News, Southwest pilot to passengers: 'We're going down'

[MJ7]

"Last month, Southwest fired a veteran pilot whose nosedive landing at New York's LaGuardia Airport in July injured 16 people. According to the National Transportation Safety Board, the pilot took control from the first officer just before the Boeing 737 hit the runway."

Southwest pilot to passengers: 'We're going down'

seems as though they might consider firing the pilot...

not sure if there has been more airline crashes or accidents lately or its just me paying more attention to it, but i have to rethink flying. i know thousands of flights take off and land daily and all is safe and sound, but it sucks that one single bird could end the lives of hundreds. comparing cars to airplanes is not a very good estimate, why? because cars do not carry hundreds of people, and there are way more cars traveling per day then there are airplanes. a good comparison would be buses to airplanes...

furthermore, when was the last time you traveled at 500mph in a car?

its simple, yes airliners are safe...but tell that to the people that have been killed on them.

[Retroit]

And cars are more dangerous than sofas, so why should I risk my life driving somewhere when I could sit and watch TV for the rest of my life?

(Sorry, couldn't resist a little sarcasm.)

[Sherifftruman]

They fired the LGA pilot because he just about wrecked the aircraft with carelessness.

I assume the "we're going down" pilot (or co-pilot) keyed the mic at the wrong time, picking up part of them telling air traffic control that we're going down to flight level (whatever). I assume the person in the article that called the TV station a couple of days later thought maybe there was a way to get more than the $200 voucher the airline already gave them and everyone else on board for the trouble caused by a flight that still ended at the destination, on time, just descending from the cruise altitude earlier than expected.

My wife was on a flight, leaving LGA actually, a few years ago, where they also had a malfunction of the pressurization system. They had to turn around and land after about 5 minutes when you could start to smell smoke in the cabin (though nothing you could see she said)and the pilot just turned around without saying anything to anyone. They just made a big old turn and then she could see the city again. They got nothing from the airline, except a new plane after about only 45 minutes and they thought they were pretty lucky not to have to stay overnight.

[flynavyj]

Originally Posted by Sherifftruman

My wife was on a flight, leaving LGA actually, a few years ago, where they also had a malfunction of the pressurization system. They had to turn around and land after about 5 minutes ...

Had to do the same thing a few years back leaving out of Jacksonville one evening. Wasn't smoke for us, but a failure of the electrical system and a couple generators, batteries started draining and I decided (after reading the Quick Reference Handbook) that returning to the departure airfield was better than going on. During the descent into Jacksonville, all the electrical systems went back to normal, we landed w/o incident...and after maintenance looked at the airplane we departed for home again...but this time, all the passengers had to stay in KJAX, since we were ferrying the airplane back to it's maintenance hub.

I don't think anyone was REALLY mad though, they all received a travel voucher and I got lots of "Thanks for getting us back on the ground safely" praise from the departing passengers. Turned out to be a win win, unless they wanted to get to the destination on THAT night.