Reality TV

[7006 fan]

For the first time, and by mistake I must admit, I saw 2/3 minutes of Airline?/Airport?. I thought I'd switched into 'you've been framed' or something. Maybe I am a snob or something, but..., at least scheduled still maintains a level of acceptable behaviour, all I saw was vulgar, uncooth, ill-mannered behaviour more suited to swimming in a sewer than an aviation related activity.
I sometimes wonder if they are safe outside their own doorstep!
I feel so sorry for the staff, you must have hours of patience and even more, the ability to restrain that quick 'left-right'.!!! :O
:ok:

[Goldryder]

I sometimes watch those programmes too, recently the Airport USA featuring Southwest.

Thing that always annoys me is the passengers who chuck their toys out of the playpen when they turn up late and can't get on the plane. Everyone knows that you need to be there in plenty of time, yet on every flight there seems to be at least one person who gets there 10 mins after gate is shut and then goes off on one at all and sundry, when its their own stupid fault for not allowing enough travel time to get to the airport.

Whenever I see these programmes I have an irresistable urge to smack the offending passenger in the mouth, how the staff in situ don't really amazes me cos they must have the patience of saints.

[nickmanl]

Are you talking about Airline, the first series which was based on Britannia Airlines? If so, scheduled airlines such as EasyJet suffer just as much from these people as airlines as the charter airlines, and I suppose so do people like BA, except they don't have a documentary on it to expose it to the public!

[Rollingthunder]

I spend alot of time in airports and over the years I have never seen any of the behavior typically seen on these shows. Is it partly down to the presence of video cameras?

[Wycombe]

Nice to see our EZY Capt setting a good example to us all on in-flight Flight Deck visits on tonights episode.

Nice of the Tupolev drivers to let him and the camera crew in as well.

Either that or there was some appropriate editing to give us the impression that they were airborne.

I hope that was the case.

[lexxity]

I deal with scheduled and loco and can confirm that loco pax are a different breed. Everytime I'm dealing with the loco I end up being shouted at for something that is not my fault, ie late pax, is that 60kgs of baggae you've got with you? But it doesn't happen when dealing with scheduled, there is the occasional disagreement, but at least you can have a coherant conversation with scheduled pax.:rolleyes:

I don't have the patience of a saint, but I do have high blood pressure:ugh:

[captainbritboy]

Mmm, an interesting thread that has made enjoyable reading.

Generally, there are three main issues which cause passengers to behave in an inappropriate manner when checking in for a flight:

1) Having to re-pack overweight hold luggage (the maximum
allowance being 32kg for any one piece) and cabin baggage
exceeding the limit set by the carrier (usually between 6-8 kg).

2) Passengers not getting the seats they wanted, or groups
being sat apart due to limited seat availability as a result of
being late to check in.

3) Passengers being denied travel after the flight has closed.

The above are the main causes of pax getting shirty on the ground. I would imagine that for the cabin crew, it is probably things like seatbelts, drunks, and rudeness etc.

The important thing to remember when watching TV programmes like Airline/Airport etc is this:

A 30 minute TV show about lots of thoroughly lovely, polite, and well behaved middle class people going on their holidays would make for very dull television indeed.

Furthermore, based on my own experience of airport life, I would imagine the production teams would have to shoot hours and hours of footage to get even one minor 'fuse blowing' incident, as they really are few and far between.

Hope that answers a few questions.



:D

[Maude Charlee]

Since when were lo-cos not scheduled?

As for the behaviour, yep, it's a mixture of the camera bringing out the pratt in everybody (staff included) and TV editors only wanting to show the most salacious details for the viewing pleasure of the dribbling morons that like to watch ITV all day.

From my experience, the check in/pax handling agents give as good as they get from some of the brain donors who walk through the airport doors, and some of them need a good smack round the back of the head too. Not everybody has the patience of a saint.

[WHBM]

all I saw was vulgar, uncooth, ill-mannered behaviour more suited to swimming in a sewer than an aviation related activity.
Oh dear. Because I've appeared in this programme by chance at least once, albeit just walking out across the apron. Amazes me how many people at the office see it and tell me, including the reruns. And others at the office have since appeared similarly as well.

But honestly, was on best behaviour, in my suit and all (as a significant number of EZY pax actually are), and in a tie. Which latter was more than Stelios (who was on the same flight, probably leading to the TV crew's interest) managed to be wearing ! But he did come down the cabin in-flight and have a chat to all.

[PPRuNe Pop]

Rollingthunder.

More likely it is a set-up. Think how dreary the programme would be without the odd couple here and there. Or Jane on Eze being normal instead of playing to the crowd! Oh dear! :rolleyes:

[Curious Pax]

A bit harsh Wycombe - UK regs for UK flightdecks would have kept him out on a UK aircraft, but maybe the Belarussian regs are different, in which case if the crew were happy then what's the problem? He may be like a significant number of aircrew on here seem to be, and think that the rule is an ass (which isn't to suggest they would disobey it where it applied of course).

Most likely is that the Captain heard that a fellow captain (plus filmcrew were aboard, so invited him up). Most interesting for me given the normal language of the air (though I wasn't sure which crew member was being subtitled) was that one of the guys was talking in a different language (sorry, not sure if it was Russian, Belarussian, but not English) and someone else was translating for him.

Back on topic - I much prefer Airport on BBC1 which has been showing a new series recently. There is more variety in stories, and the curiosity of what dangerous species the animal welfare guy will be wrestling with this week. He's either brave or daft, and must have the constitution of an ox not to heave up at some of the vile smelling things he uncovers!

