That's why I got in the habit of (don't laugh) counting the rows to my nearest exit, which, for those of you who weren't paying attention, may be behind you. If you fly Qantas, the sultry-voiced Angela Catterns scolds blasé frequent flyers to listen up; you may think you've heard the safety drill before, but every aircraft is subtly different.
Nonetheless, even the biggest scaredy-cat browses the in-flight magazine during the life-jacket bit. Nice in theory, but no pilot has ever successfully ditched in water. One wing generally touches the surface first, and flips the plane. Or the whole kit-and-caboodle is so busy dropping out of the sky that your seat cushion-cum-floatation device may be too little, too late.
Until yesterday.
Much has been written about USAirways #1549. About the skill, heroism and modesty of the pilot. About the speed with which NY Waterways craft were able to rescue the passengers. And a lot about divine intervention, prayer, grace, or sheer good fortune. FlyerTalk, and the Australian Frequent Flyer Community, both discuss the matter at length.
My first thought on reading the news, though, was this. Aviation seems to be getting safer.
Before you scoff at my bad taste, hear me out. Time was, not long ago, that any catastrophic system failure was a death sentence for passengers and crew.
Ironically, I was sitting in the USAirways lounge at LaGuardia in 2005 when an Air France plane skidded off the runway in Toronto. As news helicopters circled the flaming aircraft, broadcasters solemnly mouthed pity on the travellers inside, unable to imagine that anyone could survive the flames. Yet, everyone escaped alive, thanks to an incredibly alert and well-trained crew.
Last year, I was actually booked on the British Airways flight from Beijing that crashed-landed at Heathrow. It may seem odd to write that it "crash-landed successfully", but no other phrase seems more appropriate. Everyone lived.
Those in the know, credit the pilot's skill. "He deserves a medal as big as a frying pan," they said. Let's hope he got one.
(An aside. At the last minute, accountants at my firm switched the ticket to Air China, on cost grounds. They take this incident as a moral lesson in the virtues of pennypinching.)
And now, USAirways 1549.
Yesterday, benevolent forces controlled the universe. Or, just as important, even in an atmosphere of absurd cost-cutting and near bankruptcy, the behaviour of the pilot and crew suggests that airlines seem not to have skimped on human factors in aviation safety. Perhaps, they took lessons from safety breaches, and trained crews for many more contingencies. Perhaps they recognise the human element as the most important factor in air safety.
I never thought I would say this. Goodonya, aviation industry. And--no, hear me out-- congratulations to USAirways. They may cancel flights and lose luggage, but they appear to have put real effort into improving their safety record. EDIT: Spoke too soon, perhaps?
Personally, I am grateful. Munich and Pittsburgh, for obvious reasons, are two airports I use a lot, and USAirways maintains a significant presence in both.
It seems that the pilot of the stricken plane was, in fact, one of the key movers responsible for crew training standards. His LinkedIn profile shows two recommendations. When he gets to work on Monday, I would be surprised if there were not, at the very least, 155 more.
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The photo credit is a triumph for the citizen journalist. It is Janis Krum's first Twitter photograph of the plane in the Hudson, sourced through (ironically enough) a website named Boing Boing.
