Brought down to Earth

[Cal Alamein]

The helicopter ride to and from the rigs was the most dangerous part of my Dad's job. They ended up making them fly from Aberdeen to Shetland to then take the chopper rather than a longer chopper ride from Aberdeen to the rig to try and mitigate the risk a little.

My dad was an engineer who made that chopper trip a couple of times.

His main commute was from Stavanger to oil platforms in the North Sea. There was a helicopter crash from a platform which killed a couple of his workmates and the survivors were fortunate to be rescued in icy waters.

We flew dozens of flights on small planes (4-9 seaters) in northern Alaska. Rarely ever felt in danger as most pilots are exceptional, cautious and did not hesitate to cancel if the flight conditions were crap.

[Gangster Octopus]

Balders, the big thing to remember about flying in passenger jets, is that you are statistically safer on the plane than you are at literally any other point in your life.

Unless, of course, Boeing are trying to make a bit of extra profit...

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Even with that, you're still safer in a plane than literally anywhere else. In 2019 there were 8 fatal crashes in 44 million flights, killing 257 people. (The ethiopian boeing 737max accounted for 157 of that 257) The US hasn't had a fatal airline crash since February 2009

[G-Man]

I was in a helicopter once and loved it.

Anyway, Dassault... it's ironic that the scion of a war plane manufacturing family should die in a helicopter crash. I managed to hold back the tears at the news.

[Guy Profumo]

I was in a helicopter once and loved it.

Anyway, Dassault... it's ironic that the scion of a war plane manufacturing family should die in a helicopter crash. I managed to hold back the tears at the news.

More appropriate if his villa had been strafed, surely?

[slackster]

I did that JFK<>Manhattan helicopter transfer a few times back in the day, and I’d blagged an upgrade to BA First (and Concorde once). The operators couldn’t quite get their head around me then walking to/from the E34 St heliport and my hotel if I was staying midtown.

The only other chopper ride was in Toronto as a teen: on a Scouts exchange trip my host’s dad had a best mate who did the rush hour eye in the sky travel reports on the local radio, and I got a trip buzzing over the city streets with him in exchange for having to speak about our trip live on air. The latter experience was much more scary to me.