5 travel tips from the pilot

Airline pilots are real travel experts but it’s easy to forget that since passengers don’t usually have too much contact with their pilots during the flight. Here are a few tips from pilots that may make you double-think the way you travel.

Maybe you catch sight of your pilot while boarding and disembarking or hear their usual chit-chat after take-off and before landing. They talk about your current altitude, the weather and predicted flying conditions during your flight. Pilots travel more than even the busiest flight attendants, working sometimes 16 hours at a time. If anyone knows a thing or two about travel, it’s the pilot!

1. AM flights

If you don’t like to fly, morning flights are most always smoother. The heating of the ground later in the day causes bumpier air and thunderstorms are more likely in the afternoon.

2. Cough, sneeze, cough

Most people wonder why they always get sick or catch colds after flights. It’s not the recycled air you breathe but rather the buttons and trays you touch. Assume the lights, flight attendant call buttons and seat trays haven’t been wiped down (because they haven’t).

3. Wing seats

The smoothest ride is always over the wing. If you hate turbulence, grab a middle seat as close to the wing as possible. Airplanes are a lot like seesaws. The bumpiest place to sit is the back but the middle doesn’t move too much.

4. Engine failure

If you hear, “One of our engines is indicating improperly” over the speakers from your pilot it really means that one of the plane’s engines has failed. Not to panic though, most planes fly just fine with one engine failure.

5. Mayday!

There is no such thing as a ‘water landing.’ It’s just a soft way to say ‘crash landing into the ocean.’

Aren’t you glad these guys aren’t real pilots?

Imgs: Muffet, jimmyharris / Flickr cc.