Ron Rapp proposes a return to supersonic passenger flight in his “Blogging in Formation” post today. While commercial supersonic flight ended with Concorde’s grounding in 2003, Ron proposes that corporate aviation is on the verge of supersonic growth.

http://www.rapp.org/archives/2014/06/supersonic/

While I applaud his optimistic approach, and would love to see supersonic corporate jets become a legitimate emerging market, I just don’t see it happening in any realistic timeline. Supersonic travel is the domain of military aircraft where passengers are few (one or two pilots) and budgets are nearly indefinite. As Ron points out, the slim aircraft bodies required, and large fuel expenditures needed, make the leap above the speed of sound unprofitable for commercial air travel. Furthermore, sonic booms discourage domestic flights above Mach 1. City pairs that can benefit from supersonic travel are limited to those separated by an ocean.

So why would corporations want to buy jets that save a few hours of flying time in exchange for breaking their travel budgets? Many corporations gave up their own flight departments years ago in favor of fractional aircraft ownership. NetJets filled the niche for corporations who needed to cut back on expenses, but still needed occasional access to a corporate jet. Even the U.S. President has to justify the use of Air force One lest his constituents accuse him of wasting taxpayer money. Corporations have to answer to their board of directors as well as their shareholders, and many executives have become gold, platinum, emerald, or other premium customers on commercial airlines instead of corporate jet passengers. Imagine this potential conversation opener: You want employees to take pay cuts while you buy a supersonic corporate jet? This proposal could be the beginning of corporate lynchings.

Ron mentions: “The VLJ sector has brought small, quiet, efficient business jets to market.” But I taxi around the Eclipse Aviation headquarters every time I land in Albuquerque. It liquidated its assets in 2009. If very light jets can’t take-off in today’s economy, I don’t see ultra-elite supersonic jets making an appearance beyond maybe Sir Richard Branson’s playground.

Ron, I applaud you for dreaming big, but I just don’t see supersonic corporate jets becoming a legitimate market. Maybe someday—but not in the next decade, at least.

 

Please post any comments on original Ron’s blog post:

http://www.rapp.org/archives/2014/06/supersonic/

 

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http://marklberry.com/2014/06/01/10010/

Sometimes the planets do align. Just as my Blogging in Formation group was deciding on “Solo Flight” as our April theme, I received an e-mail from Matt Guthmiller, an MIT student promoting his upcoming around-the-world solo flight. Matt plans to fly a Beechcraft A36 Bonanza 28,000 miles this summer. If successful, he will become the youngest person to accomplish this lap around the globe.

On a personal level, I applaud Matt’s mission as a great adventure, and I wish him a safe journey. I asked him his age (19) and his level of aviation experience (Commercial Pilot -Single-Engine) before agreeing to promote his plan. I recall another record setter a few years ago that ended in tragedy. Fatal misfortune found the seven-year-old who was attempting to become the youngest ‘pilot’ to fly across the country–except U.S. citizens can’t even become pilots until they can legally obtain a combination medical and student pilot certificate (age 16). I wanted to be sure that Matt’s record-breaking ambitions were not overriding his caution. I think less about the world record, and more about Matt recording his trip around the world to share with others–inspiring big goals, careful planning, and hard work. I hope he is able to effectively share his journey through photos and description, not only about what he sees along the way, but how it changes his view of the world once he knows first hand its full circumference.

You can read more about Matt’s upcoming solo flight at:

http://www.limitless-horizons.org

 

In honor of Matt’s upcoming grandiose solo journey, I share with you my first solo flight. It was just three take-offs and landing at Daytona Beach Regional airport back in 1983, but it marked my initiation into the pilot ranks.

This is an excerpt from my article “25 Years Since ERAU” that appeared in ERAU EaglesNEST, and also ended up in my my memoir 13,760 Feet–My Personal Hole in the Sky as part of Chapter 8.

