USAIR TALES #12- KPIT - KCLT Curse of the Strutbuster...

For the last couple weeks since Steeler Air had had the new Wilco package installed, Josh, the CLT hub manager had been bugging me to have our tech guys in PIT do the same thing for his Panther Air flagship...

Well after numerous times begging and pleading, threatening and bribing, I finally decided to have the plane come in to Hangar 4 for the full treatment. I gave the crew a week off, as I oversaw the same operation that breathed new life into Steeler Air. Dan's boys and girls over at Fleet Ops did a bangup job as expected, and even the new Fleet Ops manager, Joe D was as efficient as they come. He made sure every nook and cranny on the plane was in top shape, and even took the liberty of having the Panther livery redone to correct what he called "aesthetic errors".

By weeks end, it was ready.



N717UW- Dubbed "Panther Air"... The flagship of Charlotte Hub.

Josh was gonna be so pleased I just knew it! Tasked with the job of delivery boy was none other than myself, accompanied by the usual crew, Barney, Tiffany, Wanzetta, and George. We met up ahead of time at Gate B30 to get the show on the road.

As we walked down the jetway, Tiff took it upon herself to kiss me on the cheek.

"For luck..."

Umm... what did I tell you about that public display of affection stuff?

She and the rest of the crew just chuckled amongst themselves, as we all went to our stations for zone boarding. By now it is this running joke in my crew... the relationship that had blossomed between Tiff and myself. I have to admit I do feel a little awkward sometimes... but hey. Better to be loved than not.



On time, we pushed back and did our required wait for the ok from the ground crew to move out.

I had Barney do the flightplan and entry into the FMC this time... and since it looked ok I signed off on it. Lord knows we have done this leg more times than we care to recollect. Josh even set up our own placarded broom closet, named "Black and Gold rec room"... his idea of a joke.

"Ok Boss... looks like Steve confirmed we are good for runway 23 when we get to Charlotte."

God I hate that runway...

We got our clearance to taxi to 28C and pushed off the apron. Within moments we were lined up waiting for the OK.



Seems like only yesterday the landscaping crew was working feverishly to patch and replant the gaping gashes Josh left just past the threshold when he brought this plane in.

To say his landings are NOT the best, might be an understatement. I will admit I have seen reports of some greasers... but that tends to be the exception rather than the rule. Even though Allegheny Airport Authority was mad as hell, I basically defused the situation by saying it's job security for our landscapers. After all, they need to make money too, till they become US Citizens...

I will say this... this particular aircraft has the absolute strongest strut system in the fleet! Joe saw to that when he had it retrofitted.



Like clockwork, N717UW rotated at 146 knots, and began positive rate of climb for us, thanks to the new Wilco improvements. I brought the gear up and had Barney work the flaps as we transitioned into a full climb off runway heading.

Smooth...

"Boss I gotta tell you, those folks in Fleet sure know how to put together a sweet ride!"

I agree Barney, I agree.

As always we got our call to return to our briefed flightplan about 1 minute into our departure, so we made the U turn south of KPIT, and headed towards the city.



I never understood this routing they keep giving us to go to CLT...

Fly a westerly takeoff... do a U turn, go towards downtown Pittsburgh, then do another almost U turn to head to West Virginia... It makes no sense to me at all...

But then I am not in the FAA. I knew this much... we've done this flight so many times we could sleep through it and have the plane fly itself.

Not that we were about to do that...



Well at least the city is looking good. I love this time of year... the green hills surrounding Pittsburgh create a natural mosaic that just screams, summer here is awesome!

As a matter of fact, I can see my house down there... all alone. No one occupying it, not even the cats... since they were shipped off to Jess in Florida as well. Rosemarie had expressed a desire to stay in Jamaica a little longer since no one would be there to clean up after, and I reluctantly agreed... I guess I am living the bachelor life again it would seem.

Makes it easier for Tiff to come over anyway.



I often wonder what the ramifications are for the decisions I make... drunk or otherwise. Granted no one has told Jess about our indiscretion... but it's only a matter of time till I start seeing lawyers at my door screaming like Eddie Murphy, "I WANT HALF EDDIE!!! HALF!!!!" Seemed to me divorce is inevitable.

"Ok Boss, we are clear to CVG from here, want me switch over to autopilot?"

Yeah, sure thing Barney... I hate when he interrupts my thoughts.

I let go of the sidestick as Barney activated the autopilot navigation button, and relaxed a little as Panther Air found its course and headed to it like a hound dog on the trail.



