Starting out writing this, I’m commuting home from a four day trip, both sides un-commutable. Yesterday started relatively early, with a 6:30 AM van ride to the airport in Newberg, New York, near West Point US Army Officer Academy, where President Obama spoke Saturday before we arrived. There were no signs left from the Secret Service personnel, of whom the van driver said had been staying in the hotel all week, and I had a good and needed rest for our long day of Sunday flying.
With a friendly Co-Pilot and Flight Attendant, we made our way through almost eight hours of flying, which entailed six flights and twelve hours to perform it in. Newberg-Philadelphia-Louisville-Philadelphia-Washington-Rochester-Washington was on the agenda, but a low pressure weather system and the forecast east winds and relatively low cloud ceiling in Philly promised to slow us down. My First Officer had plans to meet his wife in Milwaukee, to spend the night there before heading to Charlotte the next morning. With the delays in Philadelphia we were expecting, it was questionable whether he could catch the last flights from Washington to Philadelphia. He commutes from Green Bay, Wisconsin, and is a fellow brother in Christ. We had a good conversation about some of the particulars of Protestant Christian theology, and enjoyed flying together.
Our first two flights arrived in Philly and “Loua-Vule” on time. Now we just had to go through Philadelphia one more time, and we wouldn’t expect any delays in and out of Washington. In Philadelphia, when the winds are from the east, the airport runway layout can’t accept the same amount of departure and arrival traffic as it would normally. This can create major ATC delays, especially for traffic inbound to Philadelphia. Our scheduled departure time out of Louisville was 11:35 AM, and Louisville clearance delivery had given us a ‘wheels up’ takeoff time of 1:01 PM. We had time to hang out some, eat lunch, and talk about our commuting plans. I couldn’t make it home even if we arrived in DC on time, our Flight Attendant, a new one but a good one (she had flown for a regional based in Atlanta previously) could still make her commute flight even if we were a couple hours late, and my Co-Pilot was scheming and trying to figure out a plan to catch his last flight available in record time. It seemed we would arrive in DC at about 7:30 PM, and that’s when the last flight to Milwaukee was.
We pushed back without three missing passengers in Louisville, in order to meet the 1:00 PM takeoff time. Just then, ATC surprised us with a new delay, a 2:05 PM takeoff time. No! We had a couple options: taxi out and hope for a shortened delay, or wait to see if our three missing passengers would make it back to the gate. We could board them on our plane, taxi out, and still make the new 2:05 PM takeoff slot. In the interest of providing good customer service (this is a customer service business, despite what some of my Co-Pilot’s seem to feel), we started our engines and taxied the thirty yards back to the gate to board our three lost passengers. In actuality, we lost one passenger, who had said ‘enough’ and got off our jet to travel another day, and we put on four, for a gain of three and a ‘full boat’ back to Philly. The ‘circus music’ had started playing, because whenever a plane returns to the gate, one-third of our pax ask the Flight Attendant the litany of ‘will I still make my connection?’ type questions, and they were doing it now. Dealing with those issues is the Gate Agent’s job, and it’s a tough one in this situation. They generally make an announcement in the cabin (I asked her to this time) that ‘NOW is the time to leave the flight if you want to, that this aircraft will leave the gate again and not come back.’
We got our new passengers on board and just as we were closing up, ATC notified us that the ground delay program had been canceled, along with our 2:05 PM takeoff delay. We were released to Philly, and in quick order we taxied and took off. As we broke ground I wondered if that passenger we lost saw us climbing out into the blue Louisville sky.
Fast forward four days later: I’m commuting again back to work, trying to go through Chicago. Before my first of two flights to get me to Washington, Chicago had a ground stop issued by ATC for “VIP movement” (President Obama). My Sioux Falls-Chicago flight was now delayed till 7:15 PM instead of 6:30 PM, and with a scheduled 45 minute connection to Washington on a normal day, I knew I'd be running for it. And I literally was, after seeing on the departure monitor that my flight was delayed by five minutes, and that many others were as well. "Can't you do something, Mr. Obama, without displeasing someone?"
I caught my breath in my window seat and our Airbus taxied out for Washington National. Leaving Chicago, I’m transfixed by what I see. We’ve turned to the east just after breaking ground in smooth air, and the vast, expansive grid of greater Chicago spreads out in the window in that appealing orange halogen color the street lights have. Miles and miles of it are broken up occasionally by the stray winding expressway with white and red lit drivers making their way to where they’re going. The famous Chicago skyline is now ahead and to the right, with the (former) Sears Tower and the Hancock Tower framing the ends of it. Oddly, downtown and Lake Michigan seems to be backlight tonight. After closer observation and some scuddy clouds clear out of the way, it can plainly be seen that a full moon is out tonight, shining it’s white, reflected light on the calm, black surface of Lake Michigan. It casts a white, milky beam across the water, seemingly all the way to Indiana and the Notre Dame ‘capital’ at South Bend.
