I went to visit my Mom yesterday. I flew on a brand new Boeing 737. Somewhat disconcertingly, it had that “new car smell” all of us like so much; kind of weird to be smelling it in an airplane. The pilot came on shortly after takeoff to brag that it was the plane’s third “revenue” flight, which I assume meant the plane had been flown once around the factory right after the last piece was bolted on, just to make sure everything would work until the first payment was made, and was then put immediately into service.
Since I wasn’t sure at that point that we were going to land safely, I thought it prudent to review the emergency briefing card. Safety first is my motto.
We were flying from Dallas to Fort Meyers, FL., with much of the flight over water, so I figured if the place ditched there was at least some chance of survival, unlike most domestic plane crashes where the plane simply cartwheels into the earth at 500 MPH.
And since it was a water flight, I was glad to see they had installed life rafts, two on each wing, and two on the roof of the plane. They looked to hold around twenty people each. But I did the math, and since the plane carried maybe 180 people, I figured 60 of us would be treading water until the rescue boats came. They must not have learned their lesson after the Titanic.
They did have plenty of bright orange life-vests though, or personal flotation devices, each with its own blinky light. I supposed that would make it easier for the sharks to find us at night.
The good news was that we landed safely two hours later, only half an hour late. Strong headwinds, said the pilot. He must not have been used to landing his new airplane, because we hit the runway so hard that some of the luggage compartments popped open and there was a white and pink snowstorm of ladies underwear in row 37.
But any landing you can walk away from is a good one, right?
Right, especially if there is ladies underwear flying around.