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GROUND RUSH

By Simon Wood

I hadn’t always been afraid of heights. In fact, when I was a kid, I was a bit of a suburban
monkey, forever climbing trees and running along rooftops. My fear struck during a
business flight to Paris. The plane took off and banked left. As I stared out of the window
at the world below me, petrifying thoughts gripped me. I was mortal and I stood no chance
of survival if engine failure or gravity got the better of aerodynamics. My engineer’s mind
cataloged every possible reason for the plane to crash and, with every foot in elevation
gained, my chances of survival tumbled. I spent the flight clinging to the armrests like they
were going to save me as my gaze remained glued to the world outside the window.
My fear spread beyond flying. My heart rate leapt any time I was in a building more
than three floors tall. My imagination got away from me and I feared I might lean against a
window that wasn’t closed and that would be the end of me. No, my life expectancy
depended on me staying on firm, flat ground. After several years of this, I decided to learn
to fly to combat my irrational fear. A kill or cure approach, if you will.
I signed up with the local flying school to get a license. They ran a fleet of Cessna
152s—tiny two-seater aircrafts with less elbowroom than a GEO Metro and in aeronautical
terms, about the same capabilities. They couldn’t fly to fast or too far, but for the purpose
of training, they were more than sufficient. When I arrived for my lesson, the school
assigned me one of their Cessna.
I took to flying pretty well. Being a competitive person, especially with myself, I
wanted to do well. I had to ace the milestones laid down in the course, one of which was
the first solo flight. Flying solo is when the student gets to pilot the aircraft without the
security blanket of the instructor at his/her side. The target time for a student to go solo is
ten flying hours. My instructor cleared me for my first solo after nine. Once I had that
under my belt, I was free to accumulate the number of solo hours required for obtaining a
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pilot’s license. At the end of our exercises, my instructor would hop out and I’d fly off
again, alone.
Things usually went well, but on one particular day things didn’t go to plan. I was
returning to the airport after practicing some slow flight exercises in the local area. I
contacted air traffic to tell them I was coming back to land and they gave me clearance to
rejoin the circuit. The circuit is essentially a traffic circle in the sky the planes join to take
their turn to take off and land. Basic landmarks on the ground stake out the circuit. At
Booker Airport, Wycombe Wanderer’s soccer stadium was one, a Victorian mausoleum with
a golden ball atop was another, a radio tower marked another and the runway itself
completed the circuit. Beginning pilots are taught to navigate and fly using visual
landmarks and you need to develop a sharp eye. It’s not until you’re 3,000 feet above the
ground that you realize the world is mainly anonymous looking cities, pastures and
woodlands. Booker Airport proved this point. Beyond the circuit’s basic landmarks, the city
of High Wycombe, the M40 motorway and farmlands were the only other recognizable
objects for miles.
I joined the circuit at the “Golden Ball” and pointed the Cessna in the direction of the
radio tower. Reaching the tower, I prepared for my descent announcing my intention to air
traffic control. Air traffic acknowledged, when suddenly, another plane (a twin-engined
Piper) radioed in for a landing. Since the other aircraft was the bigger and faster plane, air
traffic wanted to get him down before me. The pilot said he was five miles out and asked
for a straight in approach, essentially allowing him to circumvent the circuit.
I told air traffic that I was on “Base” which is the last leg before final approach. The
other pilot quickly corrected himself saying he was only two miles out. Air traffic got a little
nervous and asked if we could see each other. We both responded that we couldn’t. The
pilot radioed in to correct his position again. He said he was right on top of the airport. Air
traffic nervously asked where I was. Equally as nervous, I told them that I was about to
turn on to final. There was a moment of hesitation from air traffic and I could understand
it. They had a tough decision to make. Was it better to have someone competent get the
plane down on the ground first or keep the experienced pilot up in the air to prevent
spooking the student pilot? They decided to give the twin engine priority over me, but
asked again for us to recheck for visual contact. We both said we couldn’t see each other
and given no other instruction, I reluctantly turned on to final. As I banked left, my wing
lifted and there, about a hundred feet above me, was the twin-engine Piper and its pilot had
no idea he was descending on top of me. The expanse of our aircraft’s wings had placed
each other in our collective blind spots.
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We were seconds from a collision. With no time to explain the situation, I slammed
the plane into a dive to avert the crash and radioed air traffic to tell them what had
happened. A shocked voice told me to get into the circuit again and come home. With a
racing pulse, I said that I would.
I looked over my shoulder for the runway. It had gone, and so had the Piper I’d
nearly collided with. Nothing looked familiar. It was as if I’d punctured a hole in the world
and reemerged in some alternate universe.
I tried to reorient myself and scanned the landscape for the “golden ball”, the radio
tower, or the stadium. All I saw were trees and the M40. Extending beyond the horizon in
both directions, the motorway was no help. I’d committed a student pilot’s cardinal sin--I’d
lost my visual bearings and I didn’t recognize a damn thing. This was ridiculous. I’d flown
over the same places a thousand times, but nothing seemed familiar. No matter how