 

“My First Solo” by Mark L Berry

(the italicized paragraphs are lyrics for the infused companion song “My First Solo” performed by Billy Sea)

One of my childhood goals was professional baseball; I was born with the initials for it after all: MLB. At eight, I was a starter in the nine- and ten-year-old league and I had a mean fastball with a natural rising screwball action. I spent plenty of time pitching to those backstops that Stuart and I raced around, and tried to keep batters from knocking the ball over the perimeter fence and into the graveyard beyond. As a lefty, I could throw it inside the plate to right-handed batters and it would ease over the inside corner. Every strike appeared as a brush-back pitch. When I could control it, that is, and therein lied the problem. I threw harder than my peers, and some of them had the bruises to prove it. My nickname was Beanball Berry.

I should have stuck with pitching—lefties are always in high demand in the big leagues—but I also loved to bat. Pitchers didn’t play every game unless they were also awarded a second position, and therefore didn’t spend as much time at the plate. Pitchers typically bat ninth, and I wanted to bat in the front of the lineup. Instead of improving my throwing accuracy, I focused on my hitting. By the time I moved up to the Junior Babe Ruth League at age thirteen, my coach moved me over to first base so I could stay in the line-up every game. I accepted my coach’s wisdom and left pitching to my teammates who were learning to throw fancy pitches like curves, change-ups, and sliders. My pitching reputation didn’t fully go away after I forfeited the mound, though. At my ten-year high-school reunion, I thought Will Wilson was approaching me to shake hands and say hello. Instead he said, “Hey Beanball, in fourth grade you hit me in the back with your uncontrollable fastball. I still remember it.”

“That’s Captain Beanball to you.” It was good to be remembered, but not as the kid with the wild arm. He didn’t need to know that I was still merely a first officer at my airline at the time. Reunions are great for glorious self-declarations of success.

As I was growing up, the baseball funnel grew tighter as all three of my town’s junior high school teams graduated into a single high school. Being good wasn’t good enough. I didn’t make Greenwich High’s roster. My major-league baseball dreams were crushed about the time I was learning to drive.

High school became my soul-searching time, and like almost every other kid, I had to face the future as Mom and Dad made plans to kick me out of their nest. That’s when I asked for flying lessons at a nearby airport in Westchester, New York.

After an introduction and a handshake, Glenn Larson became my first flight instructor. He asked me, “Shall we check the weather?” as he walked me over to an area set up as a multi-use office. Lots of machines were buzzing and humming. I remember watching weather reports spit out on tickertape, and instructor Larson read official-sounding words from the gibberish shorthand. A glass door beyond the flight planning area revealed a ramp filled with single-engine Piper Cherokee airplanes. Behind them were a multitude of colored lights and a maze of pavement. As we walked to tail number 1945-Hotel that would be our aircraft for the next six-tenths of an hour, Instructor Larson handed me a small clear cup and taught me how to sump the wing tanks free of water. AvGas spilled on my hands and the flying bug soaked into my soul. I could smell my future in the sky as I held the cup up to my face to see the separation of AvGas and the little bit of water I’d drained from the tank. We opened the cowling and checked the oil level, verified the tire inflation and remaining tread, tugged on the flight controls, and everything I touched on the plane felt like first-kiss excitement.

On this introductory flight, in addition to the four fundamentals—climbs, descents, straight and level flight, and turns—we flew over my house for a new aerial perspective of familiar surroundings. Trees obscured it, but we saw the neighborhood churches and schools, including North Street Elementary. I was awed by the whole experience until Instructor Larson put me back to work learning to operate the aircraft. My logbook includes radio communication in my initial entry. Communicating with New York’s extensive air traffic control system was something I’d have to learn by doing. He taught me to unkey the microphone if I was going to say uh. Better to let someone else talk than announce to the world that I was standing on my tongue.

After Instructor Larson landed with me following through on the flight controls—we each had our own interconnected control yoke and rudder pedals, but we shared a single throttle between us—I tried taxiing the airplane back to the ramp while he kept our wheels on the pavement. Mom picked me up—I was old enough to take flying lessons but still only possessed a learner’s driving permit. It was obvious to her that I was onboard with this new activity, so she bought me a logbook for Instructor Larson to sign and a primary flight book that I still recommend as a first read for flight students—William Kershner’s Student Pilot Flight Manual.

