Pilots, what was the most embarrassing moment of your career?

Is your airport controlled then? I guess that might be what causes the difference. Mine is uncontrolled and it's about 50/50 full stops and touch and gos when everyone there is doing pattern work, so no one cares either way.

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BELFORD16@reddit

Me too. Stop and gos stressed me out and full stop back taxi is just a waste of money, in my opinion (airfield dependent).

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figure-9rock@reddit

Yeah, one lap full stop taxi back at my busy class D could be 18 min with 360’s and waiting to depart…

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UsedandAbused87@reddit

Did a few warmup laps, came back to solo and had to wait 15 mins due to traffic, made one full stop, had to wait another 15, made the 2nd lap and then I was about to piss my pants

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aijaman3000@reddit

Damn that's tough. Glad I only had to do one lap for first solo. Was scary enough. Especially as I always have to pee too

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v1_rt8@reddit

On my first solo I lost count and did an extra lap. I didn't know my mom was waiting for me in the FBO and in the video she filmed you can hear her panicking, "Where is he going? You said three landings! What is he doing?!"

My dad (who was my CFI) was chill, "I don't know. He'll come back eventually"

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Roskosity@reddit

How cool! I trained my dad to fly. It was payback for him teaching me to fly. 😏

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willpc14@reddit

The pilot version of "you never see a cat skeleton in a tree."

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Effective-Scratch673@reddit

Oh man, to have your own dad as CFI. Lucky bastard

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v1_rt8@reddit

I saved sooo much money. He also mentored me during my early years as a professional pilot.

Incredible blessings from him

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Effective-Scratch673@reddit

I didn't even think about the money part, just the bonding. Who had better landings tho?

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v1_rt8@reddit

My dad by a long shot, and still does!

I still haven't had the opportunity to have him as my passenger. Every time we flew together it was as a crew or as instructor/student. His flight review is due this month so it's my turn to put him through the wringer haha

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gotemtho33e@reddit

I’m an F.O on an ERJ, and taxi’ing in LAX I contact United ramp on comm 2. For some reason my hand went down to the PA button and made the transmission “on bravo short of C8 for gate 68” or whatever the gate was. Immediately the flight attendants call me and I instantly knew I just made that transmission to the passengers and not United ramp….. was embarrassed no doubt. But oh well

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GoobScoob@reddit

I did my passenger announcement on departure frequency

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goooosseeee@reddit

Weve all done it once, then never again. Its a right of passage 😂

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nolaflygirl@reddit

"rite" not "right".

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goooosseeee@reddit

Rats

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nolaflygirl@reddit

"Rats" is right! Love it! 😁

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blindpylote@reddit

Never understood how this could possibly happen until I was on the 76 and learned how the comms work.

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__joel_t@reddit

I'm told you're not a real airline pilot until you do that on guard :-)

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Wedge_Donovan@reddit

Heard a guy do it yesterday.

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JimTheJerseyGuy@reddit

Beats meowing.

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nolaflygirl@reddit

Woof!

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nolaflygirl@reddit

Woof!

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bigbadcrusher@reddit

Dude did his Unicom call on Houston Center when I was flying through. When they let him know, he keyed up and let us a loud “FUCK”

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Bunslow@reddit

i did a ctaf announcement on guard, learned the perils of dual monitoring that day...

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StweebyStweeb@reddit

I tow planes around at ORD. I’ve heard this happen on ground at least twice since I started.

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Valid__Salad@reddit

Damn I’m surprised anyone had a chance to get a roast in considering how busy ground is

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nineyourefine@reddit

I've been there when the controller is the one roasting the guy.

Years back, ground goes "EVERYONE ON FREQUENCY STOP!". Then calmly says "Who's the CRJ out by 22 that is clearly lost". They sheepishly come back with their callsign (I think it was GoJet) and ground makes fun of them for a few seconds, they apologize, and we're in tears up front laughing because this dude just stopped all of ORD ground traffic to trash these guys. I love that airport.

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SciencesAndFarts@reddit

The one time I heard this in ORD ground very clearly gave us all a sec to roast the guy. Then the chaos resumed.

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StweebyStweeb@reddit

It depends on the time of day. From like 5pm to 9pm, no chance. Not even enough time for readbacks. Later at night you’ll get enough time for a roast or two lol

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homeinthesky@reddit

Passenger descent announcement:

“We just started our initial descent into Boston…..

long sigh over intercom

“No… no we haven’t…. We’re not going to boston… we’re going to Baltimore…. We’ve just started our initial descent into Baltimore… flight attendants please prepare the cabin for departure.”

another long sigh

“No. Not that either. Please prepare cabin for arrival”

FAs were on the intercom up to me in about .5 milliseconds ready to roast me. Then they roasted me to passengers for the next half hour… and then the passengers roasted me after landing.

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VolubleWanderer@reddit

I was on reserve and I was supposed to go to Madison but instead they pulled me to go to Bloomington. I was stoked cause it was a longer overnight and Indiana was playing a home game.

I jumped on the plane apologized for the scheduling delay and excitedly said “don’t worry folks we’ll be headed to Indiana just in time for the game go hoosiers!

Then went into the flight deck and started working. Everyone looked concerned but I figured they were kinda over waiting. The FA came into the flight deck and was like ummmm we are going to Illinois you know that right?

I didn’t know there even was a Bloomington Illinois. Why would there be two bloomingtons 100 miles apart??

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Delicious_Run_6582@reddit

Born and raised in Bloomington Illinois. Only people from there know it exists. Right next to Normal Illinois. The kids these days call it BloNo. LOL

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F1shermanIvan@reddit

The only reason I know Normal, IL exists is because I've owned three DSM vehicles in my life haha.

