Can I try to take the heat out of this.
Irlandes
You've misunderstood Hoverman's point. He didn't suggest that it was audacious of you or any other PPL to give your opinion on this matter. He didn't suggest that professional helicopter pilots belonged to some "oh so special 'club'." Nor was he disdainful of you.
He explained that professional helicopter pilots are a small sector of the industry, that they feel a bond or cameraderie with each other and, although it might seem illogical to people outside that community, when one of their number is killed in a flying accident, they identify with him and feel it personally even if they've never met him. Somebody else described it as 'kinship'.
Surely that's understandable? And not unreasonable?
He suspected you weren't a professional helicopter pilot because your views were so out of line with the 'norm'; the inference being if you were, you'd understand. I wonder if you'll hold the same views when you become a professional pilot and have spent a few years in the industry.
Hoverman wasn't rude to you. Shame you felt the need to be quite so rude in response.
newswatcher
The point was "HM's not exactly the best advert for the helicopter industry." I think you'll find if you speak to those in a position to know these things that the Queen doesn't like flying in helicopters. It's probably a tribute to the S-76 that HM has modified her views (slightly) in recent years, but she is still not keen on the idea and uses alternative transport whenever possible.
Capt Waffoo
I respect your absolute right not to express condolences when you feel they are inapprpriate, but still can't see why you disapprove of others doing so.
Perhaps the fault is mine, but I can't follow why the definition of 'bereave' indicates the inappropriateness of "condolences for a bereavement" in the case of a stranger? Those who choose to do so aren't grieving, they are merely expressing sympathy for those who have been left 'desolate', or have been 'deprived of a relation'?
Even though the pilot and his family may be 'strangers', many people clearly feel a bond through belonging to the same small sector of the industry.
If I may offer an answer to the question you've asked twice, I don't think it would be in the slightest inappropriate for someone to express condolences to a bereaved family who are strangers, saying something like: "I never worked with your husband/father, but I'm a helicopter pilot myself and I'd just like to say how sorry I was to hear about the accident and to express my sympathy to you in your loss. We all face the same dangers and we feel it when one of us loses his life flying." I think it would be a very odd bereaved family who considered that "inappropriate".
Your suggestion that it is "elitist" of professional helicopter pilots to feel more when they hear another professional has been killed in a flying accident than when they hear of the death of a bricklayer or busdriver is a terrible distortion of what people have said. It's nothing to do with elitism.
Is it so unreasonable of people to identify more with someone in their own sphere being killed doing the same job, than with (for example) someone in a completely different industry being killed - whether he's a worker on the shop floor or a captain of industry. Isn't simply a product of there being a bond? And identifying with someone in the same job being being killed whilst doing that same job?
"rather cheesy "RIP" style footnotes"
It's often difficult to find the right words to use on such occasions. Some people are better at expressing themselves than others. Aren't 'RIP style' condolences just a convenient, and universally understood, way of saying "I'm sorry this chap lost his life. I feel sorry for his family."?
(Edited to say I didn't realise how long this post had become until I saw it 'in print'. Lawyers do tend to go on a little once they start. Sorry.)
Last edited by Flying Lawyer; 19th Jul 2002 at 18:10.