My enthusiasm earned me a trip to Daytona Beach to visit Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University with my dad, my first and only campus tour, and I decided on the spot that’s where I wanted to go to school. Afterward, we extended our trip to the Florida Keys for the scuba diving mini-lobster season, and flew on Provincetown Boston Airlines—whose single pilot delivered us to Marathon Key. I won the golden-ticket: I was able to ride in the co-pilot’s seat. I wore a set of heavy headphones that completely covered my ears and tried to make sense of the radio communication. I wondered what all the cockpit buttons and knobs did, much as many of my passengers wonder about them today.

I didn’t have any clue about the job market back then, but my dad had some understanding because he was a businessman. With no formal aviation training yet, he was already studying the industry from a financial viewpoint to see if learning to fly would offer me an opportunity to obtain a reasonable return on the required educational investment. As I returned the borrowed headset to our pilot, and stepped out onto the tarmac for the walk into the terminal, my dad grabbed our bags and asked me a serious question. “If flying Cessna 402s around the Keys is as far as you advance in your career, will you be satisfied?”

I was post-airborne euphoric. The flight up front was better than any home run I’d ever hit. For me, flying was just about the flying. Earning a living was still an abstract idea. I was still in high school and hadn’t paid rent or any bills. I think Dad was trying to prepare me in case my flying career got stuck like my baseball ambitions. My view was idealistic and I said, “Hell yeah!” That was good enough for Dad.

Airplanes fascinated me as a small child. Now I sized this metallic-winged creature up with a serious gaze, as if it was an opposing pitcher and I was a fan suddenly invited to don a uniform and step up to the plate to face it. I’d turned the corner and found a new, more obtainable career goal than baseball, although Embry-Riddle accepted me as both a flight student and a baseball player.

As high school ended, I couldn’t wait to learn how to fly. Six days after my high-school graduation, I planned to drive my loaded my car to Daytona Beach in order to start college with summer school. My coach was crushed because my senior Babe Ruth baseball league was still only midseason through our schedule. I was batting over six hundred after nine games against my high school’s pitchers, who were spread around the league for additional playing opportunities.

My parents miscalculated their annual vacation and left me as the man of the house as high school ended. I walked across the stage in my cap and gown and then threw a high school graduation bash for three hundred friends; all the while my folks were sailing in Greece. Piss-poor planning on my parents’ part, and I was long gone by their return.

The first letter I found in my new university mailbox was from Mom and it began, “Dear Mark, why is our lawn growing flip tops this year?” This was before the tabs on beer and soda stayed attached to the cans after opening, and I hadn’t stuck around town long enough to collect those shiny little discards.

After Dad cleaned up my mess, and made me feel guilty because our dog cut his paws on the sharp aluminum hidden in the grass, he decided to check out what it was that I saw from the cockpit. He bought an old Piper Cherokee 160B—the same aircraft type used during my first flights at Westchester County airport—to take his lessons in during weekends. He was running a manufacturing business. It was the beginning of the computer age and his company was developing scuba diving computers back when they were big and clunky—the size of a paperback book with the weight of a softball. This began our friendly rivalry: who would earn his private pilot’s license first, and take the other one flying? The loser would have to buy clam chowder on Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket, and Block Island as we planned to make a cross-country chowder run during my next visit home.

Most of the family flying was shared only between Dad and me. My brother didn’t have any interest in aviation, although he recently surprised me by skydiving. Mom went with us once, but screamed louder than she did at Yankee games. Her friends called her Pat, my dad called her Trish, and the stadium ushers often called her over to have a talk about her unbridled enthusiasm. She was a true fan and always at the verge of being ejected. She had the world’s longest brown ponytail that she pulled through the back of an adjustable baseball cap, and she cheered and jeered like nobody I’ve ever met. She loved attending baseball games—both the pros and mine. Maybe that’s why a career on the mound seemed so appealing during my impressionable years. Mom’s attention was very focused at the games.

