Fasten Your Seatbelts: A Flight Attendant's Adventures 36,000 Feet and Below (17 page)

First of all, I had to wake up at 2:30 a.m. to get ready for my commute from Atlanta to Miami. An accident on the interstate could occur, so I had to give myself plenty of time to arrive at the airport. At the airport, I parked my car, took an employee van, went through security — and waited an hour or more before my flight departed. It then took another hour and a half to fly to Miami. After arriving, I sometimes waited three to five hours before I actually began my shift. Sometimes I had to wait even longer. The first day is a killer day. I ended up on my feet an average of seventeen to twenty three hours. But hey, it is was my choice to live in a city where there is no base, so I couldn’t complain.

One day I made my way to the Atlanta airport for the usual commute to Miami. The agent called out the group numbers to board. Passengers who awoke for these early flights boarded like zombies. I, too, stumbled onto the airplane in a sleepy daze. The beginning of the flight was uneventful. The passenger load was three quarters full. I was sitting in the exit row dressed in my uniform.

En route to Miami, I kept having a strange feeling I couldn’t shake; a feeling of uneasiness best describes it. I looked out the window on our descent to Miami. I always enjoy seeing Tampa and the beautiful Gulf of Mexico as our flight path takes us over the west coast of Florida. Following the waterways, the airplane veers to the left and goes directly over the Everglades to Miami International Airport. The clear blue sky was dotted with just a few white puffy clouds.

About the time the wheels should have touched the runway, the plane took off again. I looked around alarmed. No one else seemed to think anything was wrong, but I couldn’t shake that feeling. A few minutes later the captain’s voice was heard. “Ladies and gentlemen, our cockpit indicator light shows that our nose gear is not locked. We are going to do a fly-by for the control tower to see if the gear is indeed down.”

Ding Ding Ding!
I know what that sound is
. The pilots are communicating to the flight attendants that something
is wrong and go ahead and prepare the cabin in case of an evacuation.

Soon, the flight attendants were in the aisles demonstrating the brace positions. Cross your hands in front of you and place your head on the seat, or grab the back of your ankles and place your head on your knees.

I knew they didn’t have much time so being in uniform and sitting in the exit row, I briefed the passengers also sitting in the exit rows on how to open the window exits in case of an emergency. I explained that if fire, smoke or debris is spotted, they should not open the window and instead evacuate to the nearest available exit. Most of the passengers looked at me as if I were kidding. “This is the real deal,” I affirmed. Prepare mentally for opening these exits. They shook their heads in disbelief but understood.

The captain came on the PA, “Uh, ladies and gentlemen, the control tower said they see our landing gear is down, but they cannot tell if is locked. We are getting back in line. Flight attendants, prepare for landing.”

Another couple of minutes went by with my heart beating wildly; my hands now drenched in sweat. Once again the captain’s voice is heard, “Ladies and gentlemen, we have thirty seconds upon landing, please assume your brace positions.” Everyone obediently placed their hands crossed on the seats in
front of them. I was amazed at the silence.
This can’t be happening. We have a 50/50 situation here
. I said a quick prayer.

Glancing out the window, I saw fire engines, police cars, and emergency trucks waiting for us.
Please don’t collapse or cartwheel
.

Thud! We made it. Talk about an adrenalin rush. I was exhausted. However, I still had to continue on with the day and work my first flight.

And what can I get you to drink today?

veryone likes a good practical joke — especially if it is not played on them! Airline crews are notorious pranksters. The more memorable incidents were often aimed at new hires on their first day of work.

A standard and my initiation (thought of by the pilots) was to stick the newly hired flight attendant in the overhead bin. I have no idea why they thought it was entertaining, but I distinctly remember everyone outside of the bin laughing while I was trapped inside.

A friend of mine shared her experience on her first trip. At the end of the flight, the captain called the flight attendants to let them know they had been selected for a random drug test. All crewmembers were to have a urine sample ready upon landing. Everyone in the crew was in on it but her. They each poured some apple juice in a glass and taped their name on the outside. They told Laura it was standard procedure. She took the empty glass and stepped into the lavatory. While in there, she thought
to herself, “I am not going to do this.” She opened the door and all the crewmembers toasted and gulped down their apple juice!

A particularly memorable captain’s preflight briefing included information that catering may not have provided enough ice for the flight, so the new hire was instructed to count each ice cube before the gate agent closed the door. Another notable and harmless haze was to tell the newbies they needed to grab a barf bag and collect an air sample from the back of the aircraft for quality control!

