A pilot due to fly a Boeing 757 from Minorca back to England stood on a chair in the departure lounge and asked for a 'show of hands' vote. The question? " Hands up those who want to fly with me ". The 'plane was being delayed because of the on-board computer. It kept showing that the 'plane was in the air when it was still on the ground. The Times of London reports that he was covered in oil, from crawling around inside the 'plane, when making this announcement.

Of the 200 plus passengers only 13 voted not to fly. The plane made the journey without incident.

How would you have voted ?

I'd still go. I have no problems with flying. In fact, I feel much safer in the air than driving around with some of the idiots who are on the road these days.

I'd vote to fly; obviously the computer was wrong, and the Pilot took the trouble to check out the plane, thus covered in oil, and had more confidence in the human element than the computers (which were obviously wrong, since the plane was on the ground). He demonstrated his credability. He was going to fly the plane and make decisions, not the obviously wrong computer. My kind of guy!

Why, however, do I feel I'm missing something with the "covered with oil" reference and feel there's a trick question here?

No question, I'd fly in a heartbeat. The pilot is the one responsible to interpret the instruments and get the plane safely to its destination anyway, the computer is a luxury item that is interpreted by the pilot. No problem at all.

nu-uh.
ever see (or read) 2001?
second guess and and backtalk a computer and what do you get?

i seriously dont trust computers. if it was screwing up on that, what else might it screw up on?

Well Sailracer, perhaps the oil bit was to show he hadn't just been sitting in the bar, thus getting the courage to chance it ! I expect that he could physically check obvious things such as bad electrical connections or something trivial sticking which might cause the reading.

Reminds me of the old advice my driving instructor gave about instruments: "The oil gauge.If this little gauge reads zero you need:a) new oil or b) a new engine or c) a new little gauge!Experience and the noise will tell you which (but you can always go and look)!"

I'd fly too. I'd reckon he isn't going to kill himself.

No way! In the first place, I don't trust any of those fly-by-night British airlines, not even when they're flying "'planes" built in America (not to mention things like Concordes). And if the computer on the "'plane" was kaflooey, God knows what else might have been, too.

P.S. Do the pilots on BA or whatever it was double as ground crew? That's not very reassuring, either.

Are you kidding? Not on your life! I mean...if a computer can show that the plane is in the air when it is sitting on the ground...then it can show that it is sitting on the ground when it is in the air! And that's just a chance I would not be willing to take!!!

See Maiku, I don't always disagree with you

No Maiku it was not a BA flight. It was some charter flight organised by the tour operators, though we haven't lost any of those that I can remember.

BA's big problem is not too few staff, it's having way too many. This is a result of being long a monopoly over key routes, of price-fixing, being the beneficiary of cosy cartel agreements and long a flagship carrier ( so getting great handouts from the government). Sabena and Swissair two other flagship carriers ( Belgium and Switzerland respectively ) have already gone bust; Air France has drastically cut routes or has them run under agency agreements by other carriers ( as does BA) AirLib a subsidised French internal carrier is about to go bankrupt.BA looked for quite a while to be another looming bankruptcy. It has stopped flying Concorde anyway; now if it can cut unnecessary staff it might survive.

In Europe we fly easyJet if we can.They have the youngest fleet of any major carrier They had placed the biggest ever order for new planes with Boeing, at least for planes of short-medium haul. Now they've done the same with Airbus.They are the cheapest. But then they make a profit and are properly run.

I was just joshing about BA, Fred.

I used to enjoy flying with BOAC to Europe, and have flown with BEA inside Europe in the past. Whatever happened to those, by the way? Is BA the successor to both, or what?

Now, hearing that this was a charter flight does nothing to allay the misgivings I would have had. As I said, if the computer was bad, maybe the tyres were, too. Or the engines. Some trivial thing like that. And I always avoid charter flights like the plague. These are typically way, way understaffed, in my experience.

I must say, when I first read your story, I thought maybe you had mixed it up with one of those old wartime movies. You know, the ones where the intrepid RAF pilot (handsome, with finely-chiseled features, though probably smeared with oil, too) is begging for a crew to risk a critical bombing run with him over to Bremen. You remember how the dialogue goes: "Of course I don't have to tell you that some of us may not be coming back." "That's all right, Jack, old boy! Let's suit up, chaps, and get this old crate into the air." "Right-ho! Next stop old Goering's backyard...", etc.

I knew you were not serious about BA, maiku. This plane would not have inspired confidence. It had already been delayed six hours for various repairs; this was the 'last straw ' for the pilot who found that with all faults supposedly cured a sensor in the nose wheel was stuck hence the computer 'deducing' that the plane was in the air. Such matters do not suggest good maintenance.

British travellers are deserting tour operators with their 'own name' ( actually painted on for the season)planes and making up their own 'packages'to Europe based on easyJet or Ryanair routes; this is easy with the internet. Apart from cheap holidays in major towns this has brought sudden wealth to some small, delightful places (e.g Perpignan and Carcassone) where these operators have seen potential and cheap airports to fly to.

BEA and BOAC went a good many years ago when British Airways was created from them .