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Bunslow@reddit

went to uiuc, didn't know that "bloomington IN" existed tbh

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Ok-Selection4206@reddit

I know it exists, I drive right through it going between MN and FL. Actually most MN snowbirds drive through Bloomington ILL twice a year. I actually don't mind it because it means I am 3 hrs from being out of that godforsaken state!

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MechanicalTurkish@reddit

There’s a Bloomington in Minnesota, too. Home of the Mall of America.

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Connortbh@reddit

It’s also the largest city named Bloomington. Kind of interesting that all those Bloomingtons are about 80-90k population.

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NitNav2000@reddit

A mall so big it is in two Bloomingtons.

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thatsaqualifier@reddit

Some would say we need more bloomingtons.

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grain_farmer@reddit

The best was the BA pilot on a flight into Prague Czech Republic saying “Welcome to Czechoslovakia” which hasn’t existed since the fall of the Soviet Union and is a contentious issue locally.

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Various-Blood-3902@reddit

It’s Czechia now

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grain_farmer@reddit

The country’s official name is The Czech Republic

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Bunslow@reddit

Both are acceptable but most locals dislike Czechia. Nobody in CZ is upset when you use Czech Republic other than Redditors.

That's both good to know and somehow unsurprising lol

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Various-Blood-3902@reddit

Czechia is preferred by the government

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grain_farmer@reddit

https://mzv.gov.cz/london/en/index.mobi

https://mzv.gov.cz/jnp/en/index.mobi

Where?

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Various-Blood-3902@reddit

I made it up for dramatic effect

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Turbo_Normalized@reddit

Gesundheit

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AbhishMuk@reddit

Gesundheit.

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Bunslow@reddit

The Czech government directed use of Czechia as the official English short name in 2016.

seems pretty accurate to me, at least if one wants to abide by the govt's nonbinding suggestion

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Baystate411@reddit

All our maps in Kosovo referred to Macedonia (now north Macedonia) as FYROM. Former Yogoslavic Republic of Macedonia. Eventually they were like can you guys please stop calling us FYROM? This was 2018 lol

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Wanttobefreewc@reddit

Been there brother, Bozeman and Billings can really confuse me…. Lol

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Ok-Selection4206@reddit

How, thats two totally different names?

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22Hoofhearted@reddit

And significantly different towns...lol

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F1shermanIvan@reddit

Hahaha I’ve done that. We do a lot of our line indoc in Yellowknife instead of Iqaluit, so on the PA I’ve definitely gone “we’re about five minutes from starting the descent into Iqaluit.

…

Not Iqaluit. Yellowknife. Wouldn’t that be funny though?”

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jakep623@reddit

Typical a320 bus driver

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ce402@reddit

No airline going to either of those Bloomingtons flies anything bigger than an ERJ.

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Airkoryo_@reddit

(Allegiant's boss music starts playing)

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perispomene@reddit

"Don't worry folks, I don't know where we are, but the magenta line does. Fasten your seatbelts please."

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thatsaqualifier@reddit

"Does, uh, this guy know what he's doing?" - Passengers

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thanksforallthetrees@reddit

Getting let go from my first regional job for failing initial line check twice on the Q400. It was a big deal getting hired and after months of training I fucked it up at the last checks. An unemployed summer was very humbling after screwing up my big shot in the airlines.

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Mr-cacahead@reddit

but, you came back?

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thanksforallthetrees@reddit

Yup it worked out in the end, just had a 3 year detour back to King Air 250 medevacs. Now 787 in Asia.

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Cold_Refuse_7236@reddit

Congrats, though I don’t the flight teams wanted to hear you were demoted to flying them. 😬

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thanksforallthetrees@reddit

Haha they were used to it, there were very few lifers, mostly a stepping stone job to the airlines.

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Cold_Refuse_7236@reddit

Yes, very different between FW & RW in the aspect.

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thanksforallthetrees@reddit

What’s that?

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Cold_Refuse_7236@reddit

FW pilots want airline. No real upper echelon for RW pilots - I doubt few if any are well into 6 figures. , so I suspect many stay in medical flight for the variety & urgency.

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thanksforallthetrees@reddit

Sorry what’s FW and RW?

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Cold_Refuse_7236@reddit

You’re a pilot?

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thanksforallthetrees@reddit

Yes flew medevacs on king airs for many years. Maybe in a different country than you. But keep your secrets.

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Cold_Refuse_7236@reddit

Fixed-Wing (FW) & Rotor-Wing (RW) are pretty common English acronyms.

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thanksforallthetrees@reddit

Thanks. I call them helicopters and airplanes. Agreed much different career paths for the FW guys. We would sometimes receive transfers from the helicopter guys since they could land anywhere, so they’d pickup the patient from a remote spot, bring them to us waiting at a small airport, and we would fly them to the big city where there was better hospitals. It’s been about 5 years since I last flew Medevacs though.

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sunsetair@reddit

We are happy for you success

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Ruepic@reddit

That’s brutal

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SnorkyB@reddit

Flying 135 with a prick of a boss: I would show up early to get everything set up and the passengers would file in one by one in the FBO. The would make small talk with me and I would make small talk with them. He comes in one morning and screams how “We aren’t paid to fraternize with the passengers, only fly them! Don’t talk to them”!

I kept my mouth shut since I needed the job to time building, and a few weeks later I go through the same steps to get the plane setup, this time without talking to the pax.

We takeoff for KPIT, get to the FBO there and the passenger says “This is Pittsburgh - we are supposed to be in Portland, Maine this week”.

Boss is STEAMING MAD! Not only because he’s a cheapskate and knows he’s gonna eat the cost but it’s his fault. He makes the schedules personally and wrote down PIT instead of PWM. When I refilling in the PIT FBO he asked why I didn’t catch it, and I simply said “You told me not to talk with the passengers, so I didn’t”.

Wasn’t my fault but still I was pretty embarrassed. The passengers were always nothing but nice and kind to me. Can’t say the same for my old boss.

