I thought Halloween would be a good day to post scariest flight stories.
I can't remember which airline it was but earlier in the year we were approaching LAX and our landing gear didn't go down. You know how you always hear that familiar clunk when the gear releases? Well not this time.
As we were descending toward the runway, we all of the sudden started to ascend again and proceeded to make a large radius turn as if we were going to make another approach. This time we heard the familiar clunk and everyone sighed in relief as we made a safe landing. During that 5 minutes or so that we were making the big turn back to the airport, was a little stressful.
This sort of gave me a reality check to the fact that we are riding on a mechanical piece of equipment. Don't get me wrong, I've had my share of drink spilling turbulence over the Pacific Ocean on the way to and from Asia, but knowing that the plane actually did something that wasn't normal was a bit scary.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Monday, October 29, 2007
Nashville, TN - ATA 2007
It all started out with a call from American Airlines asking if I would volunteer to leave out of LAX instead of Burbank because my flight was weight restricted due to the high winds feeding the So Cal fires. I was a little reluctant to do this because it meant a much longer commute to a further airport. The upside was it would be a direct flight and because of my reluctance, the agent offered to upgrade me to First Class, so I took it. I think Bryan Adams and his band were on our flight also.
I arrived at Nashville Airport around 5:30 in the evening and caught a cab to the Gaylord Opryland Resort. I didn't really want to stay here but this is where the client had the room block and I didn't want to drive back and forth every day. I normally try and stay in a Marriott because I really like their properties and rewards program. It's all about the perks.
This is the first resort I have stayed in where I actually needed a map to find my way around for the first couple of days. The resort itself was very beautifuly done and you don't actually have to leave at all. The room was pretty nice with an LG 32" LCD TV and a refrigerator. The problem was that it wasn't very business traveler friendly. It had a safe but the door wouldn't close if I put my laptop inside and the desk was one of those where you can't possible lock your laptop anywhere that it couldn't be removed. I ended up locking the laptop to the chair so at least if someone was going to take the laptop, they would have to take the chair as well.
The hotel was in the middle of renovations so my room smelled a little like paint and the window was the kind that you can't open unless you brought tools, which I did but I decided not to make the effort. Another annoying item was the TV channels. They had the normal gamut of channels including HBO but they also had their own internal advertising channels and whenever you came accross one of those, the volume was much louder than the other channels.
Other than those minor things, it was a really nice place to stay. I had some really good meals in their restaurants throughout the week and only left one night to go downtown and eat at my favorite BBQ restaurant, Jacks BBQ. This is a must visit if you ever go to Nashville. I usually try and bring home a couple bottles of their sauce if I have room in my luggage.
The nice thing about downtown Nashville is you can walk into just about any bar on Broadway and hear an excellent band. I wandered into Second Fiddle and heard a great band with a female lead singer. They were doing all kinds of songs from the 80s and 90s. This was a good break before starting setup the next morning.
Across the street from the Gaylord is the Grand Ole Opry. I didn't see any shows here but walked by the entrance on the way to the Opry Mills Mall. This is an awesome mall and I could have spent an entire day there. I don't even like shopping as a rule but they have a tool store there that will amaze you. It's called Workshop Tools. I picked up a ratchet tool that accepts the drill bit size screw tips and will come in handy for those hard to reach places, like attaching speakers to a plasma screen that is already wall mounted. I also picked up an LED flexible flashlight that has a clip to attach to your shirt or hat.
There is also a very nice store called Bass Pro Outdoor World. I just happened to be there 10 minutes before the fish feeding in their 25000 gallon aquarium full of all kinds of fish like Bass, of course, and others. That was pretty cool to see. They fed them with live fish.
Setup started for me on Tuesday morning for the Airlift & Tanker Show. This exhibit included 1 Barco R12 Projector using a DVD player through a Folsom Image Pro which I really love. It's a great piece of equipment. When I was in my Barco class, the teacher referred to it as the Swiss Army Knife. I was shooting about 23 feet onto a 9 foot wide screen. In addition to that was 4, 40" LCD display panels controlled by Computers and Touch Screens.
The second exhibit was actually inside a trailer. I had to order 30 foot DVI cables to connect some laptops into an existing Flight Simulator.
We wrapped up on Saturday night and shipped my gear on to the next one.
6am flight home on American went perfectly on schedule with a short stop in Dallas. I was back in LA by 10:30am.
Next stop, Tokyo.
I arrived at Nashville Airport around 5:30 in the evening and caught a cab to the Gaylord Opryland Resort. I didn't really want to stay here but this is where the client had the room block and I didn't want to drive back and forth every day. I normally try and stay in a Marriott because I really like their properties and rewards program. It's all about the perks.
This is the first resort I have stayed in where I actually needed a map to find my way around for the first couple of days. The resort itself was very beautifuly done and you don't actually have to leave at all. The room was pretty nice with an LG 32" LCD TV and a refrigerator. The problem was that it wasn't very business traveler friendly. It had a safe but the door wouldn't close if I put my laptop inside and the desk was one of those where you can't possible lock your laptop anywhere that it couldn't be removed. I ended up locking the laptop to the chair so at least if someone was going to take the laptop, they would have to take the chair as well.
The hotel was in the middle of renovations so my room smelled a little like paint and the window was the kind that you can't open unless you brought tools, which I did but I decided not to make the effort. Another annoying item was the TV channels. They had the normal gamut of channels including HBO but they also had their own internal advertising channels and whenever you came accross one of those, the volume was much louder than the other channels.
Other than those minor things, it was a really nice place to stay. I had some really good meals in their restaurants throughout the week and only left one night to go downtown and eat at my favorite BBQ restaurant, Jacks BBQ. This is a must visit if you ever go to Nashville. I usually try and bring home a couple bottles of their sauce if I have room in my luggage.
The nice thing about downtown Nashville is you can walk into just about any bar on Broadway and hear an excellent band. I wandered into Second Fiddle and heard a great band with a female lead singer. They were doing all kinds of songs from the 80s and 90s. This was a good break before starting setup the next morning.
Across the street from the Gaylord is the Grand Ole Opry. I didn't see any shows here but walked by the entrance on the way to the Opry Mills Mall. This is an awesome mall and I could have spent an entire day there. I don't even like shopping as a rule but they have a tool store there that will amaze you. It's called Workshop Tools. I picked up a ratchet tool that accepts the drill bit size screw tips and will come in handy for those hard to reach places, like attaching speakers to a plasma screen that is already wall mounted. I also picked up an LED flexible flashlight that has a clip to attach to your shirt or hat.
There is also a very nice store called Bass Pro Outdoor World. I just happened to be there 10 minutes before the fish feeding in their 25000 gallon aquarium full of all kinds of fish like Bass, of course, and others. That was pretty cool to see. They fed them with live fish.
Setup started for me on Tuesday morning for the Airlift & Tanker Show. This exhibit included 1 Barco R12 Projector using a DVD player through a Folsom Image Pro which I really love. It's a great piece of equipment. When I was in my Barco class, the teacher referred to it as the Swiss Army Knife. I was shooting about 23 feet onto a 9 foot wide screen. In addition to that was 4, 40" LCD display panels controlled by Computers and Touch Screens.
The second exhibit was actually inside a trailer. I had to order 30 foot DVI cables to connect some laptops into an existing Flight Simulator.
We wrapped up on Saturday night and shipped my gear on to the next one.
6am flight home on American went perfectly on schedule with a short stop in Dallas. I was back in LA by 10:30am.
Next stop, Tokyo.
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