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TRAVEL
Adventures in Flying: A recollection
By Fred H. Olin, MD
Several recent episodes of airliners having problems
with landing gear, cross-wind landings, etc., got
me to thinking about the non-mishaps I’ve ex-
perienced in airplanes. I’ve never been in a
crash, never gotten sick, and never been on
one that had some sort of dramatic event
occur… you know, no sick passenger, no
violence, that sort of thing. But, since we
live so far from anything not in Texas, fly-
ing is a good way to get somewhere. Here
are some of my memories.
When I was in the Army stationed in
Philadelphia, a close relative died in Chicago at
Christmas time 1962. I got permission to go to the fu-
neral, and my wife and I boarded a Lockheed Constellation for
the trip. For you younger folks, that was a four-engine propeller-
driven airliner with three vertical stabilizers at the back. No prob- where they’ll have another airplane waiting for us.” No panic among
lems: departed on time, quiet flight, easy, nighttime approach with
holiday lights, smooth landing at O’Hare. It had snowed, and crews
were clearing the taxiways, aprons etc. They hadn’t gotten to the
taxiway our pilot was directed to use, but he made the turn and
headed toward the terminal, and promptly went off the left side of
the pavement. There was a shallow ditch there that sloped down-
ward, and so did our side of the plane, at an angle I’d estimate at
10 – 15 degrees. There we sat. Full power did nothing but blow a
lot of snow around. The airport mobilized a platoon of guys with
snow shovels who dug us out, then one of those tugs came and
pulled the plane to the gate.
It was about 1965 when we left San Antonio on Eastern Airlines
to go to New England to play tourist and visit my wife’s brother
and his family. Our older daughter was still in diapers. We had a
stop in Houston before proceeding on to Boston. About halfway
there the captain announced that there was thick fog at Hobby (the
only airport they had then) and we would fly around for a bit to
see if it would clear. A couple of hours later he attempted to land,
but at the last minute he decided the fog was too thick and did a
“touch and go.” We headed back to San Antonio to refuel. Mean-
while, we were going to run out of diapers before we got where we
were going. With some insistence on our part, the personnel
arranged for the baggage guys to get one of our suitcases out of the
hold and let my wife retrieve a bunch more of that essential supply.
In 1978, I flew American from San Antonio to Chicago to take
REVIEW
my orthopaedic board exam. On the way home, in a
Boeing 727, we had barely reached cruising altitude
over central Illinois when there was an audible
“bang” and a “bump,” sort of what you might
feel if you ran over a 2 x 4 on the freeway. The
captain came on the P.A. and said, in an
Arkansas or East Texas twang, “Frayunds, we
have a li’l pro’lem with the num’er two en-
gine, thass the big un’ in the middle, so we’ve
shut it daown. We can fly on the other two,
so everything’s gonna be ALL right.” About the
time we crossed the Mississippi there was another
“bang” and “bump.” “Frayunds, now we have
turned off the number three engine, but this airplane can
fly on one. We’ll drop daown to a lower altitude and fly slower,
and the comp’ny wants us to proceed to the repair base at Tulsa,
the passengers. A few minutes later over the St. Louis area:
“Frayunds, Ah don’ care what the airline says, we’re goin’ to St.
Louie.” Applause. He made a very steep, descending left turn and
landed almost immediately… obviously the airport had cleared him
for an urgent landing. The fire trucks were out, the whole bit. It
took a few hours to get everyone on airplanes home, but all’s well…
In the late ‘70s my wife, daughters and I went on vacation to
Alaska. We were only going to go to the panhandle area, and our
first stop was at Glacier Bay National Park. To get there, we flew to
the Gustavus airport… not a big place, Gustavus. Again in a 727,
but this time, as we approached the airport the captain told us not
to worry, we were going to land with a bump and some heavy brake
use. Indeed we did just that. He sort of “pancaked” in and it was a
really short stop. I was in a window seat on the right side of the
plane, and as we made a left U-turn to get to the terminal (an A-
frame shack back then) the wing and I were over grass, and I recall
that there was no development off the end of the runway, just some
grass and low hills.
There are more, but this magazine has word limits, and I’m push-
ing it here. Maybe I’ll write about them some time.
Fred H. Olin, M.D. is a semi-retired orthopaedic sur-
geon whose attitude toward flying is that, even at its worst
it beats the heck out of a covered wagon… and no, he
doesn’t remember those himself.
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