I am reminded that scenes like this one, which I first enjoyed while flying standby as a passenger on American Airlines as a kid, really make an impact on me. I really enjoy the beauty the skies can have, I guess you could say my eyes behold it. With the distractions and stresses of life, it’s can be easy to overlook the beautiful things, whether it’s in the sky or in your personal or family life. As the sky goes, maybe I’ve been doing some overlooking lately. But it is now thunderstorm season, and I know there will be plenty to appreciate soon! (And to be wary of)
Speaking of which, it’s a convenient time to transition back to the previous trip's Louisville departure to Philadelphia. Soon we’re climbing to our cruising altitude of 29,000 feet (“Flight Level two niner zero”). In blue sky and sunshine, my First Officer turns on the radar, and increases the range to 80 miles, then 160 miles. The tilt is low and the gain is turned up, but the screen barely shows any green returns, and that’s probably from the ground. The white, wispy clouds ahead, with a few curved, more solid looking bumps bulging slightly above them, indicate that we’ll probably have to do some deviating from our course line ahead, in spite of the clean radar returns.
We’re just not close enough to it yet; when we get within about 40-60 miles some good returns start showing up, the worst color they show is yellow. The view out the windscreen compels us to ask ATC for deviations, even if the radar was blank. The cumulonimbus tops are only two to three thousand feet above us, it looks like, but in reality they are probably four to six thousand feet higher. The tops look relatively flat, for thunderstorms, but looks can be deceptive. I see a bolt out into the burning blue sky out of one of them in front of us, confirming that these puppies can still bite. By this time I’ve been trying to ask center for a heading of 15, now 20 degrees left to avoid this buildup in front of us. The center controller I’ve been trying to check in with has been busy handling other airline traffic, and now we’re 15 miles closer to this storm than when we started calling. Another 30 seconds to a minute of this and my FO and I agree that we’re turning left, no matter what.
We could make it through it OK, but it would be constant moderate turbulence at the least, possibly severe occasionally, with icing in the tops of the cumulus formations, and a chance of lightning and wind shear with the turbulence. Not good for the pax or the Flight Attendant, and definitely not good customer service. The controller finally responds and serves us with an approval to “deviate left as required, direct Gordonsville (GVE) when able”.
Overall, it’s a good primer for the now-here thunderstorm season. A broad layer of wispy clouds stretches from left to right. As my Co-Pilot has the autopilot finish the turn to make our first of several heading deviations for buildups, we confer with each other, and agree that our course to the left, mostly in the clear, is better than to the right of the cumulonimbus. On the radar, another yellow spot, the biggest one, is now plainly seen; if we had deviated to the right we would have less room to deal with this cell than if we had turned left. Looking out the window, this largest storm cloud is mostly obscured by this thin layer of clouds previously mentioned. If we were a thousand feet lower, this situation would meet the classic definition of an embedded thunderstorm; the wispy clouds leftover from previous buildups wouldn‘t let us visually see the danger ahead! We later fly through some of these wispy areas, they are generally fairly smooth, with occasional light chop and nothing else.
We made it through the rest fairly unscathed day after arriving in Philadelphia. Philly to Washington to Rochester to Washington went off without a hitch, minus our standard wait for ramp agents to park our jet in DC, both times. However, we didn't make up enough time to improve my FO's chances of going to Milwaukee.
With my FO a little dejected, I was walking with him to the crew room when he spied the departure monitor board, and saw that he might have one last chance to make it to Milwaukee, via an American Eagle flight from Washington to Chicago, then the last United Express flight of the night to Milwaukee. He would be running for it, but we both thought he just might make it. He ran off to the gate, just like I would in the future tonight, but I don’t know if he made it or not. If President Obama didn’t get in his way, he was probably fine! I took his flight bag back to the crew room and then myself to Chipotle for a good, needed dose of burrito. I made it home the next morning, starting this post on the way.
I'm giving our President Obama a little bit of a hard time. But I'm just poking fun at everyone else who seems to be. Lately he's been taking flak from all sides, not just Republicans. I think his current troubles are more politically partisan based and stem from a lack of PR control rather than lack of performance. It's true that far left liberals haven't gotten what they've wanted from Obama, but neither have right wing conservatives. Is not preventing the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster and spill, and performing an inadaquate leak stoppage and cleanup, really his fault? No, the Deepwater Horizon disaster is not Obama's 'Katrina'.
Excuse me for getting too political, perhaps. I just feel that we should have a minimum amount of respect for our political leaders, no matter how much we disagree with them. We should pray for them, it's in the Bible too: "I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone— for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth." (I Timothy 2:1-4).
And the Bible teaches that we should pay our appropriate taxes to the government: : "Render, therefore, unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God, the things that are God's" are Jesus' words from Matthew 22:21.
That's it for now. Thanks for reading my blog.
Showing posts with label Taxes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Taxes. Show all posts
Monday, May 31, 2010
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
A Taxing time
Hello, It’s Tax Day. Taxes are in the news, people are protesting, mailing tea bags to their 'favorite' Congressman and such. Uh, no comment. Anyway, are yours done? I wasn’t late with mine, but I’m late with this post. I’d hoped to finish it before Easter, then by tax day, but I’ve had a ‘taxing time’, doing mine last week, almost late and in haste. It’s all good though. Through the grapevine, I’ve heard that my posts can be ‘long’. In response, I’ll try to shorten them in the future. Just think though, I write every week at the most, so it’s about the same material as if I wrote three shorter posts a week! A glossary is in the works too, so the acronyms won’t be so confusing. Here’s where I started on this one.