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Busy-Eye-3985@reddit

PIT is way better than Portland Maine

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poopiwoopi1@reddit

Are all Portland's bad? Portland OR is... Something

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Busy-Eye-3985@reddit

Its not that its bad, its that they're not PIT

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mr_dee_wingz@reddit

Your old boss deserved it! That would teach his sorry cheapskake ass a lesson

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Avi8tor_Zeus@reddit

I got a “golf crowd clap” from a CRJ900 crew while commuting in uniform after breaking the overhead bin prior to departure.

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Veritech-1@reddit

I turned down a job offer with JetBlue for Spirit.

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AidenTEMgotsnapped@reddit

Sorry to all of you :(

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jrstudentpilot16@reddit

Harsh Landing with passengers

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CaptainJackass123@reddit

I went to the bathroom, not once, but TWICE on a 20 min regional flight. The poor was a new hire too, low time guy.

I went the first time climbing through 10k. Came back and we ran the cruise checklist together. He briefed the approach. I went a second time. When I returned the second time, my poor FO was descending through 8000 feet and was prepping to enter a present position hold and just wait for me.

My lord I felt like such a prick. That was the day I stopped hitting up the airports Panda Express.

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TheVoidIsDark@reddit

2nd flight ever. I got to try the radios. Aircraft had "LY" in the registration. I said Lankey

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FLAviation@reddit

I threw up violently in front of the standards manager on OE.

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NordoPilot@reddit

Alright let’s here the story

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Various-Blood-3902@reddit

Hear

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NordoPilot@reddit

Oops. Thanks for the correction

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Various-Blood-3902@reddit

That’ll be .4 ground

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idkausernamerntbh@reddit

loooool😭😭

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Various-Blood-3902@reddit

Unnecessary comment, possible comment deviation. Advise when ready to copy a number

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idkausernamerntbh@reddit

*sighs, as a wee student pilot I found that comment very funny, I’m sorry ready to copy

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LeftClosedTraffic@reddit

The expert on unnecessary comments clearly

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Various-Blood-3902@reddit

Man Theres no need to talk bad about yourself

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LeftClosedTraffic@reddit

Thankfully I wasn’t

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-abschuss-@reddit

Student pilot here.

Hit 500 agl climbing out, went to turn off fuel pump and landing lights. Actually switched off battery master/ alternator. Bootyhole clenched.

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1FlyGuy3@reddit

Dispatcher here.. when I did my ppl we trained at a non towered airport and always left the transponder in standby mode.

First cross country solo I was so nervous I kept requesting VFR flight following and pressing ident for the controller thinking it was on when he finally gave me instructions.

On the leg back I requested it again still in standby and the controller yells “YOU'RE THAT GUY FROM EARLIER, VERIFY YOUR TRANSPONDER IS ON WHEN REQUESTING FLIGHT FOLLOWING”

Poor IND controller.

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AKCub1@reddit

Another PA disaster for you.

Broke my jet in a small Southeast Alaska town with no organic maintenance. Middle of summer so terminal is a madhouse and all the gates are full.
Mechanic has to be found and then has to take a ferry to get to airport. Initial estimate from mx control is a “couple hours max”. I give that info to pax. A little bit later the station says they want to pull the jet off the gate to a spot about 75 yards from terminal. There are 60-70 people on jet and a mix of locals and visitors. After our first couple hours are up and no mechanic in sight Ive been in and out of cabin enough that i know most of the peoples names.
This goes on for a while and I dutifully relay the bad eta(‘s) for mechanic and our departure to anyone who cares on jet.
People are getting frustrated on the jet and ask if they can get into terminal. All the station folks are busy with other jets so I volunteer to escort people in and out of the terminal. Works great.
At about the 4 hour point the csa comes to jet and asks me if I will do a PA in the terminal to for the outbound passengers. Not super happy about that cause standing in front of 300 people is different than hiding in a cockpit doing it but what the heck, always a first.
I follow the csa off the jet, up the stairs, up the jetway. Preparing my PA as I go, thinking I will walk into terminal and have some time to finalize things.
I walk through the jetway door into the pandemonium of a Southeast Alaska Airport midsummer and the csa hands me a wireless pa microphone immediately. All planning is gone.
I start my pa with “Uhh folks headed to Seattle over at gate…” I forget the gate number and hadn’t heard any side tone so I thought the handset was off… as I turned away from non responding crowd to read gate number, I said to myself (I thought) “dammit, what the fuck was that gate number again”.
I was facing the csa and saw her face drop. The noise in the terminal dropped by about 75%.
I figured I was already in trouble so just rolled with it, “I guess this thing is on after all. Now that I have your attention…”
when I turned around what seemed like the entire terminal was paying close attention to the guy making a pa. Lots of smiles.

Never heard anything about it.

About 4 months later, same airport, winter crowd of locals. I go up into the terminal to grab food for the crew and I see an old guy in a wheelchair and what appears to be his daughter waiting to board. He makes eye contact with me and points me out to his daughter. They discuss something and while I’m waiting in line for food she approaches me and says “my dad would love to chat with you”. I figure he’s some badass ww2 vet that wants to share pilot stuff. I’m all over it, I walk over and take a knee by his wheelchair and lean in a bit and he says, “I just wanted to tell you I’ve lived here for 5 decades and have been flying in and out the whole time and you did the best fucking announcement I’ve heard in all that time”

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N721UF@reddit

Take it as a badge of honor!

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deezknots78@reddit

Slipped going up the deice fluid covered stairs of a CRJ2 only to have my face get buried in the ass of a woman who in turn had her face go dead center into the ass of a morbidly obese woman who then stumbled into the FA standing in the galley and knocking her down.

After that was all said and done and we had everyone upright and walking, I helped the aforementioned morbidly obese woman to her seat along with her bag. She is behind me as we’re making our way down the aisle and one of her heals digs into the honeycomb floor panel and she trips into me which then results in my falling into a group of high school students getting settled.