One afternoon at college, my scheduled training flight was rained out. That’s something that flying airplanes and playing baseball share; they’re both subject to delay and cancellation due to foul weather. As I returned to my dorm, I was doused with water from all directions. The parking lot flooded during extreme afternoon thundershowers, and the battle of the dorms was happening with wastebaskets and water balloons. It was all kinds of fun until my instructor showed up looking for me, and was also doused and soaked in the process. Instructor David Esser told me the rest of his afternoon flying was cancelled, but since I lived on campus we could go up when there was a break in the weather. “Awesome, just let me change.”

“No,” he said. “If I have to fly wet, so do you. And by the way, your friends are all crazy.”

“I know, isn’t it great?”

Off we went, to the small southern runway at Daytona Beach Regional Airport in a Cessna 172 Skyhawk—a bird we sarcastically called the mighty Chickenhawk, but we really revered it with affection. It has a high wing with diagonal support struts running down to fixed, not retractable, landing gear. Inside there is room for two pilots and two passengers behind a single engine in the nose that powers a two-bladed propeller. Our school’s aircraft are all painted white with light blue and a single dark gold stripe, and all of the registration tail numbers end in ER for Embry-Riddle—pronounced Echo Romeo in the phonetic alphabet over the radio.

Startin’ the engine
Instructor just watchin’
He’s just relaxin’
Lettin’ me try

To handle the throttle
The flaps and the radio
Rollin’ for take-off
He’s lettin’ me fly

Three times Instructor Esser and I went around the traffic pattern together and then he told me to pull over onto the local fixed base operator ramp—a facility for general aviation aircraft.

Three landings later
We pulled over
Under beautiful weather
And a clear blue sky

I was confused because Embry-Riddle had its own ramp where we parked our airplanes. He hopped out, but before he reclosed the door, he said, “Now go back out and do what we just did three more times. Remember, the airplane will be lighter without my weight in it, but you can handle it.” With that he closed me in that little cockpit, walked into the building attached to the hangar, and was gone.

I later learned that this was the old school method—the human version of being kicked out of the nest. No dwelling about soloing—I was just made to go out and do it without warning.

I was both scared and excited as I looked over at the empty seat beside me. I was hyper-aware now, and even noticed that Instructor Esser had courteously secured his seat belt and shoulder harness. I restarted the engine and read my checklist out loud. Releasing the brakes was the deciding moment. With just a nudge to the throttle, I was rolling and on my way on my own.

I’ll never forget
My first solo
Instructor hopped out
And away I go

I taxied out only to find the airport was just turned around. The wind had shifted and takeoffs and landings were now operating in the opposite direction. I briefly considered turning back to retrieve my instructor. Was I qualified to do other than what he’d specifically told me to do? The urge to solo took hold of me and I rationalized, I need to be flexible. Adapt, isn’t that what pilots do? I wondered what Instructor Esser thought when I taxied a direction other than expected. I don’t know what the aviation equivalent of Beanball is, but he was probably thinking it. Perhaps he was wondering what else he was qualified to do if the FAA ripped up his license. As a solo student, I was flying on his ticket.

I’ll never forget
My first solo
Up in the air
Up all alone

No one to ask
No one to talk to
No one to blame
My oh my

I was really flyin’
I was really tryin’
To keep from Diein’
Durin’ my first landin’
I was really sweatin’
No time for contemplatin’
Put it on the runway
On my first try

            I wasn’t signed off for touch and goes—every landing had to be made to a full stop with a lengthy taxi back for another takeoff. Air traffic picked up as darkness approached and day-flight-only students returned from the local practice areas. It was a double Ray-Ban shade of dusk when I taxied back into the FBO ramp to pick up Instructor Esser. He was wired on iced Pepsi, his favorite vice, and was still holding a giant cup of it. I was wired too—I had just soloed! He sipped while letting me taxi back to the school’s ramp to park the plane. I tried to be smooth on the controls so he didn’t spill.

