Have you ever seen a grown man naked?
November 2nd, 2009
On the weekend I flew a Boeing 737-300 and successfully landed it at Melbourne airport. Well, I may have run off the runway a couple of times on landing but I did manage to get back on it by the time we came to a stop. Okay, I was actually in a 737 simulator at the Ansett Aviation Training centre at Melbourne Airport. And it was so much fun. It was part of an ‘event’ with the Australian Society of Travel Writers, which included a very nice lunch of yabbie risotto and kangaroo steaks at the Airport Hilton, then a few of us stayed the night (it was so weird staying at an airport hotel without actually going anywhere) before our morning lesson in the simulator. It was all very realistic with the simulator pitching and turning, sound effects and the view of the city at night included city buildings and the Westgate bridge. I was quite keen to crash into the Westgate bridge, but our pilot trainer Captain Peter Fraser wouldn’t let me. He wouldn’t even let me try a loop de loop – although I did get a barrel roll in.
I did have a quite a laugh when I was co-pilot, though. A quite nervous Christine was in the pilot’s seat and when she went to take off she immediately ran straight off the runway and went cross country. 
I was in fits of laughter before I put my foot down hard on the flaps controls and steered us back on to the runway just before we took off. But what made me just about fall on the floor in hysterics was when Captain Fraser jumped into my seat to help Christine with the landing. As I got out of my chair I subtly pushed hard forward and left onto the steering wheel (or whatever it’s called) and the plane nose dived towards the ground. The alarms went off and warning lights flashed and Christine panicked. ‘I don’t know what’s wrong?’ she cried. Meanwhile I was screaming ‘We’re all going to die!’ We didn’t, though. The good Captain landed the plane safely. Party pooper. I wanted us to crash into the terminal building.
So now I’m ready to pilot my first commercial airliner. Don’t believe me? Well I’ve got the certificate to prove it…
Oh, and here is one of my favourite clips from the 1980 movie ‘Airplane’ (’Do you watch gladiator movies?’) and another hysterical pilot sketch from Monty Python…
On November 2nd, 2009 Peter Moore said:
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