Dan McGlaughlin's Maiden Voyage
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On my maiden voyage, I was assigned the esteemed Charles Cresap as my trainer. It seems that the night before, he had held court with the flight crew at one of the establishments in Glyfada. I would guessBobby's, but Soppy knew them all intimately, so it could have been any of them.
We are on our way to orbit when Soppy calls the flight deck and asks if his Trainee can come up for a look-see. Permission is granted, and up I go. I am crouched down between the two pilot seats, in awe of the sky and the water and the brightness of it all, after leaving the darkness of the back end.
Soon, the co-pilot excused himself to the rear of the plane. The pilot asked me if I wanted to sit down. I had been crouched in a very uncomfortable position for awhile, so I took him up on the offer. Then, he asked me if I wanted to call in our next turn.
Sounded cool to me, so I said Yes. He had me put on the headsets, and told me what to say to Nicosia control. I keyed the mike and called in the turn. Great. Then he said, "Since you called it in, go ahead and make the turn." I looked at him stupefied, and he said it was no biggie, just put my hands on the controls and my feet on the pedals, and he would make the turn for me, and I would just follow along. OK. I could do that. Still terrified about the whole thing, but I guess I could do that.
Soon, the 135 is turning, then we straighten up and level out. The pilot asks me if I'm feeling OK. Fine, I said. OK, then son, you got it! And he got up and left, with me clenching the wheel so tightly that the blood ran out of my hands!
I am up there all by myself with the controls (or so I thought) of a plane loaded with what seemed to be the half of the entire USAF on board. I about pissed my pants. Of course, right behind me, just where I couldn't get my head around to see, were the pilot, the co-pilot, the navigator and Soppy, laughing their asses off at me. A hick from Montana who had never heard of "auto-pilot" or anything else more technical (hell, back home we had just gotten color TV!) I was scared out of my mind. I just knew that plane was going in the water, and it was going to be my fault.
Needless to say, the beer at debrief was on me.
Thank you, Soppy.