Top 10 things to do instead of landing the plane

by Laura Townsend Elion on October 23, 2009

nouturn
It’s now been reported that on Wednesday night a Delta (Northwest) plane headed from San Diego to Minneapolis overshot its destination by about 120 miles. The two pilots, who were out of contact with controllers for over an hour, blamed the mistake on a heated argument about ‘airline policy’ (never mind that the number one airline policy should be to land where you’re supposed to). Here are 10 reasons they may have missed the airport.

The NTSB is investigating whether the detour might instead have been attributable to a more quiet distraction, like sleeping. Apparently, the pilots missed all the usual signals that a destination was approaching (or passed) like the various cockpit alarms, tower contacts, etc. and only came to their senses when a flight attendant brought the matter to their attention.

However, in the name of fun, I thought I’d list a few pursuits that are worth staying in the air for:

10) Monopoly challenge!

9) Getting to the Mall of America faster!

8) Pilot and co-pilot having a really interesting debate on U.S. healthcare policy.

7) Reading the owner’s manual.

6) Avoiding that black cloud hanging around.

5) Finding out what that red, blinking thingee on the dash is…

4) Trying to count all 10,000 lakes.

3) Wanted to practice U-turns.

2) Studying for the FAA exam.

And the number one thing worth overshooting your landing for:

1) Mile high club!

Print Friendly

Tagged as: humor, landing, Northwest, pilots

  • marge

    Cute, Laura, although I can’t cope with #7. :)

  • todez

    I’m not so sure we really want to be making fun of a very serious situation. There are a lot of “what ifs” here. What if no one would have been able to make contact with the pilots. That plan may have very well ran out of fuel somewhere over Wisconsin. What if the flight attendants didn’t realize that something was wrong and couldn’t get the pilots to respond. Same end scenario.
    Nope, nothing to smile about. Something that every passenger will now be thinking about, and the FAA better think about it too.

  • John M

    What scares me is #5 is what caused a United flight to crash outside of Portland some years ago. The aircraft was circling while dumping fuel before making an emergency landing and the pilots became distracted by a warning light that had come on and ran out of fuel.

    The other concern is that following 9-11, if a plane didn’t respond to the ATC, the plan was to scramble fighters and shoot it down. Now that would have been a horrible thing to have had happen because both pilots were asleep or were arguing or whatever went on here.

    Sadly, I can’t say that I’m finding much humor in this incident, even though you made a brave attempt at it.

  • Michael

    How about this one?

    11. Updating their resumes

  • Anne pilot’s wife and RN

    My spouse has had a 40+ career as a professional pilot. He was as appalled by the mistake of these pilots as anyone. 99% of pilots in this country are closer to the Sulli Sullenberger type, but because the heroic things they do daily (like flying well, handling emergencies quietly and professionally, and making smart ‘calls’ on mechanical problems and fatigue issues) often go unnoticed by the general public AND media, their work isn’t news. The bad apples are always news. Suffice to say that these two pilots’ careers are toast and should be. The aviation industry routinely tosses the bad apples out of the barrel (and, unfortunately, sometimes some good ones).

    Now, if only physicians were subject to the same regulation and scrutiny as pilots, we wouldn’t have NEARLY so many dead and maimed patients and malpractice suits…….

  • http://nodebtworldtravel.com brian from nodebtworldtravel.com

    They just HAD to be asleep. Right?

    I mean even if they had an argument in the cockpit and they are pouting in different corners of the cockpit (not like you have room to be in different corners of a cockpit) your ultimate job function as a pilot is to land the plane safely when it is suppose to land. Not 150 miles and an hour later.

    Right?

  • harold weller

    from a security point of view:

  • harold weller

    From a security point of view
    1. Here is an out of contact plane in major city air space and fighters were still on the ground. How long do terrorists have before they have to worry about armed intervention?
    2. There is no way that a plane in the air can be contacted on a clear channel if activated overrides all other channels in the air?

  • Pingback: How Does A Pilot Overshoot an Airport? | Flight Wisdom

  • phoebemomma

    I fly from CA to Minneapolis several times a year, and this story is making me very nervous. When I fly, passengers are checking their watches and we recognize the Twin City area…if there is a delay the pilots inform us of the problem. Surely the the flight attendents knew something was wrong. Are they barred from talking to the pilots??? It scares me that fighter jets were being scrambled, technically they could have shot down the plane .
    Can you imagine how many people missed connecting flights, funerals,business meetings or insulin injections etc because of this mistake? Crazy!!
    There are many well trained pilots who are out of work these days…why can these jerks stay employed? Younger, well-trained pilots are struggling to gain job security,while these older guys don’t value their jobs or the passengers they serve.

  • Laura Townsend Elion

    Good one, Michael! We’ll see if that’s the case.

  • Thetnor

    What’s the worst that could happen?

  • MidMom8949

    I suggest that all passengers on planes so equipped push the little map button so that they can see whether the plane passes the destination. . .

  • Laura Townsend Elion

    @MidMom8949

    Good one! After this, they make take them out.

  • Pingback: Letterman’s top 10 for Northwest pilots

  • Barbara J

    Here I was hoping it was UFOs. Instead it was IFBs – identified flying buffoons.

  • Pingback: Letterman’s top 10 for Northwest pilots - Turnip Style Dot Com

Previous post:

Next post: