I have delayed for almost a year now in writing the story of a near death experience in my flying career. Some will say this is hyperbole but having been there and sat in the plane as it dived for some time out of control towards houses only hundreds of feet below, it is not exaggeration in my opinion. The video is under my videos on facebook in case you want to see more...
It was a beautiful day in Los Angeles the weather was 75 degrees and I was wondering how long it would take for Sergio and I to drive to the airfield outside of LA, where the CASA Aviojet, a jet-powered trainer and light attack aircraft was hangered. It was in fact the last jet that Messerschmitt designed.
I called Sergio in advance of our meeting. "Ok buddy where shall we meet and what is the address for the airport we are going to for the Tom Tom?"
"We are going to fly there - we can take my friends plane." He said.
This is just one beautiful illustration of how life in California is so much better than in the UK. Not only were we not going to drive to Whiteman airfield, we were going to take Sergio's friends plane to get there, I mean I can not even think of a time I lent my best friend my car let alone my plane.
I spotted Sergio sitting in his friends 4 seater light aircraft, a PA-28, a few minutes later we were airborne and flying through the green valley ridges towards the small strip of Whiteman airport. We radioed Van Nuys. "Requesting permission to enter class Delta airspace for Whiteman"
No response. We tried 3 more times.
"Standby" came the reply from the Van Nuys controller.
I sighed with impatience.
I was studying for my commerical pilots license and knew that any radio contact from a class Delta controller meant that we could now legally penetrate their airspace. If the controller did not say "Stay Clear of Class Delta" we were not going to.
"That's good enough for me" Sergio winked at me and exited our 30 degree bank for a new heading - straight into Van Nuys airspace. He was exactly the kind of pilot instructor you wanted, confident and calm at all times but with obvious enthusiasm to teach and let you fly as much as you wanted.
I could barely make out the small tower and runway strip as we called finals, it was in the midst of a busy populated area, hard to spot under Burbank's class Charlie airspace. Little did I know the next time I would be landing on runway 12 would be after requesting priority for an emergency landing.
We taxied quite a distance to some plain hangars, we opened the doors and there sat the Casa Jet trainer, in grey colours with a red lightning bolt down the empannage.
The 2 jet engine intakes at the front of the plane, looked well erm basically awesome!
We changed into flight suits, Sergio, ever the legend, let me have the better one and we took some Top Gun posing shots.
A man on a scooter approached us and spent almost a half hour asking me what I thought about the events of 9/11 and "was i really stupid enough to believe that terrorists had flown planes into the buildings in NY?!"
I argued with him but then capitulated as he was clearly unstable. I could not have guessed that the talking of planes flying into buildings would within an hour be somewhat appropriate to my own life.
We towed the plane to the run up area tested the engine and went through a start up sequence. The noise without the canopy on was simply thrilling. The whine of the turbines made my hairs stand on end.
We powered down and went to the restaurant for lunch.
Sergio ordered a BLT and I ordered some ice water. I get dizzy at times on the Mad Hatter's Tea Cups at Disney World so there was no way I was going to fill my stomach up on food before doing aerobatics in a jet trainer.
I had done some aerobatics in a Tiger Moth, a World War 1 aircraft in Australia in 1998 but that was a slow moving gentle biplane, and I had recently done some Split S turns and inverted flight in a C-172 with Mike but that's a story for another time.
I was sure this would be much more disorientating and labrynthitis inducing.
Sergio was ready, I was nervous, but I opted to sit in the front seat, Sergio could go RIO for this trip. It meant that I had to use the radio as this was only possible from the front seat and we reviewed ejection procedures. Sergio explained that in the case of an unrecoverable emergency there is no rocket propelled ejection seat. I would need to manually jettison the canopy and just jump out the aircraft and use my parachute. I didn't give it much thought really, I was not planning on having anything go wrong despite my parents suggesting I not go in an old jet trainer put together from spare parts. And my parents pretty much encourage me to fly as much as I can in whatever I can.
I put on the parachute, put on my helmet and connected my oxygen mask with radio mike.
