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Showing posts from March, 2008

pull me out of the air crash

Well, that was unexpectedly exciting. "International diversions are unusual," said the still-slightly-shaken stewardess over the PA, as we taxied towards Schiphol International. It was something of an understatement. I had heard of airplanes that took off aiming for one country but wound up landing in another - most notably in Gander on 11 Sep 01 - but until today it hadn't ever happened to anyone I knew. I've had a fair number of interesting airborne expeditions. In no particular strict chronological order, they include a Douala-Harare flight that featured an abrupt and unscheduled stopover in Kinshasa, at the height of the Congo's civil war; careening across the Himalaya on a Buddha Air prop plane full of bags of apples, with cotton swabs for earplugs; a six-seater Cessna caught in the swooping up-, down- and side- drafts above the Grand Canyon; my solo skydive from 12,500 feet over Empuriabrava; a thunderstorm landing in the Papua New Guinea highlands; a flig