Go fly on dumass airline do it fly by my pants airport. This pax check the brain at the front door. They need spend time in a airline emp shoe for a day, and they will understand maybe. thats it I am getting mad. People need to just shut up and listen and take a chill pill. thks for listen to mouth. ken exASA/emp and a NW emp.

Actually, people don’t need to “just shut up and listen” and “take a chill”.

This isn’t Russia and you can’t put a gun to people’s heads and tell them that they have to accept negligence and death just ’cause you said so.

There was nothing wrong with that airplane, no mechanical reason for it to crash and furthermore, there’s no reason the public should accept the “things just happen” answer.

I am sure you worked very hard to obtain your pilot’s license just like the commercial folks did. It is not an easy thing to do. It is also very expensive. I think the going rate for Comair’s Academy is about 90,000. Then the new pilots come out and make 20,000 a year. Not easy to raise a family on.

I hope I have understood what you said correctly. I look foward to your next note.

Phil

Very well said! It’s all about the crew and passengers.
Period!

I regret not staying focused, only on the crew and passengers, when I wrote my piece
September 22nd.

Allen

The same goes witht the Comair Flight Attendants. They to are required to go through yearly retraining, and I have witnessed this training myself. It is very difficult, and some people do not pass the testing part of the training. They can’t fly again, until they successfully pass all sections of the test.

Comair’s mechanics have the same training as any other airline’s mechanics, and many of them have worked on larger aircraft. They are required to take the same schooling, and pass the same airframe and engine classes that the other people do.

Comair ramp personnel are also trained to the highest standards, and they are expected to look for any signs of damage or mechanical issues and bring to the attention of the correct people. I several times did that myself, and the plane did not leave the ground, until the problem was taken care of.

For the gentleman that commnented on the inside appearance of the Comair airplanes, I can only tell him that even before the planes pull into the gate, Comair grooming personnel are waiting to move onto the plane and clean it as quickly as possible. Sometimes we only had 25 minutes to deplane, service the aircraft, and board the next flight. Sometimes even less, and I have seen Comair crew members help the groomers clean the plane, so there was no delay in the departure. I know for certain that the other regional carrriers at CVG had more time to clean their planes because they did not have any flights for many hours. Comair is the regional airline of choice at CVG, and it stays very busy. Not having several hours between each flight should tell all of the critics something. As a side note, each airplane is vacumed and scrubbed each and every night before the next day starts.

Someone also mentioned that his tray tables did not work. Time is again the problem here. If the plane is not full, or it is leaving from a city that does not have specific CRJ qualified mechanics to fix the tray tables, they will be put out of service until the plane arrives at a city that has the right people, and the parts to fix the problem, if it needs parts. If the problem with the plane makes it dangerous to fly it, then the people from CVG will fly on another aircraft, and bring the parts with them to the city where the plane is broken. Only then is the plane allowed back in the air.

To the comments about the young pilots just out or flight school, these people are ready and qualified to fly these planes, and it is done the same way for all airlines. Senior Captains at any airline started the same way. You are right, the income is horrible, but these people do it because they love to do what they do. They are gone from their families for days on end, and make no money at first. No other occupation is like this, and people should not complain until they can do it better.

Flight 5191 was a horrible tragedy, and it took the lives of two very good friends, and drastically changed the life of a third. The captain had years of experience, and so did the first officer. I knew them both very well. The flight attendant loved his job, and lived it each and every day. He was spectacular at what he did. I met his family at his memorial service, and I can honestly tell you they miss him. None of these crew members would have wanted the families of the victims to suffer like they all have.

Maybe all of you that have made negative comments, or have stated that you will not fly Delta or Comair again, should fly other airlines with my blessing, and then tell me that they are perfect in all that they do. I know better. I worked every day with people that had worked for other airlines, and they had the same stories to tell that we did. None of them are perfect, but maybe all of you need to learn for yourselves. Jet Blue started off with a bang, and now they are refusing airplanes that they ordered and pulling out of cities that they were once in. Reality is hitting home for them also.

My leaving Comair was of my own doing, but I can’t sit back and let people wrongly accuse my former co-workers of things they don’t deserve. It is a good place, with good people. The CRJ is a good plane, but it is built by humans,and it can break, just like a Boeing, or Embraer or any other brand.

Please think twice next time before you criticize a profession that you know very little about.

Phil

Flight 5191 was a tragedy and an accident. My heart bleeds first for the passengers and crew that lost their lives, the first officer that survived and has to live the rest of his life with the guilt surrounding the circumstances that caused the crash, and lastly for the surviving relatives and friends of each and every one of the victims.

Everything we do, as human beings, involves risk. Every day we all have choices to make based on the level of risk we’re willing to take, for a precieved personal benefit, expecting a positive return for taking that risk. One of the greatest risks we all take, is handing over responsibilty to others who determine what our level of risk will be. When we grant others that responsibility, we loose control of our personal destinies. I actually feel more comfortable when I’m in the cockpit flying myself because I’m the guy in control of my own destiny (excluding mother nature and mechanical malfuntion). But, I know in my heart, that commercial airline pilots are by far, better trained and more experienced than I.

As a passenger flying commercial airlines, I love getting that $300 round trip ticket to fly coast to coast. I’m resonably sure,like most people, that I’ll brag a little to my freinds and family about the cheap airfare I obtained. I’m also reasonably sure, that if air carrier figured out a way to lower their fare to $150, the flying public would be lining up in droves to fly that airline while other airlines would be scrambling to cut costs further just to stay in business. Unless you’re a complete fool, or just in denial (sometimes one in the same), less money in an airline’s operating budget equates to higher risk for the flying public. Just think of the finacial choices we all make with regard to our own automobiles (new tires, brakes, driving while fatigued on our way to work etc.)More money equates to better maintanence, better trained and rested crews and a lower accident rate. None of us would trust a Neurosurgeon that makes $40,000/yr. lives in an apartment and drives a fifteen year old toyota and operates on a disruptive sleep cycle. Yet we expect that of our pilots. Pesonally, I was on track to becomming an ailine pilot, but could not afford the pay cut. Pilots don’t fly for the money. It’s the love of aviation. Given the choice for a little more training in the simulator, or actual flight time, rather than a little more money in the paycheck, most pilots would choose the extra training.

Flying is an amazing feet of engineering that we humans have taking for granted. I will never stop marveling over that fact that something that weighs hundreds of thousands of pounds can become airborne, fly in the stratosphere at close to the speed of sound, and return safely to earth thousand of times each day with very few unfavorable incidents. My hats off to the thousands of men and women that provide such an incredible safe service (Most of the time with a smile).

Lastly, whew !, try flying. Go to you local airport and sign up for a demo flight with a certificated flight instructor. You may just get hooked.

Thanks for staying with me on this,

Allen K.

What you say about the same problems existing everywhere is likely very true. It does say something good for the airline industry that the previous five years were free of any major accidents in the United States. Unfortunately, something like this was bound to happen sooner or later in an industry that transports so many people so many miles every day.

My concern is that the financial problems that have hit the airlines since 9/11 might lead to a downturn in safety if maintenance crews end up being victims of budget cuts. I sincerely hope that my experience on Comair two years ago was an isolated experience — just a run of bad luck instead of a sign of larger problems.

The airlines are vitally important to the American economy and to the lives of the millions of people that travel by air every day. If anything good can come of this recent tragedy, it will be a renewed focus on air safety brings us many accident-free years like the five that came before Flight 5191’s crash.