Upon returning to the cockpit, I attempt to bend down to stick my bag in the crew close but slipped yet again because of the slick floor. This time, I had my head turned talking to my CA and inhale as my face hits the seat cushion. Cue thirty seconds of dry heaving while kneeling in the open cockpit door. The smell. That smell is something I hope no one ever has to experience. The first leg of the first four day trip of March 2003 was not great. Everything described above occurred in the span of less than ten minutes.

Oh, and my sunglasses never came off. Not once.

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Material-Length9366@reddit

You need to write aviation short stories

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Busy-Eye-3985@reddit

Was woman #1 thicc?

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Oregon-Pilot@reddit

fuck

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scruntbaby@reddit

Who let Mr. Bean fly the plane?!

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kevinw1526@reddit

Mind dropping the sunglasses brand?

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deezknots78@reddit

Killer Loop. Loved ‘em.

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bluefaceb69@reddit

I misheard information uniform and said information unicorn…

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22Hoofhearted@reddit

I suspect a lot of "code brown" stories are in order...

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fantastichaha@reddit

Did a go around because I mistakenly pressed TOGA instead of disconnecting the autothrottle on the 737

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Flimsy-Ad-858@reddit

I had a friend of mine do that to me when he was my FO on the 737. Thankfully we were far enough from the runway that he figured it out and disconnected to keep it stable, but was still funny.

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pilotw09@reddit

Back when the 135 I worked for had rolling rest we are called to do a pop up trip late one evening from CHS to CLE.

We repositioned the plane from PDK to go get the 1 passenger around 10pm, when we arrived we took fuel and I went inside to pay the bill and find our Cleveland passenger.

After checking his ID, small talked some saying I was from Dayton and he commented “oh yeah that’s right down the road”

We board, I brief our trip to Cleveland, safety speech etc and then we were off. He passed out almost immediately and when we landed he came up and said we were in the wrong place. I thought oh boy dispatch was supposed to send us to BKL or something.

-NOPE-

He wanted to go to Cleveland Tennessee. So, I call in to the company, we get the plane fueled again and fly this guy to Cleveland TN. He goes on his way at about 330 in the morning and the sheriff picks up the captain and I to take us to the hotel. Driving down the highway I see the exit for Dayton, TN. I was flabbergasted.

The company ate that cost, reprimanded dispatch and the sales person who set it up, and that taught me avaluable lesson. When greeting the passenger, confirm the city AND state they are intending on going to.

Ended up flying the same guy a few more times and he always had a laugh about it, and would tip the pilots 200 each trip, a nice little bonus.

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Flimsy-Ad-858@reddit

At least he was a good sport about it.

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Oregon-Pilot@reddit

91 corporate, someone up the ladder from me accidentally sent me to John Day OR when the mission was actually to go to The Dalles OR. It was a pretty quick hop to The Dalles, and it was a small Citation, so it wasn't that bad in the scheme of things, but it was still a mistake that cost someone a couple thousand dollars.

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Perfect_Big_5907@reddit

Same thing here. Flying Corporate. Dispatch was Raleigh. When we landed the passenger said this is not Norfolk. Yeah. Funny thing everyone else knew they had changed the destination the night before except they forgot to tell the 2 people that really needed to know.

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Flimsy-Ad-858@reddit

Late to this thread, but honestly, my first 121 interview.

I have no idea what happened to me that day. I'm normally pretty quiet and composed, and it wasn't my first ever job interview. Maybe it was just nerves from it being the first shot at an airline, but good lord I hope none of those people remember me. Endless rambling answers that trailed off into nothing, shitty answers that didn't answer the question. Stuff that makes me cringe out of my mind ten years later, after having given many interviews myself.

Thankfully at my dream job now, so it's somewhat immaterial in the end, but yeah. Make sure you do some kind of interview prep, even if it's just reading over some HR questions.

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PositiveRateOfClimb@reddit

Private pilot checkride. My legs were shaking so bad I couldn't hold the brakes during runup, so my DPE had to hold the brakes (we didn't have a park brake in the C152) lol

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Far-Event1151@reddit

Shit out a window

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SATSewerTube@reddit

“FAs please be seated for departure” on tower and reading back the takeoff clearance over the PA within 30 seconds of each other. Whoopsie

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lithium_bromide@reddit

I thank God I have a dedicated button for each

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Busy-Eye-3985@reddit

Pylot

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RunAshamed@reddit

Accidentally gave the longest passenger brief of my career on guard in Vegas while #gazillion in the lineup.

Never wanted to jump out of a plane in my life until that moment.

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PM_MeYour_pitot_tube@reddit

I gave the whole brief to ATL center once, if it makes you feel better

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Theodore764@reddit

I swear I heard this, was it about a year ago? (Loose timeline)

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Tomika20@reddit

Username checks out

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YugeWaterBottle@reddit

Almost shit ny pants in front of a smokeshow

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_Bemis@reddit

Flight attendant, passenger, or fellow pilot?

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Busy-Eye-3985@reddit

A passenger who worked as a FA and held their PPL

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thatsaqualifier@reddit

Asking the real questions...

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PostVertigo@reddit

When I flew regional, I finally got a trip out to SLC which is the airport where I trained and got my ratings at. I knew the frequency of the FBO by 17/35 (linked to my college) and wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to say a quick hello.

I somehow fumbled it and gave my “hello” message to everyone on ground. I (rightfully) got roasted by everyone on the frequency including the chief pilot of the program I trained at (who was coincidentally doing a stage check with a student and on the frequency). Captain also cackled for the remainder of the taxi. 🤣

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CrossBamboAtTen@reddit

Early in my PPL days I left KJKA (which was untowered back then), and I completely screwed up my radio call, which was supposed to be something like "Edwards traffic, N123AB is turning left downwind and departing east, Edwards traffic" and said to myself "I don't even know what the fuck I'm saying." except...I didn't say that to myself. I said that to everyone on CTAF because I forgot to release the PTT. Luckily it seemed dead enough that no one responded.

