Have you ever been on a scary turbulent flight?

[AbsentmindedWoman]

I'm curious what it was like? I've been on quite bumpy flights before, but the flight attendants always looked fine/ bored, so I wasn't worried and just kept watching whatever film. But I'm lucky as have no fear of flying in general, so perhaps easy for me to dismiss it.

Has anyone been on a really frightening flight where you were worried things might deteriorate? Did you get on a plane again after?

Worst was over the Irish sea.
Had to get drunk to find it fun

Been on a flight from Heathrow to Jersey when the plane caught on fire. That was scary. We dropped out of the sky which I thought was the end but was apparently them just losing altitude deliberately although K don’t know why. The cabin filled with smoke, it was hard to breathe. The flight attendants all had their masks on but ours didn’t drop so they came round with bottled water and soaked the material that Velcro’s to the headrests with water and we put them over our faces to breathe.
We turned round and made it back to Heathrow. They kept us in the departure lounge (evening flight) while they looked at the plane to see if we could get back on it. Umm, no. They couldn’t sort it so they flew us next day instead.
Weirdly extremely calm. The bloke in the row behind me, just before the smoke got so thick breathing was hard, said “I don’t believe this. On the way over they ran out of the drink I wanted and now this....”

We came back on a night flight from New York, and hit turbulence coming out over the Atlantic. For about 40 minutes, I honestly thought the plane was going to break apart - it was an old BA 747. I was so scared that I didn't sleep a wink, and when we got into Heathrow at dawn, the pilot aborted the landing..... almost vertically. It was horrific and people were screaming. Took ages for them to announce that there was another plane on the runway so had to get back up quickly.....

I haven't flown since.

Yes, flying from Memphis to Dallas. A hurricane hit while we were in the airport so we all had to go to the middle of the building away from all the glass windows. Surprising to us, the flight wasn’t cancelled...just delayed, but I remember looking out the window of the plane at all the lightning strikes hitting the city below. It was scary!

No but I was on one that did an emergency landing due to one of the wheels getting stuck and not going in on take off so we had to land with one wheel back at the airport we had just taken off from.

Bloody scary.

Yes

On a flight in Thailand. It was a very small plane which is a far more bumpy ride

I like a bit of turbulence but this was scary all food/drinks away and I think lights out

To and from Turkey a few times the turbulamce is quite bad (not sure if it’s the same area)

Yes, flying into Bangkok years ago. The whole flight was fairly sketchy - massive storms, the plane being struck by lightning (which they’re apparently cool with) but the last half hour was stressful as hell. Massive turbulence, oxygen masks dropping, people screaming - never been on another flight like it!

Flight back to Heathrow from Glasgow or Edinburgh, can’t recall which. We were on the plane on the stand for over two hours due to terrible weather. When we finally took off there was turbulence the whole flight. The passengers all clapped when we touched down at Heathrow.

[quote forinborin]@Honeyroar
Interesting, thank you! I assume medication is for the longer haul flights? Because it presumably takes some time to take effect, so pretty much useless for 1-2 hour flights?[/quote]
The short haul crew/planes will have the same medical equipment and training. Some of their flights could be up to 5 hours. But no they probably wouldn’t be used on very short flights. I can’t remember how long the drug takes to work. Thankfully never had to use it.

@aibutohavethisusername

Flight back to Heathrow from Glasgow or Edinburgh, can’t recall which. We were on the plane on the stand for over two hours due to terrible weather. When we finally took off there was turbulence the whole flight. The passengers all clapped when we touched down at Heathrow.

Landing in Glasgow is almost always a rather bouncy affair for some reason, IME.

Quite a few, but the only one that genuinely scared me was about an hour before landing in Antigua a few years ago, we were lurching and plummeting.

I was on a UK flight from London to Scotland and the pilot announced before take off that he was expecting a lot of turbulence due to the wind speeds and if anyone wanted to disembark to speak to the cabin crew. A few people did get off, which delayed us as they had to make sure their hold luggage was removed from the flight. The pilot came back on the intercom when we were just north of Liverpool to say we were flying into a headwind of (I can't remember the exact number, but something like 155mph) and he had no idea why it was so smooth! Ended up being a perfectly normal flight.

Once going to Majorca one engine failed.

It was very bumpy and a few sharp drops made me feel quite queasy.

DD was 16 months at the time and found it highly entertaining and cheered at every dip

Was that at Bournemouth by any chance? Every time I land there I shit myself- I think it is because it is so close to the sea = windy

I've been on two very bumpy ones with wind-- one going into Leeds where all flights after ours were diverted, and another in a small plane to Switzerland, so bumpy.

