Many people feed their fear of flying because they think that flying a jet plane is difficult and demanding. They reason that if it’s difficult to do ordinarily then it must be ten times as hard if something goes wrong.

Starting from basics the first thing to say is that things rarely go wrong. In my airline career nothing happened to me. And as a young instructor the only thing that happened to me was a slight engine malfunction so I landed  in a field. (My claim to fame is that the guest who arrived before I did, and I’m sure his arrival was much more dignified, was Yehudi Menuen the violinist. But nevertheless I was invited to sign the famer’s visitors book just below Mr Menuen’s entry.)

When malfunctions occur in a plane they are normally simple to deal with and  the Company’s procedures determine who flies the plane and who carries out the checklist. The checklist is executed slowly, accurately and completely to deal with  the problem and to ’set’ the aircraft so that is as close to operating normally as it can. Modern aircraft have electronically displayed checklists and until the actions are completed correctly they stay visible on the navigation screens.

In my book  Flying without Fear I explain how to land a plane so I won’t repeat that here.

People  who have flown the simulator with me are always amazed to find  how simple it is to control the aircraft.

Taking off

Taking off despite what you may think is a very straight forward procedure. (In fact you can hear a commentary from the flight deck on our CD Set Disc 4 Part 4)

Most anxious travellers believe that the plane is right  on the edge of what it can do, but in fact  every take off is well within a plane’s capability and the engines are not straining. Of course before we even get on a plane to fly it we know that it is perfectly serviceable. We know that when we get to the runway that the aircraft can take off having taken into account the weather, the  runway conditions and lots of other things besides. We will do our take off checks and then press the thrust switch and the engines will inrease their thrust until they reach the coorrect amount for take off.  We, the pilots keep the plane pointing along the runway  by using the rudder and then when we’re going fast enough (Vr)  we raise the nose…and off she flies! No nail biting drama, no hanging on to the controls, no Hollywood style ‘willing the old bird into the sky’, no squeezing the’ last drop of power’ out of the engines. Simple straight forward well re hearsed standard procedure.  We’ve got a detailed description of taking off  and a commentary from the flight deck on our Fear of  Flying Audio CD set

Landing

See the book Flying without Fear

If you’re interested in how we fly a plane  go to the Ask a Question page and send it to me and I’ll answer you as soon as I can

More information on how to fly a jet plane will be available soon.