ridiculous it seemed, I was lost and my raging adrenaline ignited my fear.
The October day had been a dull, overcast. Not the best conditions for flying but
flyable. As if on cue, the sky darkened, squeezing out the late afternoon light. The cloud
base descended and a mist formed. Just to complicate matters, air traffic couldn’t switch on
its runway lights to help aid my return because they’d been affecting repairs all day.
If I didn’t get a handle on my bearings soon, I’d be lost in a big way. My mouth
went dry and sweat poured off me. Fear strangled my good judgment. I still had the plane
in a slow descent. The plane’s altitude was only 300 feet and I was heading for a crash
landing in a field strewn with power lines. But that wasn’t such a bad thing. At that
moment, I didn’t have the courage needed to get me out of the situation. It would be so
easy to take a chance on crash landing the Cessna in the field. There was a good chance I’d
be injured or killed, but at least I would be on the ground and that was all I wanted--my
feet on the ground again, at any cost. It sounded like a plan and I let the plane drift
downward.
I was down to less than 150 feet when I realized this easy answer was insane. I had
to fight my fear. I hit full throttle and put the plane into a climb. Taking this action gave
me no pleasure. With the mist closing in, I didn’t know if my ascent would fly me directly
into someone. That very much in mind, I leveled off at 400 feet safe in the knowledge that
it was unlikely that anyone else would be flying that low.
I told air traffic that I was totally lost. They admitted they didn’t have visual contact
and told me to work at it. That instruction felt like a kick in the guts and as much use as a
chocolate teapot, but I did my best.
Still nothing looked familiar. Twice I blew over the runway from the wrong
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direction. Both times my sudden discovery of the airport came as a surprise. I tried to
maintain a visual lock on the runway, but with panic running riot through my brain I lost
visual contact with safety within seconds. It was a miracle that I didn’t crash into someone
flying like that. Air traffic admitted they were struggling to see me beyond the end of the
runway because of the mist and that they were clearing the runway and other aircraft until I
was down.
I checked my gas gauge. I still had half tanks, which was good enough for another
couple of hours of flying time. A couple of hours? The plane might be able to stay aloft for
that long, but I knew my nerves wouldn’t last. Stress would kill me long before then. I
really had to get a grip and get the plane down.
I knew why I was so panicked. For the first time in my short flying career, I’d lost
my safety tether. As a student pilot, I wasn’t much different than a baby bird that doesn’t
venture far from its nest. I’d spent so much time in the circuit that it had become my
beacon, my safety blanket. If I ever needed to feel safe, I knew where to go, but not
anymore. By getting lost, I’d broken that link. I was flapping around in the breeze with no
hope of ever getting home safe. I flew aimlessly in circles draining away my fuel and hope
reserves.
Just as I was at the point where I didn’t know what I was going to do, a helicopter
announced he’d spotted me and had a view of the runway through a pocket in the clouds.
Air traffic handed control to him without a moment’s hesitation. He told me to do exactly
what he said and when he said it. I told this sky angel I was his to do with what he would.
Air traffic advised they had the on-site fire crew on alert (hardly a heartwarming
thought) and they’d managed to jerry rig the electrics to switch on the main runway’s lights
(a very heartwarming thought).
The helicopter pilot issued instructions: Turn left now. Stop. Maintain heading.
Turn right now. Stop. Begin descent now.
As I crested a tree line over a hill, the runway in all its blazing glory came into view.
I was coming in at an angle to the runway, but I didn’t care. I could wing a landing, even if
I trashed the plane doing it.
Although it should have been easy to make a landing, it wasn’t. Because of the
shallow angle I was approaching from, the runway’s perspective from the air was unusual,
making it hard to estimate my descent rate. But I wasn’t about to screw this up, not with
the chance to walk away from this in one piece now within my grasp.
I homed in on the lights twinkling in the distance and brought the plane down,
making one of the best landings of my flying career. The moment the undercarriage kissed
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the tarmac my jelly legs and rubber hands regained their strength. The relief was so
overwhelming that I wanted to cry. I radioed in that I was down safe and sound. I
continued to give an Oscar speech thanking everyone and apologizing to the airport, air
traffic, the helicopter and everybody tuned in to the radio frequency.
I parked up and tottered into the flying club’s main office where a number of
instructors congratulated me and the chief flying instructor told me, “You just learned the
most valuable flying lesson you’ll ever learn.”
He wasn’t talking about losing my bearings, but the fallout from a screw up. When
the shit had hit the fan, I’d coped with the stress. Up until that day, I’d been pretty cocky
about my flying. I was accurate and adept and never made mistakes, but that meant I’d
never having to fix a problem.
On the way home a wave of euphoria swept me away and I couldn’t stop laughing
and crying. This passed, but the exhilaration didn’t. My adrenaline levels turned me into a
rubber ball bouncing off the walls for the next several hours.
I wasn’t sure I could continue flying. I’d come very close to giving up and the idea of
piloting a plane again filled me with dread. I didn’t trust myself not to screw up again. But
I persevered and attained my license. I still fly from time to time. Unfortunately, learning
to fly never did cure my fear of heights.

© 2004 Simon Wood

Ground Rush was originally published in the magazine, Morbid Curiosity.