It’s Palm Sunday, on the fourth day of my current five day sequence. I’ve hit the wall, so to speak. I’m officially homesick and weary, sleep indebted, and missing my wife and two young girls. A number of things are going on in my world right now, spinning in and out of my head, in addition to a trip interspersed with spring season curveballs.
Day one: Afternoon show in DCA, DH to PHL, wait for my FO and FA to arrive late from another flight they were performing so we can all go late to YUL, CAN (“Muntrayall”) and back. We depart PHL about two hours later than scheduled. Montreal is really an island, and beautiful at night, lit up so we can see the outline of the lake and rivers that surround the city. We pass by the attractive Olympic tower (which was finished in 1987, only 11 years late! click here to find out more info about the tower) again on base leg to final, as we always do. Lately I’ve been fantasizing about a Toyota Tundra truck making a colossal jump off the tower and surviving, just like in the TV commercials. We were empty back to the States because all our peeps went on an earlier flight. Our male FA enjoyed the view from ‘his jumpseat’, a different one that his normal seat if you know what I mean (I didn’t tell you that BTW). I found out about his fiancé and got to know him better, as I had worked with him before. He’s a good guy and good FA in spite of his trait to talk incessantly.
A ‘converging’ ILS approach to runway 17 in PHL meant exactly that: PHL ATC had the Boeings and Airbuses flying approaches to 9L, towards the east, while we were landing toward the south, our flight path converging with their flight path, if we both went missed at the same time. To prevent this, the FAA has an alternate missed approach procedure, which for us is an immediate left turn away from runway 9L’s approach path. Higher legal cloud and visibility minimums than normal on this approach also better facilitate the separation of aircraft in the event of a ‘missed’. I had to program the alternate missed approach in the FMS manually, but it’s just par for the course. The approach turned out to be a layered affair, with multiple orange street light lit cloud levels unfolding before us down to about 1,000 ft AGL, revealing a damp runway to land on.
A midnight departure for the short hop to DC, still one hour behind schedule, had me leaving the thrust up for maximum speed at 10,000 ft MSL, about 320 knots until Baltimore VOR, which we have to cross at 250, even in the middle of the night. DCA ATIS reported 1 mile visibility with moderate rainfall and 800 ft OVC (overcast). On the ILS approach to runway 01 I had ground contact but only a dynamic gray wet splotch on the windscreen. Ah, that’s what wipers are for. The runway appeared with no depth perception, the darkness, wipers and rain on the windscreen taking away what was left of it. Soon we saw that this airport, ‘The Nation’s Airport’, was absolutely soaked with water, with big, deep puddles in the low spots of the predominately asphalt runway and ramp surfaces. Full reverse thrust and light to moderate braking with what seemed like a little hydroplaning later, we turned off two runway exits later than normal. We taxied in and ‘treated’ (we had to) the passengers to dashing down the airstairs in the hard rain to get on the bus for the short ride to the terminal. The women looked like cats, the men like sheep. I looked for an umbrella in the coat closet, and found one just when the bus was leaving without me and my crew. The younger FO and FA went for it, college kid style. I caught up to my FO and we shared a taxi to our respective crash pads at Crystal City, Arlington, DC. It was lights out at 2 AM, after a cool down spent reviewing the day. This was only a one day trip, so I was starting anew at 1 PM with a new crew, and the show time was creeping up to me.
My new crew was all female, a switch from the all male crew the first day. I was paired us with a new FA I hadn’t flown with before, a friendly and outspoken Chicagoan, and an FO I have flown with before. She’s got skills, as they say. An all around good FO communicates well, flies well, and is proactive and helpful, among other things, and she fits the bill nicely, ready to upgrade if you ask me, but she’ll have to wait awhile in today’s climate.
On the agenda was DCA-CAE-CLT-MKE, and a 10 hour overnight there. Our sky chariot arrived late, and we rushed to swap into it as the Captain handing it off to us checked the operation of the cabin door. He said the FA told him it was difficult to open. It seemed fine to him, and that was good enough to me, as I watched him operate it. Our peeps were on the ramp, peering through the bus windows, imprisoned together with a hair trigger impulse to board at the first sign, at least that’s always my impression. Columbia, SC, the Capital, was sunny, but compensated for that with a gusty crosswind, evidenced in the new leaves on the trees before the runway swishing their color just below us on short final. We had a friendly jumpseater in the cockpit with us, who had the last name Gurley. We called him ‘girlieman’, of course, and he said we weren’t the first to do so. It was OK because he is one of us, a fellow Captain for my airline, going home for a few days. His nickname fit even better after he couldn’t open the door. See, our FA called him to assist in opening the cabin door, she had lifted the handle but it wouldn’t open. She tried, he tried, I tried, and we all scratched our collective heads. I’d never had a cabin door that I couldn’t open. We had 50 peeps in back dealing with yet another delay, and I had the voice of Clint Eastwood from Heartbreak Ridge in my head declaring “Marines improvise, adapt, and overcome” as I felt compelled to quickly resolve the problem. My FO told the station over our radio that we couldn’t get it open, and after opening the service door I told a ramp agent of the problem, and to bring external stairs over to the service door. The service door, on the right side of the plane, right across from the cabin door, is much shorter and narrower than the cabin door. Catering drivers board drinks and supplies through it. It was unorthodox, but I briefed the pax over the PA on what we were doing and what to expect. They looked like they were coming out of a cave into the sunlight; I stood on the platform at the top of the external stairs to help them out. Contract maintenance came relatively quickly, and after a couple minutes, he got the door to open. How? He replied ‘I pushed’. I couldn’t believe it, we had all pushed, hard, before, I think. How did a mechanic pulling, pressing, and inspecting a door for a few minutes make it operate better than we had? After letting the FA operate it again and a phone conversation with MX based on her comments, they decided to MEL (Minimum Equipment List) the door as a deferred maintenance item. The handle didn’t feel right to her, and I agreed that it was likely that the door would jam again sometime in the future. With the door MEL’d, that meant we could fly the plane, but without passengers. We were to ferry the plane to CLT, the short flight that we were already scheduled to do, and then take a different plane to MKE. Presumably, another crew would take the broken door and the jet it was attached to towards a MX base from CLT.