My most recent embarrassment was when I was so focused on a crosswind landing I forgot to go idle for a few seconds and the plane just went "RETARD...RETARD...RETARD...RETARD...RETARD...RETARD...RETARD" if not longer. I wonder if the people in first could hear that (probably).

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Informal_Policy_2957@reddit

Spacing out and getting yelled at ATC bc I didnt tak the runway fast enough

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grumpyoldman10@reddit

Not as a pilot, but I remember being at home and hearing what I thought was an airplane fly overhead. I went outside to look and couldn’t see or hear anything. Also had to pee, so I figured while I was outside I might as well save a gallon of water. When the airplane that was fertilizing my brome came back around the house, he must’ve been 50 yards away from me and I was just standing there with my dick in my hand. I could see the look on his face.

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masepoes7@reddit

On a late night flight, we’re in cruise and it had been a while since we heard anything on frequency. The captain I’m flying with is a jokester and does a lot of meowing on guard and such. We hear someone else come on and say “hey just let checkin if you’re still there” to which center replies “yup still here”.

My captain goes on and says jokingly “we get scared out here when we’re alone” Immediately we get a call from the FA’s and turns out he said that on the PA. I’ve never laughed so hard in the flight deck and I’ve never seen someone go red in the face so quickly. I wasn’t embarrassed but he certainly was. Good times

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minfremi@reddit

I told everyone in Albuquerque Center that we’ve started our descent to Charlotte.

At least the next day I told them the correct destination.

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PlaneShenaniganz@reddit

Triple whammy! Nice.

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pilot_1999@reddit

Oh man……….
The hardest landing I’ve ever done in the airbus. About a year on the line, was just getting comfortable. Night landing super calm and the bottom just dropped out. I’ll never forget the sight picture. Heard the FAs call each other so I turned on the cabin switch on the ACP and heard them asking each other if they were all ok. No idea how it wasn’t a LOAD 15. I landed so hard my captain didn’t do the landing callouts. Then I had to walk through customs with all the passengers. I felt so bad. I wanted to disappear.

Honorable mention: Told everyone over the PA the seatbelt sign was off when it was really on. FAs called up .2 seconds after the PA

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mr_dee_wingz@reddit

Had a pretty positive landing as a new guy earlier on my career, purser calls in to ask us to request a wheelchair, captain asked for who, purser said “ME!”. Boy did i get flack for that and continued for a few more years when i flew with her

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AbhishMuk@reddit

If it helps you feel better, many passengers don't realize pilots have much control over (smooth) landings. Heck, I (as a passenger) struggle to differentiate between landings, most feel quite hard anyway.

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TristanwithaT@reddit

Embarrassment by proxy… while on an IOE trip, we were in cruise one night, pretty quiet on center and not much on guard either…

Corporate guy on guard: “signature at XYZ airport, N12345”

Some random dude: “go ahead”

Corporate guy then goes on a minute long request for fuel, ice, lav service, rental car, and whatever else his pax needed

Next 2 minutes is every pilot in the sky absolutely roasting him. After that, I triple check before i key up a new freq or a PA.

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Oregon-Pilot@reddit

I hear this on guard every now and then. Its bad, but its also really, really funny to me. Not safety sensitive stuff, and no one is doing it to Life Flights, so I figure I'll just grab my popcorn.

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RaiseTheDed@reddit

I heard a tug trying to call ramp on guard. Everyone was trying to tell him to check his frequency, until someone just said "that's approved" and I assume the dude just started towing an airplane in the ramp without approval.

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cpt_konius@reddit

First flight of trip. FO and a JS got to witness this - trying to start the taxi with the parking break on and me making remarks that she’s heavy today.. makes me cringe to think about. Never seen another CA do it from when I was an FO which makes it worse

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Oregon-Pilot@reddit

I was flying single pilot in a Citation one time and couldn't figure out why we weren't moving. Plane was packed, and it was the start of a 3-4 day trip down to Mexico. FBO ramp was empty of helpers.

Wheel chocks.

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kytulu@reddit

I did that the other week at my school. Went out to to a MX run on a Seminole. Untied it, hopped in, started it up, and released the parking brake.

1800 RPM and the damn thing wouldn't move. I shut down to get out and see if I forgot the tail tiedown or something...

...nope, all untied. Walking back around the airplane, I spot a cheap set of black plastic chocks on the NLG tire.

The only Seminole with a working parking brake at the school, and someone put chocks on it...

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OTheodorKK@reddit

I have seen it twice in the last 8 month if that helps

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capn_davey@reddit

Did the Gatorade bottle trick on the way to a show in a 206. Got parked at the static display and a very helpful FBO employee started unloading all my stuff for me into a golf cart before I noticed or could say anything. She wasn’t expecting the lemon lime Gatorade bottle to be warm and dropped it like it was a grenade. I don’t remember how much cash was in my wallet but all of it was left as a tip…

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aFineMoose@reddit

I was 10 minutes from landing (a Beaver), and a passenger asks me how long we’ll be. I tell him, and he asks if I have a bottle. I shrug and pass him my coffee tumbler. He proceeds to fill it up in front of his wife and other passengers. He profusely apologized on the dock, and gave me a big enough tip that I didn’t mind at all.

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capn_davey@reddit

I mean, sometimes you just can’t quite land the beaver in time.

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NitNav2000@reddit

Glad it didn’t go off like it was a grenade

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Tracerz2Much@reddit

She was just checking for contaminants.

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gasp_@reddit

Every day. I wake up and remember a time when I believed flying to be a stable, long term, well paying job.