The worst experience Ive had was going to India, at take off from London a woman started screaming and crying 'let me off we are all going to die please let me off there's a bomb on the plane'. It was awful, I went cold with fear at the terrified tone of her voice, having flashbacks of Final Destination. The cabin crew did nothing! Everyone was so scared and agitated. Weirdly when we got off the ground she went totally silent. Maybe she had a sedative which kicked in.

Yes a few. A bad one Brisbane to Sydney lots of regular flyers were freaked out, not helped by a woman completely freaking out during it. A few into Wellington. If anyone has flown into Wellington then they know that those pilots are amazing battling those winds, I’ve definitely had a few scary ones though, one was the last flight allowed before all flight were suspended before a big storm him. Worse was Frankfurt to Manchester on a Lufthansa flight, I think I could have handled the turbulence if it didn’t feel like the plain was about to be ripped apart.

It’s never put me off, I still love flying, especially long haul.

@PenCreed

Yes. Landing in high winds, twice - both times at the same airport in the UK. The first time it was like the plane was being shaken all the way down, and the man next to me started throwing up in the sick bag.

The second time we got halfway into landing and then had to go back up and circle for half an hour. The plane was being buffeted the whole time, DH was green, and I was starting to freak out that we were going to die.

I've been on a plane and flown into that airport since.

Was that at Bournemouth by any chance? Every time I have landed there I usually end up crying 🙄 I think it is because it is so close to the sea = windy

Nothing as full on as some of these! I had cabin crew on one flight rush everyone to collect drinks back saying 'Trust me, it is going to be like Alton Towers in here in a few minutes' and so it was.

A take off from New York that was very strained and turbulent and things obviously weren't properly secured where cabin crew were sitting just up from me as things had come loose and were flying around there.

A flight where we had to land at an unscheduled airport suddenly and get off for 3 hours whilst they checked the plane. All very calmly handled and no noticeable problems to us.

Nothing too major.

Quite a bit, but the worst was an air bubble that came out of nowhere - plane was fine fine fine and then dropped. It must have been less than a second, but I honestly thought I was going to die.

Not turbulence, but we flew in a teeny tiny plane over the Nazca lines in Peru, and the pilot would dip the wing each side in turn so we could see over each of the lines. Very helpful of him, but every one of the six passengers threw up within the space of our hour long flight. It was so disgusting. The Inca-cola sangria we’d all drunk the night before probably didn’t help though...

O flights to Madeira that regularly go wrong on landing on a platform along the sea...one time ended up at another airport altogether as I think they have a rule that if a pilot doesn't nail it within 2 goes they are not allowed a 3rd attempt.

We were on the way back from majorca when I was 20 weeks pregnant with my first. It was late September and the weather here was stormy and windy, apparently they stopped some flights. As the flight went on the turbulence got worse and worse and we were not allowed to get up, it was so loud and bumpy constantly and then it suddenly felt like we dropped, horrible sensation and I was so scared it had hurt my baby! Was so glad to get off the flight safely, really scary.

Crosswinds going into Salzburg a couple of years ago, airport is in a tight valley with mountains either side. One aborted landing, warnings that may have to divert to Munich (we were on a weekend break so would have been a pita) but successful second attempt if bumpy.

Flying into Naples many years ago, low cost last minute deal via a little known budget Italian airline with old stock. Italians crossing themselves on approach and applauding on hitting the tarmac after a very rough time.

Yes. Small flight in Thailand flying from an island to Bangkok as a part of my solo travels in my early 20s. We were circling above a severe storm for an hour above Bangkok and couldn’t land. The pilot announced we were running out of fuel so had to go through the storm. It was black and like being thrown around on a rollercoaster...a very nice french man on the row in front of me held my hand. I hate flying.

Once coming back from Belfast we got a lot of turbulence, but I was quite badly hungover and the plane was worryingly decrepit (bmibaby - remember them? No, thought not).

The worst though was trying to land in Birmingham coming back from some holiday destination in the middle of the night. There was a terrible storm and the poor pilot made two unsuccessful attempts at landing. It's the only time I've joined in with the applause on landing when he finally got it down safely on the third attempt.

In the 80s I came in to land at Alice Springs airport with fire engines hurtling alongside us as we touched down 😬 We disembarked normally but the air slides were down on two exits!

Trouble was, as I was on-going, we had to wait HOURS as a spare part was flown up from Adelaide. Then we all calmly climbed back on board......

Yes, Chicago to Heathrow. The trolley came rolling out of the galley quickly down the aisle. A man later on had the nerve to ask why dinner was late.
Boston to Heathrow, BA seemed to be the only flight not cancelled. After 2 miserable days of torrential rain (and not being able to buy wellies for less than $200!) we just wanted to get home. Preferably alive. We had to fly above the storm but it was a hairy take off and climb.