We went up to Instructor Esser’s desk and he grabbed a pair of scissors. Several other instructors and fellow students watched as he cut the back off my T-shirt, still wet from the water war and now also mixed with my sweat. I was initiated as a fledgling pilot in the true aviator’s tradition. He signed my now priceless shirttail with the airport name, runway, and date—8-9-83. First solo is the monumental milestone, even with so many more ahead. The shirttail was a trophy like none I’d ever earned before, because it marks the day I can forever look back, and recognize myself as a pilot. I sent it to my dad with thanks for his support. A few weeks later his arrived in the mail, and I hung his solo shirt up proudly in my dorm room. Coincidently, we were scheduled to solo on the same day, twelve hundred miles apart, and we were both rained out. My soaking wet instructor made up our flight right away, while it took my dad two more weeks to reschedule.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you liked Chapter 8,
you can find Mark’s entire memoir 13,760 Feet–My Personal Hole in the Sky on Amazon.

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What do we gain from so many theories about what happened to MH370? A friend of mine, Jerry, wrote: “If your only previous experience amounted to having once assembled a plastic model airplane kit, you could have gotten ten minutes on TV as an expert.” But among the caste of theorists I did see former TWA Captain Barry Schiff present a credible scenario for an onboard fire in lieu of my hijack worries. And International Airline Pilot Karlene Petitt held her own in spite of an unfortunate scrolling news update below her promo photo “found dead in her New York apartment” that referred to a different story about Mick Jagger’s former girlfriend L’Wren Scott. The news runs twenty-four hours a day, but new information only arrives sporadically. So, does all this speculation do us any good?

In a word: yes. Although variations of the two main theories—hijacking and mechanical failure—dominate the media frenzy surrounding MH370’s disappearance, only one will end up eventually resembling the truth. Right now we still don’t know which one. It’s frustrating. We live in a technological age and wonder why our radar and satellites, spy planes and drones, and even hoards of volunteers browsing Google Earth can’t find the missing jumbo jet with 239 souls onboard. We are worried for the families of the passengers and crew, yet overall we feel completely helpless. But we are not a culture of idle minds, and so we speculate.

Sometimes we are not polite, and anonymous blog posters throw verbal hand grenades at other peoples’ ideas; I approve all but the most vulgar posts on my blog in the interest of sharing different points of view. But others offer more constructive criticism—new clues or corrections why one theory or another doesn’t quite fit, and needs to be adjusted. I’m hoping my fellow aviator Ron will share his expertise on ELTs (emergency locator transmitters) and why he feels we would have found the aircraft already if it crashed on land or in the water. ELTs only send out a signal after the force of an impact triggers them. My buddy Warren asked me, in a not so friendly flabbergasted tone: “Why can the oxygen on an airplane even be turned off on an airplane?” And of course the answer is: it would need to be shut off periodically for maintenance or servicing. “But why in flight?” Well, the law-abiding majority of us find it difficult to imagine how someone would want to deliberately misuse a safety system. And I’m not saying that happened for sure on the Malaysia flight. But our collective speculation about the unknown allowed us to debate that idea, and now regulators and manufacturers might consider designing a system that can only be shut off on the ground. Will this make aviation safer? It might, or it might not. But my point is that our social media postings—our desperate attempt to make sense of a critical situation that has left us too few clues—can still be put to productive use. No theory is ridiculous if it brings about a positive change.

Actual accident causes have lead to many regulated safety changes—Traffic Collision Avoidance Systems (TCAS) were invented after numerous midair collisions, and crew rest regulations were recently revised (many decades after the original rules were dictated) due to recent accidents attributed to pilot fatigue—but anticipated safety threats can also serve the same purpose. If we, the aviation community, can imagine a problem, then we can begin designing a way to fix it. Sometimes it takes a tragedy of one type for us to consider other previously-unimagined hazards and threats. So all this speculation about MH370’s fate may eventually end up doing some good on more than one level. In the meantime, my heart breaks for the families of those onboard. The immediate, overwhelming sensation of loss trumps any future safety gains when the the sacrifice is personal. I know. I was one of those family members after TWA Flight 800, and the speculation about that air disaster continues almost eighteen years later.

