whew... glad to be in one piece

[jay]

I nearly didn't make it here, tonight... severe wind shear in a thunderstorm caught our 737 on final into Atlanta and slammed us down toward the ground. The pilot reacted and hit full throttle... we were tail-down and the engines were shaking and some people were screaming... we popped out of it. My guess is that it knocked us down from about 500 feet AGL down to 100-150. We were off-line for the runway, way too low and engines high, so we did a go-around. First commercial go-around I'd been on in a few years. We were also down to our last half-hour of fuel, given lots of in-flight holds. Just as well that we weren't heavier, I guess (wry grin). ATC turned the approach directions around 180 degrees, and when we finally landed (much better, still gusty) the passengers broke out in cheering and applause. We'd dodged one... I congratulated and thanked the co-pilot on my way out.

We were already 3+ hours late leaving San Jose.... I was supposed to have been here at 8:30pm. So I'm tired, besides coming down off of near-miss adrenaline. Dinner was a cookie and some mixed nuts.

Otherwise... Easter was good, at home. David and Kevin hunted candy and plastic eggs that I'd hidden the previous night, patgreene made a nice breakfast, and church was overflowing, probably 300 at the 9am kid's service. I missed having traditional hymns.... needed something more joyous and symbolic. Bubblegum second-hand Christian-rock is OK for outreach and ordinary time at an informal service, but IMO is just too surface-level, too shallow for Easter.

Comments

[mactavish.livejournal.com]

Wow, I'm so glad you had competent pilots.

[hopeforyou.livejournal.com]

Fuck.

Glad you made it!

[who-is-she.livejournal.com]

wow, that sounds scary, and I dont know if it was better or worse that you knew what was going on!

I'm glad you're ok.
!
hugs

[tenacious-snail.livejournal.com]

*tight hugs*

I am very, very glad to know you arrived safely, and both relieved and scared to have the more details on the "nearly crashed" version of your flight. LIke who_is_she, I wonder whether your knowledge of flying makes this more scary or less scary than it is for other people.

incidentally, did I tell you that for years, I was in a church where the tradition was to do an Easter sermon of St. John Chrysostom's responsively? It was weird the first time, but I grew to really, really love it. Easter is a great time for smells and bells, and that bit was great for it.

[elissaann.livejournal.com]

Whew! I'm glad you're OK.

And it's a little late, but here ya go:

Jesus Christ is risen today, Alleluia!
His triumphant holy day, Alleluia!
Something something on the cross, Alleluia!
Suffered to redeem our loss, Alleluia!

I'm all Eastered out.

[sisterfish125.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you made it, somewhat safely...

It was pretty nasty out in my area too. I think it finally stopped being so severe around 1 am out in the boondocks.

[geekchick]

I'm glad to hear you made it okay. *hug*

[rosefox]

I'm so glad you're okay.

[datagoddess.livejournal.com]

Oh, man, that's scary!

Last time we had something like that happen was on Northwest, too, coming into Minneapolis. We were almost down (like maybe 10 yards from the runway - no joke) and all of a sudden we were nose up and engines straining. Apparently there was a small plane who hadn't cleared the runway, and the pilot decided he wasn't going to be out of the way fast enough.

My sister-in-law about lost it. She's afraid of flying as it is. She maintained because she was holding her 20-month old, was sitting next to her 5 year old, and her 8 year old was in the row with me and my brother. She about took the armrest between her and Dan off, though.

But at least our pilot had control. Yours, man, that's got to be nervewracking for the crew.

[deedeebythebay.livejournal.com]

*hugs* I'm glad to know you're ok. In truth, I hate flying and that would have been a bad, bad thing for me to go through. *hugs*

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Wow. I'm glad that downburst wasn't any stronger. :-O

[frankenboob.livejournal.com]

Glad you are okay! Must have been frightening.

I can't believe how crowded church has become. I was looking at pictures of Easter from 10 years ago (hence the pix of C) and there were a handful of people hanging around back then.

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

How terrifying! I'm very glad that you are back safely.

[simplykimberly.livejournal.com]

((hugs)) Very glad you're okay! That's some scary stuff, for sure!

Eek, yikes!

[vokzal.livejournal.com]

Yay, physics of flying!

Wasn't it the 747 that a test pilot did a barrel roll in?

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

EEP! Glad you walked away from that one ("Any landing you can walk away from is a good one"). Toni already told you about our go-around in Minneapolis a few years ago.