My FO, ‘Jan’, ran to Burger King for a flight deck meal that wasn’t ‘fit for a king’. To save time, we boarded as soon as the FA was ready. Jan climbed our different, good plane into the dark sky over North Carolina as in haste I ate my lukewarm and getting cold whopper, and listened to a new jumpseater we had with us tell me about why he was grateful we were taking him to MKE. He was a US Airways Captain, and his father lay dying in Wisconsin, an hour’s drive north of MKE. His father was afflicted with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease, and he had been unable to properly swallow food or liquid for about a month. They had stopped feeding him and giving him water because of this. Food and liquid in his lungs had already caused an infection and worsened his condition, and he had given a ‘no feeding tube’ order. My jumpseater hoped he could make it there in time, we could only hope with him and sympathize with him. My own father in-law has Parkinson’s disease, and he has a lot of trouble with just moving around, with hand-eye and body coordination, and vision. But he still has his faculties mentally. What a trial that must be for the close relatives of those afflicted with Alzheimer’s. We were glad to serve him, even though we, our 50 pax and one jumpseater arrived 1 hour late, over dark Lake Michigan, into the welcoming lights of the ‘Brew City’ and the green and white MKE airport beacon.
Day three was coming quickly. A short overnight in MKE awoke us abruptly to our easiest day of this trip, a DH to PHL, then our flight to BUF for the overnight. We left on time and everything was normal for my leg to fly to this large city on the east end of ‘Erie’. Until we started getting ice on descent and approach, that is. We expected it, as you always do in areas downwind of the great lakes. Descending into the cloud deck about 10 minutes before landing, the ice detectors detected airframe icing immediately, indicated by a corresponding message 'ICE' displayed in yellow on one of our flight displays. The visual prscence of it on the windshield wipers confirmed it. We already had our engine anti-ice on, as is SOP, and turned the wing anti-ice on now. Immediately it was accumulating quickly, and internal my danger detector started illuminating. ‘Tell approach we have light to moderate clear icing’, I said while thinking this is moderate. The windscreen flashed all cold, alternatively gray and white. ‘Can you see any on the winglets’, I asked my FO. Her response was ‘I can’t see the winglets’; which made me look as well, sure enough. It’s rare that I’ve seen ‘thick’ clouds like this before, but this stuff is out there sometimes. It seemed to be very frothy, to have a lot of air spread in with the moisture. A particular nut and safety wire which is part of the windshield wiper arm assembly accumulates a lot of ice, and it had grown a pretty ice flower to a half dollar coin size within a couple of minutes maximum. I activated the engines’ continuous ignition, disengaged the autopilot, and asked Jan to ‘Tell approach this is moderate’ as we heard Colgan checking on the frequency behind us. If you’re in the know I don’t have to tell you about Colgan and Buffalo, where one of their big turboprops unfortunately crashed in icing conditions here in February. We had entered the clouds at 6,000 feet and now had been in icing for perhaps only three minutes when it seemed to subside as we were in the bottom of the layer, breaking out at 2,000 feet and looking for the Buffalo airport. The controls felt funny and gave a constant buffet at some point; either that or I was imagining it, because I was certain that icing had accumulated on our unprotected tail surfaces. But it was certified that way, ‘it’s OK’ says the FAA. Five extra knots airspeed wouldn’t and didn’t hurt on final. In the warmer air on final approach below the clouds the ice couldn’t hold on and started breaking off the airframe. We taxied in with almost nothing hanging to us, told the outbound crew of the conditions, and went to the downtown Holiday Inn hotel.
I did a few hours good work on our income taxes (part of this ‘taxing time’), and celebrated with my crew by dining at a neat German place called Ulrich’s. It was a speakeasy with food out front during prohibition, and is now a rustic place with plenty of character and excellent German food. I thought 'Now I know why my Iowa Dutch wife puts applesauce on her mashed potatoes', after seeing their potato pancakes served with a side of applesauce. 'Yaw', The Netherlands are right next to Germany, you know.