In short time Barney was announcing that we hit transition altitude... which for a pilot means two things... 1- time to turn off the seatbelt sign, seeing as there is no turbulence, and 2- almost time for my juice... which meant Tiff would be in shortly.

Ahh Tiff... I almost hate to say it, but at this point I dunno what I would do without her. You have to realize I have always been a pretty independent guy. Heck my wife barely sees me, even less now that she is in Ft. Lauderdale. I can't believe I have gotten so close to a woman that her very presence makes me want more.

Ok Drew... focus...



A knock on the door... There she is like clockwork.

"Hey Drew, Barney... here's your juice."

Thanks Tiff.

Before she left she leaned over to me...

"Hey Drew", she whispered, "When we get to Charlotte, we need to talk..."

UH OH...

She patted my shoulder and left the cockpit.

"What was that about Boss?"

Umm.... I dunno...



Ok I hate this. I hate when women say "We need to talk". That is NEVER good.

All sorts of things start running through a man's mind when those words are uttered, and believe me, as a person who has been around the block a few times, NONE of them are ever good.

I cannot let this get to me though... might be something minor...

Oh God, she's gonna tell me she's pregnant, isn't she...

Crap...



You know, if there was a chase plane following us, I bet they could count every bead of sweat on my brow right now.

Barney says I worry too much.

Maybe he is right.

"Boss, you still with me here?"

Huh? Oh yeah, yeah... I'm cool.

"Ok... Just a walk in the park here... but you know I cannot do it without you."

Yeah Barney I know.

I hate it when he picks up on my moods. I wonder if he can read minds through that headset of his?



Well at least the weather is good.

I like the weather... no matter how big or small your problems may be, watching Mother Nature do her thing always makes me feel insignificant in the big picture... and yet it is soothing. Well, except when she's pissed.

Oh what the hell, I cannot take it anymore. I hate being in suspense.

I pushed the attendant call button.

Barney looked at me, as expected...

"You ok Boss?"

Yeah yeah... just something I gotta know.

"Oooooooo k..."



A couple minutes later a noticeably agitated Tiffany came into the cockpit.

"What's up Drew?"

Tiff... I may not have time in Charlotte... can you tell me what's on your mind now please?

"Umm NO!" She glanced at Barney.

Barney rolled his eyes.

Well... if it's important I am sure I need to know. Is it something important?

"Well yes, of course it is, but we have a job to do here... It can wait." she responded, " I still have half of first class to serve yet."

Ok but is it bad... ?

"Drew I don't have time for this..." she sighed... "Depends on how you look at it I guess. I will tell you later..."

She gave me a peck on the cheek then left. I hate it when women do that... always ambiguous.



"Boss I been meaning to ask you. I know it's all good and all that, you know you and Tiff are like really close n'at, but you ever think maybe you may be going a lil too far"

Ok that's enough... I am NOT going to be lectured by my First Officer, or you can find another ride back to KPIT.

"Ok ok, chill out Boss... No offense meant!"

We were interrupted by Steve, East Ops manager, and regular in KCLT tower...

"US Air 1839, ahh we got a change in winds here... you are to make vectors to runway 18R. Repeat, scratch runway 23, you are now to come down on runway 18R."

Oh great... I hoped Tiff and the others had already sat down and buckled up.

I put on the seatbelt sign just in case, and disengaged the autopilot, then swung Panther Air around to the appropriate vector.



It was then I realized what a curse it is to be so caught up in ones own thinking in the cockpit.

We were too high to come down to 18R, there was a full traffic load coming in to that runway, everyone and their brother was adjusting course, and the skies were filled with metal hornets stirred up by this sudden disruption to their flight plans.

This was going to be interesting...

I popped open the speed brakes a few times just to get us slowed enough for a usable approach, and had Barney do the announcement to the cabin explaining why the plane was making all kinds of odd movements.

Steve popped up on comm again...

"US Air 1839... Hey Drew, are you gonna be able to come down from that altitude? I show you way too high and too far to the left to make it in. I can have you go around if you like."

Ahh Negative Charlotte Approach, I think we can do it. Just gimme some spacing and I will bring her in.

Barney stared at me for a few seconds... I knew what he was thinking. This was NOT the proper way to do this... In retrospect I should have just called for a missed approach.



"umm Boss... you may wanna check the MFD... We got traffic behind and below."

Oh shit.

I looked outside but could not see where they were at. I could see them on the computer screen... clear as day, a little red square that indicated someone WAY too close for comfort.