Cracks me up every time. Then I pop a zyn and drink coffee until the voices go away.

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skunimatrix@reddit

First flight in my Cherokee we couldn't get the engine to start. Pushed back in hangar after checking plugs for fouling and discovered the fuel selector was set to off. Something both me and the CFI missed.

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kytulu@reddit

I was doing a post-inspection run-up on a Seminole. Towed it out, cranked it up, headed to the run-up area. As I'm turning into the wind, the left engine dies. 5 seconds later, the right engine dies.

I'm sitting there, confused as fuck for a minute, until I checked the fuel levers.

"Off."

My co-worker had shut off the fuel to do the fuel filter inspection and did not turn them back on when he was done.

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pilotshashi@reddit

Your manager is also shopping around. 😂

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fallingfaster345@reddit

It’s not all that embarrassing but I’ve definitely accidentally said “thanks for choosing American and American Express” on the PA before.

(For any of the non American pilots that might be reading this, in the US the regional brandings for the 3 main legacy airlines are American Eagle, Delta Connection and United Express and sometimes regional companies operate flights for all three. There’s also the credit card company, American Express. I accidentally combined American Eagle and United Express and ended up with the credit card.)

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tarrasque@reddit

Oh man this just hit me with a memory. Used to fly out of ORD as an unaccompanied minor but lived in Rockford. American used to basically comp us with an American Eagle ticket out of RFD to simplify the whole thing.

Those were the turboprop days.

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ledzepplin408@reddit

I’ve got some bad ones:

Had a charter to move a gentleman who missing his legs from the above the knees down. He pretty mobile on stumps and did not want help getting on or out of a beaver on floats which is saying something. I got us tied up at the docks and opened the door for the passenger who got all the way onto the float and was lifting himself up onto the dock. I turned to my chief pilot to chat about the trip and stepped forward too far off the end of float into the drink. More than a few charter passengers were out on the docks to see the show.

In a 767 as an FO I was paired on a red eye with a 20yr skipper who had a rep for ridiculous interactions with ATC. Coming to the hold short line the runway guard lights were flashing and we were cleared to line up. Capt asks me to request the stop bar lights be turned off before we cross. I protest that these aren’t stopbar lights and should have flat out refused to make the call. He insists and tower informs me that these are not stopbar lights and throws them on so we can see check them out and a few more arrivals. Wanted to melt into the rivets under my seat.

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Hot-Fox-8797@reddit

First XC as a student pilot I was requesting taxi for departure at the destination airport where I wasn’t familiar with their SOP.

Anyways, they gave me an intersection departure. I had no idea what it was and my brain couldn’t compute how his taxi instructions would get me to the beginning of the runway. We went back and forth like 3 times asking him to clarify taxi instructions.

After a few minutes it finally clicked what he wanted from me. That’s the day that I learned what an intersection departure was.

(I will always hate intersection departures)

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__joel_t@reddit

Honestly, your CFI should be embarrassed for not ensuring you knew what an intersection departure was before signing you off to fly solo to a different airport.

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Hot-Fox-8797@reddit

Very few other airports around me do intersection departures. And it’s common sense after you hear the terminology intersection departure.

If ground/tower would’ve just said those words I would’ve been able to put 2 and 2 together. But I just kept trying to figure out what he meant on the taxi diagram

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__joel_t@reddit

At some level, that's even more reason why your CFI should have ensured you knew what they were, so that you're prepared to be a competent pilot at airports apart from those you regularly flew to in your training.

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Hot-Fox-8797@reddit

Fair, I’ll never do an intersection departure again by choice in a single engine. Very little upside and potentially lots of downside

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Horror_Place2697@reddit

Inform me please, what it is

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Ruepic@reddit

You depart from the point the taxiway intersects from the runway, so you don’t backtrack.

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Czexican613@reddit

Not sure if you meant to imply it’s a local rule, but it is true in all of Canada — ATC can not instruct you to do an intersection departure but they can approve it if you request it.

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stygarfield@reddit

I get intersection departures all the time in Canada without requesting them.

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Czexican613@reddit

Yup, I just looked it up and it seems I was mistaken, my bad. I'm curious why I had that idea in my head and wonder if that was an older rule.

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randombrain@reddit

And FYI that is not true in the USA, we can initiate an intersection departure and we let the pilot tell us if they can't do it. "Runway 27 at Bravo, taxi via Charlie, Bravo." That's all we need to say.

We will issue the distance remaining if the pilot asks for it.

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Wedge_Donovan@reddit

Entering the runway from an intersecting taxiway and taking off from there with reduced runway length, rather than from the end of the runway (full length).

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Ted_Striker02@reddit

I accidentally said thank you for flying delta airlines on the decent PA. I was a new hire at Spirit.

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CAVOKDesigns@reddit

Leaving the batteries overnight while flying for the OEM manufacture, and the flight was with the entire C-suite.... Got a nice procedure to avoid that for the rest of my life

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AceTend@reddit

I was flying home a new shit box Cessna 150 I bought and was having some static issues with the radio. I decided to turn the volume down as I was just VFR and would turn it back up when I needed to get through the NYC bravo…. I start with Philly approach and probably made 5-6 attempts to get flight following, then guard several times, and then an uncontrolled airport near me. All with no luck.

I eventually realized I had the volume down and was so embarrassed I waited to get out of Philly airspace to pick up flight following with New York approach

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Character-Car-2975@reddit

Saying left final and right final.

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OP_Skis_In_Jeans@reddit

Realizing that I not only knew several of the people who meow on Guard, but also that I actually liked some of them.

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Ok-Skill8583@reddit

I had a neutral opinion of you since I dont know you. Now I know you keep bad company. Make better life choices.

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VolubleWanderer@reddit

Anyone who meows on guard should spend 3 months on the bottom of the seniority bid list.