And that brings us back to where we started, day four, Palm Sunday morning, to be exact. What other things are taxing me, besides taxes, and the changeups and challenges in my flying? I have to bid for May’s schedule by Sunday night, to try to have a few critical days off. We have six legs to fly today, BUF-LGA-GSO-PHL-ORF-DCA-GSO. Fortunately it’s going to be a beautiful day, with a great air tour of Manhattan and a DC Potomac river visual approach, sightseeing the cherry blossoms in bloom around the Jefferson Memorial. I’ve promised to help out our union with some work, which I’ve hardly touched so far. I’ve already stated I’m homesick, and in addition, I’ll be missing Palm Sunday services and watching my Daughter Marissa sing with others in her age group as part of the service. I’ll admit it, I feel overwhelmed, burdened, and low on sleep, probably just a minuscule, molecular bit compared to how Jesus felt in his human body during his last week on earth.
Where do I go when I need a shelter?Where do I go when I need a friend? Where do I go when I need some helping? Where do I go? Back on my knees again.
That’s from a great classic song of praise. As a believer, for me, that’s easy to say, but hard to do, consistently, sincerely, and honestly. But this morning I try, and it helps, and I feel better about this day, with a measure of grace that only comes from the Lord above.
On Palm Sunday Jesus rode into Jerusalem not on a stallion as a conquering King whom for the Jews would bring rebellion and revolt against the occupying Romans, but as a gentle and peaceable King on a donkey’s colt, just as Zechariah 9:9 prophesied. Matthew 21:8-11 recounts how the crowds which lined in the streets in Jerusalem recognized but misinterpreted Jesus’ true glory: They spread their cloaks on the road, and waved palm branches, and shouted him along: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna (‘Save!’) in the highest!”. The ‘whole city was stirred’, but it wouldn’t last long. For more on Jesus' 'Victory Parade', click here for a good study of Luke 19:28-48.
I cannot do the rest of his story justice, especially his crucifixion, but I will try to look at one of some of the times of Jesus’ suffering, specifically his time praying in the garden of Gathsemane, where he came to terms with the work he was about to complete, and prayed and gained strength to 'finish the mission', in fighter pilot parlance. If you’d like to learn more about his crucifixion, click here.
From Matthew 26:36-46: Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to them, "Sit here while I go over there and pray." He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me." Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will." Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. "Could you men not keep watch with me for one hour?" he asked Peter. "Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak." He went away a second time and prayed, "My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done." When he came back, he again found them sleeping, because their eyes were heavy. So he left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing. Then he returned to the disciples and said to them, "Are you still sleeping and resting? Look, the hour is near, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us go! Here comes my betrayer!"
If he was the Son of God, why then was he ‘overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death’? Jesus often called himself the ‘Son of Man’, and as he was still in a human in an unresurrected, unglorified body, he still had the same ability to feel pain and suffering as we do. Jesus was in great agony over his approaching physical pain, separation from the Father, and death for the sins of the world. 'Overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death'; he was so stressed that his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground (Luke 22:44). I feel that the most indicative element of his sorrow is that he was starting to shoulder the burden of taking on the sin of all humanity, of becoming the sin that all humanity (including me and you) has and will commit (2 Corinthians 5:21).
He asked that the cup be taken from him, ONLY if it was possible. He furthermore asked that his Father’s, God’s, will be done. That’s not really saying ‘do I have to’ as a child (your child perhaps) might say to a parent, is it? Or was his human body, his ‘son of man’ body revolting in temptation to avoid the pain and suffering he now was just getting a taste of? Maybe so, the ‘spirit is willing but the body is weak’ verse I’ve heard here is usually applied in reference to him finding his disciples sleeping instead of praying. This could also be a reflection of his prayers and victory of his spiritual intent prevailing against his body seeking escape from the sorrow and pain he was already enduring and about to commit to in the deepest degree humanly possible. He was tempted to give up his mission, he prayed, multiple times, was victorious, and prevailed. Praise God!
Here's just a couple observations regarding his death on the cross. Crucifixion was a supremely horrible and tortuous death. Jesus had been flogged and whipped, and had been made to carry the crossbar for a ways until he could no longer. He was already weak before he got to Golgotha. Considering that and the burden of the sin guilt of humankind that he felt since the night before in the garden, it becomes understandable that Jesus declared ‘it is finished’ (John 19:30), gave up his spirit, and died before the other two crucified criminals did. Even in how and exactly when he died, Jesus fulfilled prophecy: he died without any bones being broken (John 19:31-37, Exodus 12:46, Numbers 9:12, and Psalm 34:20). If the soldiers had found Jesus to still be alive, they would've broken his legs, causing him to suffocate immdiately, like they did to the two other criminals crucified along with him. The Jews had asked Pilate to have their legs broken and their bodies taken down, because the Sabbath was about to begin, and this wasn't just any Sabbath, this was the Passover.
I can't make an Easter posting without referring to Jesus' resurrection, however. If you are so disposed, see these two sites for a defense and validation of the resurrection. By his resurrection, Jesus proved he has power over death, the power to have eternal life, and that he is God in the flesh. Because of his death on the cross and resurrection, and his Love and grace for you and me, he offers and will deliver eternal Life for anyone who believes in him.
If you don't, then try him out. Seek him out and believe. 'Taste and see that the Lord is good.' (Psalm 34:8) Happy Easter!
