Adventures in Flying: When Things Go Wrong

My first trip in a free seat from frequent flyer miles, was from Lexington, Kentucky to San Francisco. I had been scheduled to present a training in Santa Rosa, California, and I had booked a prepaid non-refundable hotel in San Francisco for a long weekend after the program, adding a couple of personal days onto the work trip. The training was cancelled at the last minute, and I was left with a choice of walking away from the pre-paid hotel, or flying to California on my own dime.  I had enough miles with Delta to get a free round trip, and I wanted to spend a couple of days in the City by the Bay.  It was a great little getaway.  The trip out was easy. 

The return flight was San Francisco to Atlanta, a change of planes in Atlanta and onto Lexington. The plane from SFO to ATL was newer and well equipped.  I was watching the Lethal Weapon movie that was filmed in Orlando (they imploded City hall for the film) at about 40,000 feet someplace over Texas when the lights went out.  Not the lights in the movie, the lights on the plane.  A minute or so later, the captain came on the speakers, saying there was a little problem with the electrical system, and would be stopping in Dallas, would the flight attendants please prepare the cabin for landing.  Less than ten minutes later we were on the ground in Dallas. When we rolled up the gate, there was smoke coming out the engine cowling on my side.  

More on the technical side, there are three electrical generating systems on a twin engine jet airliner, one in each engine, and a third one in a small jet engine in the tail that is used for power on the ground (the APU.) One of the main generators had failed, and when it went down, it overloaded the other one and shut it down. The flight crew restarted the APU in the tail, it supplied power for essential systems for a safe landing. Airplanes have lots of backup systems for safety, and pilots spend years practicing what to do when something goes wrong. 

Delta called in the troops that night, I was led to another gate and onto another plane to Atlanta within minutes of landing.  I arrived in Atlanta after the last flight to Lexington.  I was loaded on the crew bus and taken to a very nice hotel for the night, and on the first flight out the next day. 

In years of flying that is my only emergency landing. It was a little  unnerving - - - but I know the pilots are professionals and planes are built with lots of backup safety systems.  A couple of weeks later I was back in the air headed out for the next training. 

A friend of mine was traveling cross country with her 8 year old, when the oxygen masks dropped down, and they had an emergency landing someplace in the middle of the country.  She was worried that her son would be terrified at the idea of getting on the next flight, instead he said, "I wonder if the oxygen masks will drop again, that was so exciting."  Her worry, not his.