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willreadforbooks@reddit

Please tell them we all hate them ✨

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Limotinted@reddit

Here I am flying VFR not talking to a damn soul with the radio tuned to guard. I'm listening to a comedy station on XM and sure as shit right when they get to the punchline "meow" Every fukin time!

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OP_Skis_In_Jeans@reddit

Don't worry, many new nicknames were earned that day.

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eStrangeIbanez@reddit

Pass gas

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Oregon-Pilot@reddit

Was flying with a pretty intimidating Polish captain who I’m pretty sure didn’t think highly of me. I already was a bundle of nerves because we had flown together on the previous trip, and it was pretty bad for a number of reasons. We had gone into Denver, got a ton of change ups last minute (god I hate Denver), they have shut vectors, I ended up kind of blowing through the localizer, it was a mad dash to get back on profile on the cusp of going around, and then on touchdown, I did the pilot induced oscillations thing for the first time ever on an airliner, of course with him sitting there. Ugh.

Anyway, this flight was on the next trip, this leg originating at Newark. We had some mx issues with hydraulics at the gate, and those were apparently fixed, but once on the taxiway, they popped up again. We were hopping around on radios between ground, mx, FA, and cabin speaker. I was used to him using the phone to make cabin PAs, so when I saw him giving his PA over the hand mic, I made wild hand motions for him to stop because I thought he was transmitting it to ground or mx, and he looked at me like I was an absolute fucking idiot. I looked down and saw that he was indeed transmitting over the cabin PA.

I can still feel it, and it feels bad haha

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Any_Purchase_3880@reddit

I asked for a progressive taxi to the midfield run up at John Wayne. He was like "uhh yeah turn right on Charlie and uhhh go straight." Pretty sure I heard Southwest laughing on their next transmission.

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554TangoAlpha@reddit

Better than when I went to the wrong run up area at SNA.

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Oregon-Pilot@reddit

Rumor has it some asshole landing on a taxiway over there, big if true

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BleachIF@reddit

I’ve done the same

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Wallphotography@reddit

I did my fist PA last month because captain was late. Went horrible. So funny though.

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bonerparte1821@reddit

bro we cant hear half the ish you guys say anyway.. lol

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Foreign_Kick1790@reddit

We’ve all been there brotha

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ItzMattyIce25@reddit

PPL check ride it was 13 degrees Fahrenheit the day I got my checkride. My local airport was nice enough to let me store my plane in their heated hangar to prevent any wing ice from forming overnight. Arrive early that morning and pull the plane out everyone wishes me luck and off I go. Get to the run up on my checklist and can’t get past the magneto test the rpm’s kept dropping out of the acceptable range. Me being a bag of nerves combined with it usually doesn’t get that cold where I live and I forgot carb heat existed. Taxied to the maintenance hangar walked in described what was happening and they said “have you tried carb heat”… it was indeed carb heat… felt like the biggest idiot mainly because I knew better but learned a lesson that day lol

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WhiskySails@reddit

Failing my first ifr check ride.

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HydrodynamicShite@reddit

same......

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MrAflac9916@reddit

in the stress of my seaplane checkride, I forgot that adding carb heat would help in a partial loss of rpm situation. I ended up emergency landing in a lake when the examiner lowered my RPM. I still passed, but that was embarrassing

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Doolie_69@reddit

Middle of training, off station in busy airspace for basically the first time. Practice missed approach, on the go I was denied several different approaches while heinously exceeding 250 knots. After MUCH back and forth, the controller was getting frustrated with my antics. Finally he asks in plain English, “Glock69, what are you trying to do?”

After a long pause I said: “… I don’t know.”

It was silent for probably 15 seconds until an army helicopter stepped in to roast me. My instructor was dying laughing in the back seat the entire time.

Fun times!

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TheFourDeeNinja1@reddit

When I first started flying, I accidentally out of maybe stress, was holding down the PTT button and the Unicom and other planes in the circuit heard a heavy meditation session amount of breathing lol. I made sure to take more of a chill pill when I went out in the pattern after that.

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Ok_Witness179@reddit

Hah don't feel too bad. I've had a couple students do that. Heavy breathing after downwind call, or during landing over the radio. One even managed to transmit his entire after landing checklist before he relaxed enough to release the PTT 🤣

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arziben@reddit

Dropping a voice message to the boss of the company I wanted to work for just a few days ago

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Log_Nice@reddit

I was stationed away from my family during flight school for about a year and a half. During instrument training I had the chance to fly down to see them (in a jet no less). I hadn’t flown at night in this particular airplane before and I wasn’t supposed to be in the front seat for that reason. We also had a broken taxi light and I was using paper pubs (instead of an iPad) to navigate.

After we landed, I didn’t realize we needed the fuel card out of the plane so my instructor sent me back to get it. I couldn’t find it so I went back again but still couldn’t find it. Eventually, he went back to get it. We eat dinner with my wife and daughter and then they go home and we brief for the return leg of our flight.

Right off the bat he asks me if I forgot anything. That’s when it clicked that I forgot to pin my ejection seat and the handle for an emergency system in the canopy (explosive det cord that sits right over my head). Not only had I missed it when I got out of the plane, but I went back TWICE and still missed it (the pins are black and yellow with a 2 foot neon orange flag…it’s almost impossible not to see them). That is a HUGE NO NO. Fortunately, I had safe’d my seat so it wouldn’t have gone off anyway. My instructor took pity on me and since I shouldn’t have been in the front seat anyway he gave me a mulligan. I never forgot to pin or safe a seat ever again.

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EezyBake@reddit

pissed my pants on an approach during ir training

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Express_Professor_93@reddit

At my airline we were big on standing in the cockpit door, saying buh-bye to the deplaning passengers. On my legs, I dutifully said the buh-byes. One day after the walk around or something, I returned to the cockpit, and found a mechanic in my seat working on something. Trapped between the jammed cockpit and the emplaning passengers, I turned and thought, I’ll welcome the passengers. The problem was, I guess it was muscle memory in my tongue, but as they got on I said “buh bye” to 5 or 6 passengers before I clued in.