It’s Palm Sunday, on the fourth day of my current five day sequence. I’ve hit the wall, so to speak. I’m officially homesick and weary, sleep indebted, and missing my wife and two young girls. A number of things are going on in my world right now, spinning in and out of my head, in addition to a trip interspersed with spring season curveballs.
Day one: Afternoon show in DCA, DH to PHL, wait for my FO and FA to arrive late from another flight they were performing so we can all go late to YUL, CAN (“Muntrayall”) and back. We depart PHL about two hours later than scheduled. Montreal is really an island, and beautiful at night, lit up so we can see the outline of the lake and rivers that surround the city. We pass by the attractive Olympic tower (which was finished in 1987, only 11 years late! click here to find out more info about the tower) again on base leg to final, as we always do. Lately I’ve been fantasizing about a Toyota Tundra truck making a colossal jump off the tower and surviving, just like in the TV commercials. We were empty back to the States because all our peeps went on an earlier flight. Our male FA enjoyed the view from ‘his jumpseat’, a different one that his normal seat if you know what I mean (I didn’t tell you that BTW). I found out about his fiancé and got to know him better, as I had worked with him before. He’s a good guy and good FA in spite of his trait to talk incessantly.
A ‘converging’ ILS approach to runway 17 in PHL meant exactly that: PHL ATC had the Boeings and Airbuses flying approaches to 9L, towards the east, while we were landing toward the south, our flight path converging with their flight path, if we both went missed at the same time. To prevent this, the FAA has an alternate missed approach procedure, which for us is an immediate left turn away from runway 9L’s approach path. Higher legal cloud and visibility minimums than normal on this approach also better facilitate the separation of aircraft in the event of a ‘missed’. I had to program the alternate missed approach in the FMS manually, but it’s just par for the course. The approach turned out to be a layered affair, with multiple orange street light lit cloud levels unfolding before us down to about 1,000 ft AGL, revealing a damp runway to land on.
A midnight departure for the short hop to DC, still one hour behind schedule, had me leaving the thrust up for maximum speed at 10,000 ft MSL, about 320 knots until Baltimore VOR, which we have to cross at 250, even in the middle of the night. DCA ATIS reported 1 mile visibility with moderate rainfall and 800 ft OVC (overcast). On the ILS approach to runway 01 I had ground contact but only a dynamic gray wet splotch on the windscreen. Ah, that’s what wipers are for. The runway appeared with no depth perception, the darkness, wipers and rain on the windscreen taking away what was left of it. Soon we saw that this airport, ‘The Nation’s Airport’, was absolutely soaked with water, with big, deep puddles in the low spots of the predominately asphalt runway and ramp surfaces. Full reverse thrust and light to moderate braking with what seemed like a little hydroplaning later, we turned off two runway exits later than normal. We taxied in and ‘treated’ (we had to) the passengers to dashing down the airstairs in the hard rain to get on the bus for the short ride to the terminal. The women looked like cats, the men like sheep. I looked for an umbrella in the coat closet, and found one just when the bus was leaving without me and my crew. The younger FO and FA went for it, college kid style. I caught up to my FO and we shared a taxi to our respective crash pads at Crystal City, Arlington, DC. It was lights out at 2 AM, after a cool down spent reviewing the day. This was only a one day trip, so I was starting anew at 1 PM with a new crew, and the show time was creeping up to me.
My new crew was all female, a switch from the all male crew the first day. I was paired us with a new FA I hadn’t flown with before, a friendly and outspoken Chicagoan, and an FO I have flown with before. She’s got skills, as they say. An all around good FO communicates well, flies well, and is proactive and helpful, among other things, and she fits the bill nicely, ready to upgrade if you ask me, but she’ll have to wait awhile in today’s climate.
On the agenda was DCA-CAE-CLT-MKE, and a 10 hour overnight there. Our sky chariot arrived late, and we rushed to swap into it as the Captain handing it off to us checked the operation of the cabin door. He said the FA told him it was difficult to open. It seemed fine to him, and that was good enough to me, as I watched him operate it. Our peeps were on the ramp, peering through the bus windows, imprisoned together with a hair trigger impulse to board at the first sign, at least that’s always my impression. Columbia, SC, the Capital, was sunny, but compensated for that with a gusty crosswind, evidenced in the new leaves on the trees before the runway swishing their color just below us on short final. We had a friendly jumpseater in the cockpit with us, who had the last name Gurley. We called him ‘girlieman’, of course, and he said we weren’t the first to do so. It was OK because he is one of us, a fellow Captain for my airline, going home for a few days. His nickname fit even better after he couldn’t open the door. See, our FA called him to assist in opening the cabin door, she had lifted the handle but it wouldn’t open. She tried, he tried, I tried, and we all scratched our collective heads. I’d never had a cabin door that I couldn’t open. We had 50 peeps in back dealing with yet another delay, and I had the voice of Clint Eastwood from Heartbreak Ridge in my head declaring “Marines improvise, adapt, and overcome” as I felt compelled to quickly resolve the problem. My FO told the station over our radio that we couldn’t get it open, and after opening the service door I told a ramp agent of the problem, and to bring external stairs over to the service door. The service door, on the right side of the plane, right across from the cabin door, is much shorter and narrower than the cabin door. Catering drivers board drinks and supplies through it. It was unorthodox, but I briefed the pax over the PA on what we were doing and what to expect. They looked like they were coming out of a cave into the sunlight; I stood on the platform at the top of the external stairs to help them out. Contract maintenance came relatively quickly, and after a couple minutes, he got the door to open. How? He replied ‘I pushed’. I couldn’t believe it, we had all pushed, hard, before, I think. How did a mechanic pulling, pressing, and inspecting a door for a few minutes make it operate better than we had? After letting the FA operate it again and a phone conversation with MX based on her comments, they decided to MEL (Minimum Equipment List) the door as a deferred maintenance item. The handle didn’t feel right to her, and I agreed that it was likely that the door would jam again sometime in the future. With the door MEL’d, that meant we could fly the plane, but without passengers. We were to ferry the plane to CLT, the short flight that we were already scheduled to do, and then take a different plane to MKE. Presumably, another crew would take the broken door and the jet it was attached to towards a MX base from CLT.