Sure enough Steve confirmed my fears... we had traffic behind and below. He was gonna try and clear us in, but if we did not look right on final approach, he was waving us off.

Thankfully the traffic, Northwest Airlink, saw us, and called for missed approach.

WHEW.

But we had another problem... we were STILL too high.



Full flaps Barney... cut throttle to idle, disengage the autothrottle and autopilot.

"Boss, you sure about this????"

Affirmative, just do like I ask, I am gonna hand fly this thing in.

Once again from the corner of my eyes, I saw Barney do the sign of the cross over his chest.

With the throttles cut back, Panther Air growled its disagreement. I dropped gear and steadied her on the course to come in... still too high.

Crap crap crap...

How much descent could I get away with till the passengers felt some discomfort, or Barney mutinied...

This was definitely a gamble here.



"Gentle, gentle on the stick Boss, look at the descent rate!" Barney added nervously. I could tell he was tensing up... his five o'clock shadow had turned white. I could see he wanted to grab hold of the sidestick and pull her up, but I think he had enough faith in me to not do it.

It would figure... Josh's plane, recently refurbished, about to make potholes in Charlotte runway under my command. I swear this plane has the curse of the Strutbuster on it.

Barney tensed up as we dived for the runway.. I could have sworn I heard him mumble "Oh shit!"

We sailed over the threshold, over the touchdown zone... almost to halfway down the runway... and then plopped down with an unceremonious and ingracious THUMP.



Oh my God... that has got to be the worst landing I have ever done in all my career...

And I STILL had to stop this thing...

Thankfully this thing has thrust reversers and really good autobrakes.

With autobrakes on full, ground spoilers deployed and reverse thrusters engaged, I braced myself for a near brush with the end of the runway. The most god awful noise was heard in the back, the autobrakes grabbing every bit of concrete they could to slow this several ton behemoth down.

The Panther had dug her claws in!



I could see the end of the runway a little too close for my tastes... and nervously Barney shouted his callouts.

"80 knots!"

"60 knots!"

The growl turned to a whimper as the plane settled down to a stop just before the very last turnoff on the 36L end of the runway.

It took us a second before we got moving again, and just as we did, Barney made a concerted effort to remove his fingers from the dashboard.



We pulled off to the taxiway, so that traffic could resume.

No sooner we got off the runway, Steve was on the comm.

"US Airways 1839, contact ground on 121.8. By the way Drew... I would not mention that landing to Josh if I were you. That was pretty rough."

Yeah Yeah I know... sorry Steve, been a long day.

Curse of the strutbuster... I was sure of it.

I turned on the ground music and started our turn onto the taxiway...

I looked over at Barney and he was white as a sheet. Not a word was said...



As we passed the US Airways building I wondered if Josh was inside watching the debacle that was a landing.

Does it even matter now?

I still need to find out what is on Tiff's mind.

But I guess I better get the plane to the gate first...

Looks like Barney is still playing the role of Casper.



Well Barney, there's our plane. Only 6 more hours till we fly back to KPIT.

"... Umm.. yeah.. Boss..."

Oh well, guess there is not much talking going on on the way to the gate.

Gotta say this has indeed been an interesting flight.

Oh well... Allegheny Air is waiting.

Company comm lit up on the way to the gate:

"DREW!!! OMG MY PLANE LOOKS AWESOME!"

Hey Josh... I should have her at the gate in a sec here.

"WELL GIT R DOOOOOONE!!!!"

Ok Josh... pulling up now to the gate.



Well looks like he did not see the landing, but he did see the taxi... as long as he is approving of it, I am not gonna worry about it.

Barney has not said a word since we got into our taxi.

We pulled up to the gate and hit the parking brakes.

The resounding whine of Panther Air powering down was indeed music to my ears.

The great cat is ready to rest, and to be handed back to her rightful owner.

Without a word Barney got up and headed for the door.

What the hell is that smell?



"Dunno Boss"... I heard as he left running up the jetway.

As I looked at the first officer seat I immediately identified the smell... confirmed by the dark stain on the seat.

Oh My Gawd... My first officer just pissed himself.

I guess my landing was not quite what I hoped it would be... well at least Josh will have had his first true strut stress test with this aircraft.

Not something to be proud of...

As I got up and threw some paper towels over the stain, Tiffany barricaded the door.

"Drew... You know I have always been friends with Jess." she began.

I sat back down...

"Well... I told her what happened..."





OH SHIT...