On my trips back and forth down under, I've had a chance to sample the flying prowess of both US and Australian pilots. And I have to say, I prefer the ones for the United States.
Thinking back on the humble origins of the Queensland & Northern Territories Air Service (see! I'll bet there are plenty of Australians out there that had no idea that's what QANTAS stood for!) it was really started by a bunch of people who needed planes to get to the nearest Woolies for a pair of Y-fronts.Now before Americans laugh, just think of what some of us go through to get to the nearest Wal*Mart, awright?
But it's not the lengths those intrepid pilots went through to fly, but rather the fact that the "seat of the pants/ any landing you walk away from is a good one" mentality I have a problem with. While US pilots sorta of have the feeling that landing should be more like a swan landing on a still lake, Qantas pilots seem to think that landing a plane is more like one of the Swedish Chef's "flappen-jacken" shot down off the ceiling. But what's more amazing is that the cargo of these erstwhile wrangler pilots is about 200 thoroughly complacent Aussies to whom this slap dash approach to getting on the ground seems to mean nothing to.So a landing where a US pilot would be standing at the exit by way of apology is instead interpreted by Qantas as being a flight attendant mouthing a very indifferent "Bu-bye.." as you pass. Makes you wonder if there were pilots behind that closed cockpit door or was it instead a filming of an episode of Mythbusters.
I guess they can blame it all on overseas maintenance.
- Farmer Ted
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