My FO, ‘Jan’, ran to Burger King for a flight deck meal that wasn’t ‘fit for a king’. To save time, we boarded as soon as the FA was ready. Jan climbed our different, good plane into the dark sky over North Carolina as in haste I ate my lukewarm and getting cold whopper, and listened to a new jumpseater we had with us tell me about why he was grateful we were taking him to MKE. He was a US Airways Captain, and his father lay dying in Wisconsin, an hour’s drive north of MKE. His father was afflicted with Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease, and he had been unable to properly swallow food or liquid for about a month. They had stopped feeding him and giving him water because of this. Food and liquid in his lungs had already caused an infection and worsened his condition, and he had given a ‘no feeding tube’ order. My jumpseater hoped he could make it there in time, we could only hope with him and sympathize with him. My own father in-law has Parkinson’s disease, and he has a lot of trouble with just moving around, with hand-eye and body coordination, and vision. But he still has his faculties mentally. What a trial that must be for the close relatives of those afflicted with Alzheimer’s. We were glad to serve him, even though we, our 50 pax and one jumpseater arrived 1 hour late, over dark Lake Michigan, into the welcoming lights of the ‘Brew City’ and the green and white MKE airport beacon.
Day three was coming quickly. A short overnight in MKE awoke us abruptly to our easiest day of this trip, a DH to PHL, then our flight to BUF for the overnight. We left on time and everything was normal for my leg to fly to this large city on the east end of ‘Erie’. Until we started getting ice on descent and approach, that is. We expected it, as you always do in areas downwind of the great lakes. Descending into the cloud deck about 10 minutes before landing, the ice detectors detected airframe icing immediately, indicated by a corresponding message 'ICE' displayed in yellow on one of our flight displays. The visual prscence of it on the windshield wipers confirmed it. We already had our engine anti-ice on, as is SOP, and turned the wing anti-ice on now. Immediately it was accumulating quickly, and internal my danger detector started illuminating. ‘Tell approach we have light to moderate clear icing’, I said while thinking this is moderate. The windscreen flashed all cold, alternatively gray and white. ‘Can you see any on the winglets’, I asked my FO. Her response was ‘I can’t see the winglets’; which made me look as well, sure enough. It’s rare that I’ve seen ‘thick’ clouds like this before, but this stuff is out there sometimes. It seemed to be very frothy, to have a lot of air spread in with the moisture. A particular nut and safety wire which is part of the windshield wiper arm assembly accumulates a lot of ice, and it had grown a pretty ice flower to a half dollar coin size within a couple of minutes maximum. I activated the engines’ continuous ignition, disengaged the autopilot, and asked Jan to ‘Tell approach this is moderate’ as we heard Colgan checking on the frequency behind us. If you’re in the know I don’t have to tell you about Colgan and Buffalo, where one of their big turboprops unfortunately crashed in icing conditions here in February. We had entered the clouds at 6,000 feet and now had been in icing for perhaps only three minutes when it seemed to subside as we were in the bottom of the layer, breaking out at 2,000 feet and looking for the Buffalo airport. The controls felt funny and gave a constant buffet at some point; either that or I was imagining it, because I was certain that icing had accumulated on our unprotected tail surfaces. But it was certified that way, ‘it’s OK’ says the FAA. Five extra knots airspeed wouldn’t and didn’t hurt on final. In the warmer air on final approach below the clouds the ice couldn’t hold on and started breaking off the airframe. We taxied in with almost nothing hanging to us, told the outbound crew of the conditions, and went to the downtown Holiday Inn hotel.
I did a few hours good work on our income taxes (part of this ‘taxing time’), and celebrated with my crew by dining at a neat German place called Ulrich’s. It was a speakeasy with food out front during prohibition, and is now a rustic place with plenty of character and excellent German food. I thought 'Now I know why my Iowa Dutch wife puts applesauce on her mashed potatoes', after seeing their potato pancakes served with a side of applesauce. 'Yaw', The Netherlands are right next to Germany, you know.