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lurking-constantly@reddit

Helping load spent jerry cans from a tiny tender boat into a classic radial DHC-2 Beaver on floats. Just met the pilot, great guy, trying to act cool because I’ve never been in a sea plane before. Leaned out to grab a can. Slipped. Splash. Thankfully he had some towels.

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stickwigler@reddit

Requesting an approach that is NOTAM’d out.

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imapilotaz@reddit

Not as a pilot but similar to the Bloomington, IN/IL guy.

I started 2 cities when i thought they were different markets.

Waterloo, Ontario and Wilmington, NC

I had no idea i had set up meetings not with Waterloo, IA and Wilmington, DE.

Ended up riding that mistake, announced service and while Waterloo didnt work, ILM worked great.

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NitNav2000@reddit

In the E-2C Hawkeye, it has a ditching hatch above your head with a spring loaded handle. I would take a coke and put it up there to cool it off in flight (cold outer skin). Drink it prior to recovery for the sugar & caffeine boost at night. Forgot about it.

During the carrier landing I was all the sudden being sprayed in the face with a fluid. Thought...hydraulic fluid? Av gas? Some kind of coolant? Oh yeah, I'm going to get an air medal for this. Fought it down to an arrested landing, but it was not pretty. Looked up, coke can was finishing emptying itself on me through a pinhole leak.

LSOs come to debrief, and were like, "You were looking pretty good, then you were all fucked up."

Yeah, uhhhh....

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arunko@reddit

My wife flew with me on my last trip as a FO to BKK. So, after we parked, I got out of the flight deck immeditely to tell her to clear immigration and wait by the baggage carousel. As she walked out, I was checking out her rear and the next few pax disembarking noticed me checking her out, started laughing and one girl even told me that I fit the typical pilot stereotype. I told her she was my wife and she replied 'You wish' loudly and walked out. The 2 cabin crew at the door burst out laughing and they all had fun teasing me about it in the van to the hotel.

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7nightstilldawn@reddit

First solo flight to Boeing Field as a solo commercial student. All the helipads are labeled numerically. I called tower to request takeoff clearance while hovering before I looked to see what pad I was on. Tower asked me. I panicked and looked down and saw I was hovering over an H. So I told him I was at helipad H. Controller que’d up his mike and I could hear the whole tower laughing at me. Controller says: “Sir, all the helipads have an H”. It’s been all downhill after that.

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Recent-Day3062@reddit

Sometimes when I read or see these things, I am very impressed by how pilots or controllers come up either a line like that

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dhnguyen@reddit

Lol. I hope your coworkers buy you a cake with a big ass h on it for your birthday every year.

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Exciting_Spare4297@reddit

One time the PA wasn’t working right, so I tested it on the ground by making a bunch of funny noises thinking just the crew was on board…….we were still deplaning.

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Tracerz2Much@reddit

Just a little encore for the passengers.

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Parking_Bunch7596@reddit

Made my traffic calls on guard

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vagasportauthority@reddit

“XXX 5023 descending via the SID”

“[Redacted approach] we would rather you descend via the Star”

Most embarrassing moment in recent memory.

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throfak@reddit

😂😂😂

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DisregardLogan@reddit

Threw up in the school’s parking lot after my solo

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davenuk@reddit

I landed at a grass airfield for the second time, I had trouble identifying the taxi way, I'm sure there was a lane there somewhere.

Ah that gap must be it.

Turns out they had cut the grass back and I was now taxying through a corn field.

Undeterred, I gave it the beans.

"Golf Charlie Oscar Charlie Kilo you can exit the corn field to the right and continue on the taxiway"

My god that made a mess.

Poor prop.

Creamed Corn anyone?

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dunmif_sys@reddit

A couple of weeks ago I did nearly my entire boarding announcement on tower frequency by accident, including my full name. I always use the hand mic for PAs, but this time I picked up the wrong hand mic.

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F1shermanIvan@reddit

I was spinning a turbo Otter on the dock by pushing the tail out as the other pilot had a rope around the bow of the float to move it.

I pushed a little toooo hard, and fell off the dock into the lake.

He just looks at me in the water, and goes “you know October in Manitoba is not the time of year to be falling in the water…”

He was right. I was freezing.

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vARROWHEAD@reddit

I don’t know if there is any time of year I want to go in the water in Manitoba

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F1shermanIvan@reddit

Dig a hole in Churchill in February, live a little! 😂

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vARROWHEAD@reddit

“Polar bear was here an hour ago you just missed it”

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Significant-Pen-2274@reddit

My very first leg after OE at my regional, I proudly announced to the pax that we were descending into Sioux City. That would have been awesome if we hadn't been going to Sioux Falls.

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ananajakq@reddit

One time I accidentally made traffic calls and entered the pattern at an airport I wasn’t supposed to be at. I heard them called for me on guard lol wooooopsie

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Perfect_Big_5907@reddit

Well not me but back about 20 years ago i had just taken off from BNA and was about to switch to departure. Guy in a tri pacer had just taken off and was still on tower freq. He thought he was on Intercom for his passengers and proceeded to give a flying tour of Nashville with all the commentary on tower freq. Tower had to get on arr/dep freq and tell everyone to use alternate tower freq as this guy would not shut up long enough for anyone to get through to him.

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rcbif@reddit

Someone said there were donuts in the break room, and I went in there, and the vendor who brought them was still having a meeting with one of my co-workers, and I was like - oh sorry.

(I'm a pilot who works in engineering. Bet yA didn't see that one coming DID YA!?)

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rFlyingTower@reddit

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What moment in your career makes you cringe when recalling it?

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