Ask the Pilot 2

Ally — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 19:42:00 +0000

This is the second installment of Ask the Pilot and is an interview with my dad, an international pilot with Delta Airlines.

1. What’s the longest flight you ever flew?

When I was in the Air Force I flew from New Jersey to Kuwait, which is in the Middle East next to Iraq. The flight took 15 hours. Commercial airliners can also fly that far, for example from New York to Tokyo.

2. What kind of plane do u fly now?

The plane I fly now is the Boeing 767, which carries about 215 people when it’s full. We normally fly from New York to Europe or Africa.

3. Are most pilots from the military?

Many are, but nowadays more are coming to the airlines from smaller airlines.

4. Which do you think is the busiest, and which is the nicest, airport?

The busiest airports are always in the busiest cities, like New York, London, Paris, Los Angeles. Most big cities have more than one airport, and sometimes one or all of them are very busy — one time I had to wait for takeoff from New York Kennedy airport for three hours because there were 85 planes in line for takeoff!

The nicest airports are always the newer ones because their terminals have a lot of amenities. Some of my favorites are in Istanbul, Turkey, and Amsterdam, Netherlands since they have interesting architecture. I also like airports with lots of runways so there aren’t lines for takeoff and landing.

5. How long does a flight have to be in order for it to have TVs and play movies?

Normally international flights have this, but actually, almost all airliners have these or will soon have them. They are re-fitting the older airplanes to put video in each seat. This is good because flying can be boring for passengers and everybody loves to watch TV and movies. You can also play video games on the seat-back units.

To read the first installment of Ask the Pilot, go to: http://www.teentraveltalk.com/2009/10/ask-pilot-1.html

Do you have a question for teentraveltalk.com’s pilot? Ask it in the comments below.

This is not a picture of me, but I like this guy!

Ask the Pilot 1

Ally — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 18:20:00 +0000

My next few blogs will be answers to questions that I asked my dad, an international pilot with Delta Airlines.

1. What is your favorite city you have gone to and why?

Well, I’ve flown 12 years with the Air Force and 10 years commercial flying. So, I’ve been to many different cities but, right now, it’s Accra, Ghana. The people are really nice and it’s amazing that people who live in such poverty can be so friendly. Some of our flight attendants do good work at an orphanage and I’ve visited the orphanage and the juvenile detention center to try to help them.

2. Do you always fly with the same person?

No, because we have 600 pilots based in New York so it is very rare that I fly with the same person twice. The pilots come from all over the country. They can live locally or come from Florida, Texas or even a few as far away as California.

3. There are pilots that live in Florida but fly in New York?

They do something called commuting. They fly from Florida to the New York airport then they go to their assigned destinations.

4. Why aren’t the pilots based in their hometowns?

Because our airline doesn’t fly internationally out of every airport.

If you have questions, post them as comments to this blog and I’ll get back to you.

Teen Travel Talk » pilot

Ask the Pilot 2

Ask the Pilot 1