May 2005-
Aviation has a very short history when you compare it to something like sailing or horseback riding. Only a little over a hundred years of experience and look how far we have come.
I have been thinking about that fact a lot lately along with some other stranger thoughts that I will, of course, share with you. Aliens Don’t Sail or Scuba Dive… I don’t know if you believe in aliens from outer space or not. Some people do and others don’t.
I’m not here to argue the point either way, but let’s assume that they do exist for the purposes of this discussion. Trust me, I know this is an aviation magazine, and we’ll get from UFOs to aircraft very soon.
The first thing I thought of when contemplating aviation history, E.T. and the like is that I have never ever heard of anybody reporting a sighting of an alien sailing a boat, riding a horse, or driving a car. They are always flying. On the surface this isn’t a surprising thing. After all, these bald-headed, big-eyed outer space guys did come from the Great Beyond.
Don’t you find it a little silly though that they traveled all those light years though trackless space and when they arrived at our very thin atmosphere they were totally equipped to fly in it? You might think that their encounter with our atmosphere might be why they occasionally crash and burn, but I think I know the real reason why this happens.
They are scud running.
I think they are doing that because of their observations of General Aviation pilots. In other words, “aliens just want to have fun.” Every single so-called first-hand account of an encounter with a UFO says that the space craft can fly quickly in any direction and the occupants somehow are protected from the g forces involved. Also, the space craft seem to be able to navigate and fly themselves through intricate maneuvers that make them able to elude even the most dedicated Air National Guard F-16 pilot.
In other words, the UFOs are most likely totally automatic in operation and immune to the laws of physics that we humble General Aviation pilots deal with every flying day. My question to you then is this: which would you rather pilot, a UFO or a single-engine Cessna?
At first glance, most people would say the UFO, but I think after some reflection almost everybody would chose the single. Let’s think about a simple maneuver—a 60-degree-banked 360-degree turn.
In a UFO you could probably emit a brain wave and your spacecraft would do the maneuver flawlessly and automatically without gaining or losing a foot in altitude. You wouldn’t feel any increase in g force and the whole thing would be a yawn. Even if your UFO hit its own wake when it came around it would probably automatically adjust for that as well.
On the other hand, in a single-engine aircraft you would get to feel the sagging sensation of two gs. You would have to add a little back pressure to keep your altitude and you would have to plan your rollout in advance if you wanted to end up on the same heading you started from. Even the engine would sound a little different and if you hit your own wake you’d get a nice jolt.
The Best Inter-dimensional Space Warp Is One You Walk Away From…
Landing an airplane is more art than science. Landing a UFO only entails finding a remote cornfield and some gullible trailer dwellers. Airplanes can land on floats, skis, wheels, skids or their bellies. UFOs leave weird patterns in farm fields, pay no tiedown or landing fees and buy no fuel. UFOs therefore are tax evaders and are not contributing to the system in any way.
In a pinch, and if you are properly trained, you can hand prop your airplane to get it started and on your way if the battery is dead. To this day nobody has reported an alien hand starting a UFO. If they quit and don’t start, our Air Force (again, at our expense) has to tow them to New Mexico.
When you inadvertently meet a pilot you are likely to get a handshake, a $20 hamburger and some flying talk. Meet an alien under the same circumstances and you are likely to get probed, mind-erased and reproduced.
This is why aliens are never invited to fly-ins, pancake breakfasts, or FAA safety seminars. This is a pity, because the little green guys could really get something out of an FAA safety seminar. For example, they could learn how to get an ATC clearance for once. This would negate the need to scramble fighters to intercept them all of the time and would make it easier for them to avoid near-misses with airliners.
Yo! Millennium Falcon—Squawk Altitude, Willya?! Is it too much to ask ET to maintain a hard altitude and squawk mode C? Apparently. UFOs routinely fly though clouds without a clearance and constantly break the 250 knots below 10,000 feet rule.
The worst problem that visiting UFOs seem to have is crashing. I attribute this to them having a case of “aviation envy.” Imagine being an alien and your view screen shows all sorts of General Aviation pilots cavorting though the skies, feeling g forces, worrying about weather, talking gleefully with ATC controllers and having a whale of a time.
There you sit in your green foggy haze, the stupid spacecraft is doing everything automatically without being asked and you can’t feel a thing. What would you do? You would do what many hapless visitors from the outer rim of the galaxy have done—you would click off the auto flight system and hand-fly that sucker!
Hey E.T. – Have You Completed Your Bi-Century Flight Review?
The problem is you haven’t hand-flown this space craft in over 6,000 of our earth years. In addition to not being current you are very close to a very big and hard chunk of rock—our planet.
Add to those facts the knowledge that every living human with visual range of your spacecraft is watching and evaluating your fly-by performance and I think you can see the problems here. You are under-qualified, under-trained and are in over your big bulbous head.
In addition to that, depending on what star system you are from, you are probably trying to show off a little. Every pilot in the universe has from time to time made an ass out of himself or herself by doing something stupid in the air.
This whole situation is a cockpit resource management crisis about to happen. I’m surprised there aren’t 20 UFO CFITs (controlled flight into terrain) every day!
There is certainly no need for General Aviation pilots to envy our UFO brethren. Sure, they have fancy, shiny and really fast rides, but I ask you, where is the fun?
The Star Pilots From Algernon Five Will Meet in Tent Six at 3 pm
Perhaps at the next Oshkosh or Lakeland fly-in we could add a UFO section right next to where the ultralights are parked. Both groups are a little “out there” and would get along nicely. The aliens would have an opportunity to review the latest in General Aviation products and ideas and we pilots could have a conversation with them that didn’t include the term “anal probe.”
It’s Not Just Them…
We humans may be falling into the same trap as our little green buddies. As airplanes get more and more modern they lose the feel of the old days. Not that the old days were that great. Nobody wants to fly airplanes that randomly come apart or experience frequent engine failures.
On the other hand, a lot of our airplanes are already better at navigating themselves than we are. Many airliners, like the 777 I used to fly, do a better autoland in bad weather than I can hand-fly. You’d be crazy to try and hand prop most production General Aviation aircraft—and when was the last time you did an actual NDB approach in real weather?
When we add technology to our aircraft designs we certainly gain a lot. We increase safety, accuracy, economy and style. In any exchange there are losses for every gain. For the improvements to our flying technology we have given up many of the sights, smells and feelings that flying used to give us.
GPS is a very accurate way to navigate, but when was the last time you followed a railroad track or read a water tower? You can probably access up-to-date weather data through some sort of interface in your cockpit but when was the last time you tried to gauge the wind by looking at a wind-sock?
When aliens have an engine failure they crash. When was the last time you practiced a zero-thrust approach and landing? Next time you are tired from trying to program the GPS on your Cessna do me a favor and open a window or vent. Fly uncoordinated for a minute just to remember what it feels like. Look out a window, enjoy the view and feel a little pity for our UFO alien pilot counterparts that don’t have windows, can’t open a vent and wouldn’t know what to do with a rudder pedal if it hit them on their left tentacle.
Kevin Garrison’s aviation career began at age 15 as a lineboy in Lakeland, Fla. He came up through general aviation and is currently a senior 767 captain. When not frightening passengers, Kevin plays tennis and lives on a horse farm in Kentucky, where he writes unsold humor projects and believes professional wrestling is real and all else is bogus.
