Everyone thinks flight crews are fearless creatures walking on air. It’s remarkable how many people are truly uncomfortable flying. I had flown personally since I was a baby, I was very fortunate. I began my career with no fear, I was naïve.
I got my first introduction to the serious side of things in training. The public doesn’t go out and look at these things on purpose and neither had I. We studied past accidents to learn from them so we would know what not to do, and to build our toolbox of responses if it happened to us. Movies, slides and more movies. Desensitizing us, hopefully, a little bit at a time so we wouldn’t freak out if called to act.
When I began flying, I roomed with my best friend from college in Schaumburg, IL, which is a virtual airline employee suburb of Chicago. We quickly adapted to the crazy life of 24 hour phone calls and beepers and life on the fly. We were both avid Cubs fans and I scored great passes over the dugout after having lunch with a ball player in New York where I learned to share tables with new friends. It was really a new life. She got us opening tickets to theater from her First Class guests. We fell into a new and fun rhythm.
On May 25, 1979, just 3 months after our careers began, my roommate got called out and left a note that she was going to sit standby. I saw the note when I got up for my turn around (one day trip.) Standby was when you went out to the airport and just sat there for 4 hours in case they needed someone on a plane NOW.
My flight was returning to O’Hare in the afternoon around 3:30 pm, and got stuck circling out over Indiana. I went up front and asked the guys what the deal was. They informed me that American had lost one at O’Hare. Just 3 months into my career I learned an important detail; crew never uses the term “crash.” In fact most folks in aviation don’t use that word, the call that went out over the radios to all emergency personnel at O’hare was that there had been “A strike on the field.” At 3:04 pm that day. All souls perished.
I clarified to be sure, and they told me what they knew. I was sick. Shit just got real. My roommate’s airline, my airport, where did my roommate go today?
When I got home, everyone we knew was calling to see if we were ok. I was a little shocked at the response. Looking back, I was childlike, not really understanding it all. Friends came over to sit with us. Thankfully, my friend had been sent home that day. For the next week or so, all we could see every time we turned on the TV was American 191 flying sideways over O’Hare. Something broke in my heart and I knew part of the family was gone. That was the end of the innocence.
I learned that our flying machines were not perfect. They could not do everything. The systems that maintained them were not perfect. Their design was sometimes flawed. I realized that all of the wonderful skills I had learned and felt so good about might never be used and might not ever help. Reality set in and I could no longer just wander fearlessly. That was a true coming of age experience and I grew up fast.
The stuff that lurks in your dreams…
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