On one of my flights, we had a brand new flight engineer. I called the cockpit during the flight to say we had a very unusual air leak. I told them we needed someone to come and check it out. I’m sure the captain knew what was going on and sent the flight engineer back to the cabin. Previously, I gave a few passengers pillows with instructions to throw them when I gave the signal. When the flight engineer walked to the aft galley, I told him the air leak went away. When he returned to the cockpit, I made a PA to welcome our flight engineer on his very first trip. As he walked through the aisle, everyone applauded and threw pillows at him.

There have been pantyhose sticking out of the pilots’ suitcase as they rolled it through the airport, lipstick kisses on their bright white shirts, flashing of the breasts for their first flight, toilet papering their room overnight as they slept, and God only knows what else. As long as no one is hurt in the process, I’m all for making their first flight one they will not forget.

Sometimes the ramp personnel would get in on the action. When I was based in Dallas, our operations area was underneath the airport, also known as the dungeon. It was dreary down there. We also shared the area with other employees of the company. The ramp guys knew that the crewmembers were known to be a little on the cheap side, so they placed a nickel on the ground and glued it to the floor. It was strategically placed right in front of their operations area. They would laugh at all the pilots and flight attendants who bent over to pick up the nickel. Of course, being a starving new hire, I too fell for the old nickel-glued-to-the-floor trick!

My all-time favorite prank took place when I was based in Raleigh. I had been flying with the same crew the whole month, so we established a bond. I had gone to a novelty shop and found an unbelievably realistic pile of poop.

The first leg of our flight was a 5 a.m. sign-in. It was dark outside and dark on the airplane. I was first to enter the aircraft and quickly threw the poop prop on the floor of the galley. When the first officer turned the power on to the aircraft, the lights came on in the cabin. I screamed while pointing to the brown spiral of doo-doo. Other crewmembers screeched in horror. The pilots raced out of the cockpit to see what all the commotion was about. They muttered a few nasty comments about the caterers and decided to call cabin service to clean up the mess. I told
them to never mind; I would take care of it. I grabbed a paper towel and squeamishly picked up the plastic pile and tossed it at one of the pilots! He jumped back trying to avoid the poop and once it hit the floor we all enjoyed the stunt together.

I flew international for many years out of Miami. I loved flying international but clearing Customs and Immigration was always a hassle. In Miami, the Customs’ guys were shameless flirts. They would pull you aside under the guise of searching your bags just to start a conversation. It was harmless and kind of flattering at first, but when you are in a hurry to make your flight home, it wasn’t fun anymore.

I was in my hotel room with my creative juices flowing trying to figure out how I could stop them from doing this. So, on one of my trips, I took a hair brush out of my bag and pulled all the hair from it, forming a hairball. When I arrived in Miami, sure enough the same Customs guy searched my bag. As he opened it, the wadded up hairball sprung out at him. He quickly closed my bag without saying a word. I was cracking up on the inside as he ushered me along.

After this worked, I decided I would try something else, so I took a tampon and again placed it on top of my clothes. I was targeted, as usual, for a bag search. This time he was thoroughly embarrassed and again quickly closed the suitcase and sent me on my way. I don’t know if they talked about it among themselves; all I know is the searching and flirting came to an end.

ave you ever awakened from a nap and felt a little disoriented? A flight attendant whom I was flying with went way beyond a little disoriented.

It was an early sign-in for our trip. We ended up in Philadelphia, but it took three flights to get there. We arrived at 3:30 p.m. absolutely depleted. A nap was definitely needed for the three of us flight attendants.

Our number one flight attendant, Julie, said she wanted to sleep soundly, so she took her phone off the hook, put on her eye mask and drifted off to sleep.

Our van pickup for the morning was scheduled for 6:20 a.m. This poor girl woke up from a deep sleep; her alarm clock read 6:25. Seeing it was dark outside, she was sent into a horrible panic. Julie thought she was late for pickup. The phone was off the hook, so she assumed everyone had tried to wake her and went on ahead to the airport.

Immediately, she called the front desk and asked them to hail a cab. Knowing she had no time for a shower, Julie threw on her uniform, shoved everything into her bag and off she went to the airport in her cab.

Julie went through security and ran to the end of the terminal. Ironically, the Chicago evening flight was leaving around the same time we were the next morning. She ran down the jet bridge and threw her bags near the front closet informing the number one flight attendant she could go home now. (Thinking she was a reserve flight attendant who had been called in to replace her.) The number one flight attendant didn’t know what to say. “This is my flight,” she insisted. Julie looked in the back of the aircraft and realized the flight attendants did not look familiar.