And that brings us back to where we started, day four, Palm Sunday morning, to be exact. What other things are taxing me, besides taxes, and the changeups and challenges in my flying? I have to bid for May’s schedule by Sunday night, to try to have a few critical days off. We have six legs to fly today, BUF-LGA-GSO-PHL-ORF-DCA-GSO. Fortunately it’s going to be a beautiful day, with a great air tour of Manhattan and a DC Potomac river visual approach, sightseeing the cherry blossoms in bloom around the Jefferson Memorial. I’ve promised to help out our union with some work, which I’ve hardly touched so far. I’ve already stated I’m homesick, and in addition, I’ll be missing Palm Sunday services and watching my Daughter Marissa sing with others in her age group as part of the service. I’ll admit it, I feel overwhelmed, burdened, and low on sleep, probably just a minuscule, molecular bit compared to how Jesus felt in his human body during his last week on earth.
Where do I go when I need a shelter?Where do I go when I need a friend? Where do I go when I need some helping? Where do I go? Back on my knees again.
That’s from a great classic song of praise. As a believer, for me, that’s easy to say, but hard to do, consistently, sincerely, and honestly. But this morning I try, and it helps, and I feel better about this day, with a measure of grace that only comes from the Lord above.
On Palm Sunday Jesus rode into Jerusalem not on a stallion as a conquering King whom for the Jews would bring rebellion and revolt against the occupying Romans, but as a gentle and peaceable King on a donkey’s colt, just as Zechariah 9:9 prophesied. Matthew 21:8-11 recounts how the crowds which lined in the streets in Jerusalem recognized but misinterpreted Jesus’ true glory: They spread their cloaks on the road, and waved palm branches, and shouted him along: “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna (‘Save!’) in the highest!”. The ‘whole city was stirred’, but it wouldn’t last long. For more on Jesus' 'Victory Parade', click here for a good study of Luke 19:28-48.
I cannot do the rest of his story justice, especially his crucifixion, but I will try to look at one of some of the times of Jesus’ suffering, specifically his time praying in the garden of Gathsemane, where he came to terms with the work he was about to complete, and prayed and gained strength to 'finish the mission', in fighter pilot parlance. If you’d like to learn more about his crucifixion, click here.
From Matthew 26:36-46: Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to them, "Sit here while I go over there and pray." He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me." Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will." Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. "Could you men not keep watch with me for one hour?" he asked Peter. "Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak." He went away a second time and prayed, "My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done." When he came back, he again found them sleeping, because their eyes were heavy. So he left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing. Then he returned to the disciples and said to them, "Are you still sleeping and resting? Look, the hour is near, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us go! Here comes my betrayer!"
If he was the Son of God, why then was he ‘overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death’? Jesus often called himself the ‘Son of Man’, and as he was still in a human in an unresurrected, unglorified body, he still had the same ability to feel pain and suffering as we do. Jesus was in great agony over his approaching physical pain, separation from the Father, and death for the sins of the world. 'Overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death'; he was so stressed that his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground (Luke 22:44). I feel that the most indicative element of his sorrow is that he was starting to shoulder the burden of taking on the sin of all humanity, of becoming the sin that all humanity (including me and you) has and will commit (2 Corinthians 5:21).
He asked that the cup be taken from him, ONLY if it was possible. He furthermore asked that his Father’s, God’s, will be done. That’s not really saying ‘do I have to’ as a child (your child perhaps) might say to a parent, is it? Or was his human body, his ‘son of man’ body revolting in temptation to avoid the pain and suffering he now was just getting a taste of? Maybe so, the ‘spirit is willing but the body is weak’ verse I’ve heard here is usually applied in reference to him finding his disciples sleeping instead of praying. This could also be a reflection of his prayers and victory of his spiritual intent prevailing against his body seeking escape from the sorrow and pain he was already enduring and about to commit to in the deepest degree humanly possible. He was tempted to give up his mission, he prayed, multiple times, was victorious, and prevailed. Praise God!
Here's just a couple observations regarding his death on the cross. Crucifixion was a supremely horrible and tortuous death. Jesus had been flogged and whipped, and had been made to carry the crossbar for a ways until he could no longer. He was already weak before he got to Golgotha. Considering that and the burden of the sin guilt of humankind that he felt since the night before in the garden, it becomes understandable that Jesus declared ‘it is finished’ (John 19:30), gave up his spirit, and died before the other two crucified criminals did. Even in how and exactly when he died, Jesus fulfilled prophecy: he died without any bones being broken (John 19:31-37, Exodus 12:46, Numbers 9:12, and Psalm 34:20). If the soldiers had found Jesus to still be alive, they would've broken his legs, causing him to suffocate immdiately, like they did to the two other criminals crucified along with him. The Jews had asked Pilate to have their legs broken and their bodies taken down, because the Sabbath was about to begin, and this wasn't just any Sabbath, this was the Passover.
I can't make an Easter posting without referring to Jesus' resurrection, however. If you are so disposed, see these two sites for a defense and validation of the resurrection. By his resurrection, Jesus proved he has power over death, the power to have eternal life, and that he is God in the flesh. Because of his death on the cross and resurrection, and his Love and grace for you and me, he offers and will deliver eternal Life for anyone who believes in him.
If you don't, then try him out. Seek him out and believe. 'Taste and see that the Lord is good.' (Psalm 34:8) Happy Easter!
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