that God didn’t have a very good record at saving people in plane crashes. Just sayin, but I was reasonably certain that people prayed prior to every plane crash that has ever occurred but still had pieces of their former selves identified with DNA testing. The intensity of their prayer didn’t appear to make much difference to rapid descent and the ground so I wasn’t counting on God for any help.
I’m not sure if I was imagining it, but I was certain that the plane gained altitude when we spewed our options for flying anywhere else onto Mennonite lands. For a split second I was sure we experienced a little bit of weightlessness. The same kind of feeling Allied bomb crews might have experienced when they dropped bombs onto the relatives of the Steinbach Mennonites about sixty years earlier in Dresden or Berlin.
Prior to dumping the fuel we climbed aggressively. Then after the shedding of flammable weight we banked sharply and headed toward the Winnipeg airport. At that point Tamara turned to me and started to cry. I didn’t even get mad at her. Later, when I was telling my wife the story she remarked that I would have gotten angry at her for crying. She said I would have remarked to her that crying wasn’t helping the situation so get a fucking grip. I reluctantly had to admit she was probably right but we’re generally nicer to strangers. Funny how that works.
Anyway, Tamara looked at me through tear filled eyes and wondered aloud if she was going to get off the plane. She was worried that she might hit her head and get knocked out or just pass out from fear and excitement. She worried about not being big enough to fight her way off the plane assuming we survived the initial impact.
Tamara had a right to be concerned. Statistics from plane crashes indicate clearly that the odds for survival are best for males. Fully grown, non-crippled males capable of knocking down or climbing over the less genetically blessed. Sad but true.
I told Tamara that one way or another I was getting off this fucking plane. I further assured her that she was getting off before me and I didn’t care if I had to carry her or drag her through or over people. I also told her that we were going to her brother’s exit and that my brief meeting with him suggested to me that he wasn’t going anywhere until his sister was out the door.
I think that helped because she stopped crying. Right about then Jeremy rushed by us and stowed a cabin dividing curtain in the seat behind Tamara and I. I stopped him for a moment and asked if the curtain was real leather. Jeremy looked at me like I was on fucking drugs and didn’t answer. Tamara was however puzzled enough to wonder why I would ask Jeremy the question. I told her that if the plane caught fire that I suspected real leather would provide a shield for us as we crawled along the floor toward her brother. She thought about it for a second and then leaned across me so she could touch the curtain. Tamara thought it was leather and so we agreed that it would be our shield from flames if needed. Then I asked Tamara how many seats we needed to pass before we got to an exit. I had already counted the fuckers preparing for the need to touch the seats if the in an event of an emergency floor lights didn’t function. Tamara and I counted together. Nine, We needed to pass nine rows of seats.
I have to admit that I also made judgements regarding the passengers nearer to the doors. I looked for cripples, fat people and children. I looked for members of the human race that had probability of slowing down an evacuation process. Tamara joined me in the assessment of our fellow passengers and together we determined that everyone looked surprisingly capable.
Then we started our descent for the fly by.
I have to say that a low altitude, low speed fly by in a jet was the coolest thing I have ever done in an airplane. I’m guessing we were only a couple hundred feet off the tarmac and with full thrust and full throttle the physical sensations of noise and vibration were awesome. I’m not sure everyone felt that way though. In fact, as I looked around the cabin I noticed that most of the passengers were frozen into their emergency positions. Not Tamara and I though. She had the window seat and I mentioned to her that there was a high likelihood that emergency channels were being monitored and that film crews might be in the observation area of the airport. I suggested that she might even make the news if her face was pressed against her window. She looked at me and then reached into the seat pouch in front of her and produced her glasses. Then she turned to me and said, “do I look better with or without the glasses.” We both started to laugh at the absurdity of the thought. We got a couple of odd looks from people that perhaps thought our situation was bereft of humor.
Fuck them. Humor is everywhere. You just have to look for it sometimes.
I had speculated with Tamara that if we had tires to land on that once that was determined then our landing should be quick. My best guess was that if we were being diverted that a turn wasn’t in the cards and we would be leaving Winnipeg airspace in a gradual ascent.
So, when the plane abandoned the fly by and climbed sharply I was relieved. Then Jeremy started to yell at people to assume the position and I was more relieved because it was now obvious we were going to land in Winnipeg.
That meant we had at least one tire on each side of the landing gear. I shared this with Tamara as we assumed our impact positions. They gave passengers an option for the position. You could put your hands on the seat top in front of you or into the seatback. Depends on how tall you are I guess. Tamara was shorter than me and so in the practice sessions she had chosen to not put her hands on the top of the seat. But as Jeremy yelled and the plane turned she reached over and made sure her hand was on top of mine. I think she was reminding me that she was there and I had made promises.
The bank back to the runway was the second coolest thing I’ve ever done in a jet. It felt like we were completely turned on our side and Tamara’s window was looking straight down at the ground. I also felt some G force as the pilot turned the plane 180 degrees. I never lost sight of the fencing at the edge of the runways and Winnipeg isn’t that large an airport so the turn was sharp.
As we neared the ground I ignored Jeremy and his head down routine. I apologise to Air Canada and my fellow passengers for not listening but I wanted to see what was happening and I couldn’t come up with how I might be putting others at risk with a little curiosity.
So, I witnessed the emergency vehicles that were roaring down both adjacent runways to ours. I noticed that when we did touch the ground that we left them so quickly that they seemed parked. The landing was smooth and uneventful. Apparently one tire is enough. We didn’t use our brakes at all and so we coasted for what seemed like a couple of minutes. By the time we got stopped we were surrounded by fire and other emergency vehicles.
Then we just sat there. I assume that someone outside inspected the landing gear and communicated that information to the pilot because the co-pilot came on and told everyone we were good to taxi to the gate. Tamara and I shared a high five and a hug and it was over.
No one from Air Canada met us at the gate. The only people that seemed interested were reporters who were in fact in the observation area as I’d assumed. I’m guessing a part of them was disappointed the footage wasn’t better.
I was glad to be getting in my car. Other people were having to connect to other flights. Still, the way I figure it, the odds for that type of thing happening to a person twice are infinitesimal. It sort of makes me bullet proof flying wise.