[WATABENCH]

We've had a series on BRS down here, it was so frustarating to watch, as all they were doing was following ASU whilst he merrily picked mushrooms from around the airfield and told us how best to cook them, then showed him setting bunny traps, then a women who was taking 2 dogs to PFO with BY, then last but not least a cycleing airport fireman?!
This was the 2nd series, the 1st was much more interesting and actually followed things that people who don't work in the industry would be interested in. People watching this 2nd series must have wondered what the hell was going on, 28 mins of mushroom picking and 2 mins of actual going ons of a busy regional airport.
What made me laugh most is they actually followed 2 ASU guys who went to MAN!! to plane spot, but it was foggy and they couldnt really see anything.
Airline has been and still is filmed in BRS now as well LPL/LTN/NCL.
Compulsory viewing in the WATABENCH house hold, does'nt it just make you want to shout at the TV, The pax are Vile!

Oh well they say any publicity is good publicity!:E

[7006 fan]

WHBM,

I was of course referring to the SLF not the staff. But then again...
;)
only kidding
:ok:

[MerchantVenturer]

easyJet used to announce the filming of a new series on their website asking anyone flying during the period of filming who had 'an interesting story' to contact the television company beforehand.

So the filming of such people chasing bulls or going on stag or hen groups (the only common denominator being they flew with easyJet to get there) are certainly not spur of the moment events captured by cameras that happened to be running when the 'actors' turned up.

I think the shows such as Airline and Airport (with that blasted animal man who appears every week, making the programme seem more like one about a zoo instead of Britain's major airport) have run their course and should be pensioned off.

I now record them and fast forward them and find that in each 28 minute Airport and 24 minute Airline (cut out the start and end titles plus adverts and this is the length) there is usually no more than ten minute's worth that vaguely interests me.

I disagree with WATABENCH about the second BRS series. Granted there was a lot of padding as he describes but there was still far more 'front line' aircraft action than you ever see in the two national programmes mentioned above.

As a non-industry viewer I enjoyed the BRS series although doubtless those 'in the trade' would watch these types of programme from a different perspective and understandably pick holes in them in the same way that I am sure policmen would criticise the endless 'reality' programmes about their job.

[WATABENCH]

MV, I know you and I have been down this route before, and i do respect your comments, however working at BRS and actually seeing what is going on at both pax and ramp sides, there was so much that was missed or not given enough coverage, instead we had a whole 15 mins of 2 dogs on their merry way to PFO and the only part of that whole bit that had anything remotely to do with BRS was the loading of them into the hold of BY!
Guess we'll have to agree to disagree on this one my friend, still filming for next series starts in a few months i've been told!

[captainbritboy]

I agree with you Mr Venturer. Airport/Airline seems to feature all sorts of odd tenuous links which have little, if any, connection to the aviation industry. This, I'm sure is of disappointment to those who watch the show because they have an interest in airlines and airports.

Perhaps we are all missing the point of such programmes. It is not to give an insight into the industry for the purpose of education, but to appease the masses who seem to have become obssessed with everybody elses lives. Welcome to the era of 'celebrity' where we can all have our five minutes of fame.

Does anyone remember a BBC aviation documentary series from the early 1980's called 'Diamonds in the sky' , presented by Julian Pettifer? Now that was a class series, and there has not really been anything like it since.

Dear BBC...

[effortless]

I hate to admit it but I miss "The Airshow" with DeCabinet. I used to whince but I realise that I was just jealous of the chap. :{

[WHBM]

WHBM,

I was of course referring to the SLF not the staff. But then again...

Alas I have to report the fact that I am indeed a humble SLF myself !

Yes there were some better aviation programmes years ago. Who remembers a well done one on the BBC about 10 years ago for the 50th anniversary of Heathrow, with Juliet Morris (blandly reading from autocue but the subject matter was well written) and Raymond Baxter, (obviously knew his stuff). Baxter was a WW2 Spit pilot I believe.

This will get moved to AH&N if we're not careful.

[numloxx]

G'day all,

I remember seeing the US version a few weeks ago.
Drunk pax, late check-in pax, and one guy who got thrown off the aircraft for shouting too much. While he was on the aerobridge walking away he turned to the FA onboard and said "Have a lovely flight, I hope you crash"
At that point the staff told him to goto another carrier.
Not a joking matter to tell you the truth.

If someone did that to me, I would hit the alarm bells.
I do Check-in every now and then, and 2 times I have asked a pax if they have anything dangerous in their bag, and have been told "Nah, just a bomb" or something similar.

Reported it to the duty supervisor and they gave them a stern talking to. Next time however, I will phone Aust Protective Services. I dont find it funny one bit.

Some carriers are now posting "No jokes" signs around their terminal.

Cheers,

[Wycombe]

Curious Pax,

Don't get me wrong, I also regret the fact that the World changed and that those of us who liked to visit the sharp end (and those that used to enjoy allowing it) have been denied the opportunity.

In 10 years prior to 9/11 (the last time only 4 days before), I waved my PPL and asked on many occasions - I was never refused that I can remember.

My point was that a 100% ban means a 100% ban. Harsh maybe, but the only way to be certain there is no ambiguity or doubt.

A Capt who has to enforce the rules when he is in charge should set a better example. Would he allow a fellow ATPL travelling on a private journey as paying pax to visit his Flight Deck, I wonder?

[7006 fan]

WHBM,

But hopefully not of the 'Toga' fraternity!!!

:ok:

[Curious Pax]

Wycombe,
I hear what you are saying, however my point was that it isn't a 100% global ban. It is 100% ban for all UK airlines, US airlines, and a number besides, but may well not have been banned by the Belarussian authorities. If that is the case then I don't see any problem. Of course if the Belarussians have also banned cockpit visits then I totally agree with you.

I am assuming through all this that they were flying on Belavia, the Belarussian flag carrier - it was certainly a Tupolev flight deck, so there isn't many other candidates.