We lined up to the runway.
"Two One Two Alpha Mike is ready for departure" I keyed the mike.
"212AM take off no delay, left turn out after departure"
"Left turn out after departure, lining up"
"Here we go!" I could hear Sergio over the intercom but barely as the jet engines spooled up to take off power.
I was tachycardic and tachypneic - I breathed harder into the oxygen mask and turned up the flow.
We shot into the air and I could feel amazing thrust propelling us to 200 knots within 30 seconds. I was waiting for Sergio to call out for the hydraulic pump circuit breaker to be pulled which was only accessible from my position. I waited and waited for what felt like an eternity. I spoke into my mask, "Hey buddy is it time to hit the breaker?"
I could not make out a reply, the noise inside the cockpit was just too loud. Was this normal ? I tried again and again. Still I could not hear Sergio.
My heart got faster still. Something was wrong. Something was definitely not right here. I had never flown this plane before, it was unfamiliar to me and I did not fancy dealing with anything out of the norm. Whereas in a plane I was familiar with I could feasibly help my co pilot, in this jet I was not so sure. We were at about 1000 feet AGL and level. 200 kts indicated.
I turned my head around to try and show Sergio that I had a problem with comms. I could not hear him. It was in that split second I realised why! Sergio's canopy, the roof of the plane ripped off the plane in front of my eyes, it was hanging on by one final safety bolt. If that went the canopy could hit the tail plane and severly cripple the aircraft.
Time slowed down, this was now an actual emergency. Sergio was blinded by the 200 kt head wind in his face, and he was screaming at me. But the plane was not an open cockpit design and it was never meant to be going at such speeds without a roof, communication was impossible.
I also had no clue as to whether there was a more serious problem and Sergio had himself jettisoned his canopy and was preparing to jump out the plane.
Was he yelling at me to jettison my canopy and eject? Had I caused this by not pulling the hydraulic circuit breaker?!
I held off ejecting , I knew we were barely at 1000 feet and jumping out would be suicide anyway.
"Fly the plane!" He yelled. I still could not hear what he was saying.
"Take control of the plane!" This time I got what he was saying and I turned around and grabbed the controls.
This plane was fast and twitchy as hell not like the cessnas and pipers I had been flying for the last 2 months at 90 kts. I glanced at the VSI, the vertical speed indicator it was showing about minus 500 feet per minute and I could see the houses were looking bigger and bigger. If I could not level her out whilst Sergio wrestled with the canopy we would be a fireball within two minutes.
I kept her roughly level but thoughts were racing through my head, I knew we were not out the woods yet and I gave us 50/50 odds to make it through this alive. I was praying that it was simply that the canopy had not been locked in place properly and had come loose and that Sergio would be able to fly the plane back to Whiteman.
As the plane rocketed away from the airport, I lost sight of it and I thought of my family and how if I died they would absolutely kill me!
Everything was happening in micro seconds and within that time frame there became a moment when I was flying the plane and there was nothing I could think of to do so I keyed the mike once more.
"Two One Two Alpha Mike declaring an emergency, request immediate landing!"
Fuck I was still flying this bitch and I had no idea where the airport was, somewhere off the port wing. Come on Serg, fly this bloody plane, I need you right bloody now!
And from that moment on Sergio positioned himself so my body acted as a wind breaker and he could see again, he calmly regained control, I could feel her settle to his experienced touch and I could hear the hydraulics whirr into action as the undercarriage lights illuminated and locked into place. I told him we were cleared to land!
He turned smoothly back West and I caught sight of the airport, I knew we were going to be ok. The landing was perfect and the tower asked me if we needed emergency vehicles.
We didn't.
I was sitting in a bath of my own sweat. "Good job Man" I said to my instructor, friend and co pilot.
"Want to go again?" He laughed as if nothing had happened but a slight waste of JET A fuel.
I was thinking no fucking way!
"Sure, let's go again." The words left my mouth and after a new canopy was found an hour later we were doing barrel rolls and 20 foot passes over the Nevada desert.
What a ride.