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Blogging in Formation: January 2014

Dealing with Passengers – by Mark L Berry

 

NOTE: This essay has a companion song that goes with it. “Into the Sky (The Whom and Why for Whom I Fly)” was co-written with, and recorded by Matt Pierce during FAWM 2014 (February Album Writing Month). Matt and I have collaborated on a handful of companion songs over the last few words, and several of them appear within my memoir 13,760 Feet–My Personal Hole in the Sky.

Into the Sky (The Whom and Why for Whom I Fly)
 Words by Mark L Berry
Music by Matt Pierce
Performed by Matt Pierce

 

While working, I am locked behind a bulletproof door and segregated from my passengers, but they are still the best and most important part of my aircraft. Oh sure, sometimes flight attendants tell me their horror stories about screaming kids, or the white-knuckle fliers who won’t stop ringing their call bells, but I signed up for a life of travel, and what better way to spend it than with 148 passengers and crew to share my journey? That’s the capacity of the MD80 I fly if we fill every seat that doesn’t flush—including the cockpit and both cabin jumpseats—but not including any lap children under the age of two.

My freight-flying friends, who affectionately call themselves freight dogs, love to tell me, “boxes don’t complain.” They can bank and yank their commercial transport aircraft all they want, and restraining straps rather than seatbelts hold everything, rather than everyone, securely in place. That’s fine for those who love flying, but gravitate toward a less social nature. I’m cursed as a severe extrovert, and enjoy interacting with my customers—however limited that may be.

As I drag my overstuffed rollaboard and piggy-backing worn-leather flight kit down the fluorescent-lit Jetway, this chute is often stuffed with people waiting to board. I greet the cue with a joke to encourage them to politely let me pass by: “Excuse me please, I promise that I won’t take your seat. I have my own that has both a forward-facing window and access to an aisle.”

Usually they let me cut the line to the cabin door. I’m sure it’s my uniform more than my beaming smile that overrides their natural compulsion to protect their spot in line. Today they have questions:

“How old are you?”

“Where did you go to flight school?”

“Have you had anything to drink in the last twelve hours?”

Their questions reflect their concern for the weather, the maintenance of the aircraft, and every aspect of the flight that they have absolutely no control over. I get it. They don’t want to remain anonymous; they want their pilot to care about them. They don’t just want to be fragile eggs in our giant, aluminum-winged carton. Like the Whos in Whoville, they are speaking up and exercising their right to be heard. They are flexing their influence as individuals, not collective cargo, and although they may sleep on my flight (like I would if I were crammed into a coach seat), they are depending on me—a uniformed stranger—to take them off and land them safely.

Well, I am happy to be here. Now if you’ll just let me slip past you so I can hide behind my bulletproof door…

 

In case you are curious, here are the lyrics to the companion song “Into the Sky (The Whom and Why–for Whom I Fly)“:

Locked behind the cockpit door
Can’t see my passengers anymore
But they are still the who and why
Everyone for whom I fly
They are the entire reason I
Will take this silver ship
Into the sky
Into the sky
Into the sky
Into the sky
So that we can slip into the sky

This ain’t no cargo ship
Needs to be a gentle trip
They are onboard and sitting straight
We are ready to leave the gate
Oh, I relax my grip
So that we can slip this silver ship
Into the sky
Into the sky
Into the sky
Into the sky
So we can slip into the sky

Although I don’t know them by name
I’m still glad they came
On this midnight flight
‘Cause they’re still the who and why
They are the entire reason I
Will take this silver ship
Into the sky
Into the sky
Into the sky
Into the sky
So we can slip into the sky
Into the sky
Into the sky
Into the sky
Into the sky
So we can slip into the sky

 

My fellow Bloggers (in formation, of course) can be found at:

March 1: Saturday:
Brent Owens –  iFLYblog
Mark L Berry – marklberry.com/blog

March 2: Sunday:
Andrew Hartley – Smart Flight Training
Rob Burgon – http://tallyone.com

March 3: Monday:
Karlene Petitt – Flight to Success
Chip Shanle – www.project7alpha.com

March 4: Tuesday:
Eric Auxier – Adventures of Cap’n Aux
Ron Rapp – House of Rapp

Check out their Dealing With Passengers stories, and if you like what you see, share us with your friends: #blogformation

 

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