Those thunderstorms eventually got the upper hand and our confidence in our machines and our skills was shattered in an instant. Lessons always seem to come when we really think we’ve got it all dialed in. That’s when we have to be reminded that when we fly we are guests in another element and we must respect that.
On August 2, 1985 we got a very large reminder from another Flight 191, this one flown by Delta Air Lines coming in for a landing at DFW Airport. Another hot summer afternoon with those afternoon thundershowers that we were so used to at DFW, just work around them per usual. The flight that landed right in front of flight 191 was a Learjet, just to put things in perspective. It got a little wet and experienced some turbulence, but nothing worth noting. Certainly nothing worth passing along to the giant L-1011 lumbering in behind him, next in line to land.
Flight 191, the Delta L-1011 started vectoring around the showers, changing course a bit due to some wind shifts and rain, but getting a good path in. They were in contact with the tower, giving feedback on the conditions and it was a go for landing. Their gear was down, speed slowed and then the first officer noticed lightning out of a nearby cloud. As the crew tried to confirm, it hit. An other-worldly combination of headwinds, tailwinds, updrafts and downdrafts took control of the aircraft. The pilots used every mitigating procedure they knew to regain control, but about 2 miles short of the runway they clipped a car on Hwy 114, skipped up and then got hit with the final microburst that slammed them to the ground between two remote water towers at the airport in a fireball.
My phone rang. I was home, making dinner. It wasn’t even raining at my house about 20 miles away. It was my best friend and ex-roommate who flew for American calling from Chicago. She was so relieved to hear my voice. It was her turn to be relieved to hear a voice after a 191 accident. That was the first I heard of it. I turned on the TV as the phone kept ringing. I just stared in horror. I was almost surprised at just how personal it felt. This was family, this was home. The news, in an effort to have the story first, reported that it might be a cargo plane. You could clearly see the Delta logo, and I knew we had no cargo planes, yet I found myself hoping it was a cargo plane. I was just in shock. I must have stared at that TV for hours.
We drove over to Parkland Hospital to donate blood, it was the only thing the community was being asked to do. The line of cars started miles away. It was so heartwarming. Sadly, there were not enough survivors to warrant that response, but blood is always needed.
That accident radically changed how aircraft are vectored around storms and sped up the installation of doppler radar at major airports across the nation to give better information to those making decisions.
That accident also seemed to break the ice among crew members I knew to mention the unmentionable. Crash dreams. None of us will tell you about them, but get enough wine and beer flowing at a debriefing and if the conversation goes a certain way, we finally started talking about the dreams. It was like it was just too much to carry all alone any more. I don’t know if every base talked through it, but we were pretty open in DFW.
The variety was surprising, but limited to a few basic themes. Some people actually go down with the plane, some wake before the event. Some are like me, and witness the event and are always trying to get to it to help, screaming the commands learned in training. Pilots tend to have very technical dreams whether they are in the plane or watching. It’s interesting to listen to everyone and armchair quarterback what the dreams mean in reference to the person having them. It’s also comforting to know it’s just a normal “pressure valve” for release now and then. It’s not like any of us develop a fear of flying, we just have this dichotomy we have to resolve after being fed conflicting information. And there’s the sadness you can never display.
So some of you are disappointed by now because you picked up a book/blog about the life of a flight attendant. Wow! This should be a good beach read right? Well, I’m sorry to say, I’m telling you the whole story. All the things that happen. If you were looking for a book about slipping into each other’s hotel rooms on long layovers; you want to look in the fiction section. These are the things that shaped a 40 year career. Every flight crew member has this element touch their career. I like to think, in the end, it’s what makes us better at our jobs as we gain experience and learn where the edges are.
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