Had a good one the other day, aircraft was delayed (the famous coffee down the galley sink again
), I was in a rush to sort out the fuel with the flight deck to get the aircraft away, and I was in a foul mood. A passenger stopped me as I was walking through the cabin on the upper deck to the cockpit.
The conversation went as follows:-
Pax: Why is the aircraft delayed, is there a problem with it?
Me: No madam, it's absolutely fine, we just had a blocked sink that they wanted us to clear out before the aircraft departed.
Pax: So that won't cause the aircraft to crash?
Like a blocked sink is going to cause an aircraft to drop out of the sky!
Me: No madam, the worst that can happen if it blocks up again is the sink will overflow and make the galley floor a bit wet and slippery.
Pax: The aircraft is safe to fly then, everything is ok, it's not going to crash or anything like that?
At this point I became slightly impatient, like I'm going to send an unsafe aircraft flying with 300-400 passengers and crew on it. My sarcastic sense of humour kicked in and I said something that maybe I shouldn't have.
Me: Oh definatley not madam, the aircraft is thouroughly checked over each time before it goes flying. I checked it myself and I can assure you that you have a good set of wheels, two wings and you still have three engines bolted to the wings.
Pax: I thought the 747 had four engines?
Me: It does, unfortunatly the gaffa tape that they used at the other end wasn't really up to the task, we've got the coast guard out looking for the other engine as we speek, I guess they will re-attach it the other end!
The passenger looked somewhat nervous and said: Can this aircraft actually fly on three.........
(The passenger trailed off, paused, saw the smirk on my face, looked out of the window and started laughing)
Pax: Oh you're such a tease. That was a cruel joke.
Me: On a serious note madam, I can assure you that we have thoroughly checked the aircraft over and we would not allow it to depart if it was unsafe.
It was very naughty of me and I shouldn't have said it, but thankfully she saw the funney side of it. If she had complained, I could have been in a lot of trouble.
Some people will believe just about anything!