The Good Old Days ... will they ever return !!!

[leisurelad]

Hey,

Sorry if this has been discussed before and i know everyone has moved on but when will the good old days return !!!

Will we ever see carriers back like Air Europe / Airtours / Caledonian / Excalibur / Air Ops etc.

Huge volumes of people all excited about going on holiday, interesting flights being worked by crew, people loved their jobs and their was a constant buzz about the place, a place that you were proud to work in.

What has happened eh - all i see now is people being stressed over 30mins delay, threating legal action, abuse, staff unhappy in their job and just damm right arrogance towards everybody.

I know i may be dreaming here but can we have a topic to look back over the good old charter days - a time that was fun.

Be interested to hear peoples stories

Cheers http://static.pprune.org/images/smilies/thumbs.gif

[411A]

Don't know about you, leisurelad, but our mob, flying the 'ole L1011' still enjoy going to work, the passengers all seem pleased, hardly ever a complaint, and the company makes a handsome profit.
All in all, quite a satisfying job.
Next question?:E

[BEagle]

You mean the days when people saved up all year to go on their annual holiday? And actually 'dressed up' for the occasion?

Yes, it was a special event. The visit to the flight deck was the icing on the cake for many.

But the endless customs issue with some men-minded little revenue spy wandering about making sure people didn't open their duty-free purchases before leaving on their flights didn't make things enjoyable in the UK.

Neither did the clouds of cigarette smoke.

But it was a slower, less aggressive world. When people weren't treated like terrorists - and airport staff actually said 'please' and 'thank you'....

Nowadays most people travelling from Uk airports which support LoCo operations are probably on their nth flight of the year - drunken hen parties in Prague, kids in tracksuits off to insult Europe with their debauched behaviouar and pensioners in pink pyjamas off to escape the gloom of Britain under the yoke of nuLabor for a couple of weeks.

And who can blame them - if the LoCos have dumbed-down the pleasure of airline travel to this extent, then that's the reward we all now have as a consequence.

Must dash - flight to catch!

[Rainboe]

Why do you feel the need to post this more than once?

[Albert Driver]

The Good Old Days ... will they ever return !!!

Do you know, I believe it's exactly forty years ago I first heard someone say that on a flightdeck.....


.

....but that's only because it was my first trip and I wasn't around to hear Wilbur say it. :rolleyes:

[flash8]

In a word... no.

Over regulated bureaucratic interference in all aspects of operations, Management encroaching everywhere, hand tying SOPS, constant worrying not about future prospects but even if will have a job, erosion of T&C's, disrespectful passengers (a manifestation of the lack of respect for others generally in society today), cc always stressed out.. etc etc

What I would give to be on the BOAC VC10 back in the 60's long haul. That must have been living.

[Dan Winterland]

Nostalgia isn't what it used to be!

[Blacksheep]

What I would give to be on the BOAC VC10 back in the 60's long haul. Changing an elevator PFCU on a cold, wet January midnight, atop a cherrypicker, with a nor'easter gale blowing freezing horizontal rain in your face and no, nostalgia ain't what it used to be.
Curse their fuel quantity indication, flap asymmetry and other frustrating analogue electro-mechanical systems. Give me a nice reliable post 1990 aircraft any day.

[Albert Driver]

What I would give to be on the BOAC VC10 back in the 60's long haul.

Enjoy:
Atlantic Barons insisting on being addressed as "Sir" but never giving a sector away.
The Gulf in summer with no APU/ground air conditioning but "Jackets On".
BOAC Rest House cell blocks.
IMC on the flightdeck with three pipe smokers.
Fuel flight plans based on where the jet-stream was reported to be last week.
Short of fuel but cruising at Point-eight-seven anyway because Sir has a "theory" he worked out on Comets.
Loran not working and all you can get for the next four hours is a sun position line from the sextant.
"Digital" means tapping the fuel gauge with your finger in the hope it will unstick before you break it.
"Computer" means that thing you draw pencil triangles on when you work out the flight plan manually, if you're really out of luck.
TCAS - two, four, six, eight little screwed-up eyes looking at the horizon.
GPWS - two, four, six, eight big round eyes looking forwards.
EEC - what you say when Number Three fails and takes Number Four with it.
ACARS - how you feel when you've done eight passenger sectors to get to Sydney to start your trip.
VCTen-derness - how you feel when you've done eight................


Ah, but it did LOOK nice!

[flash8]

that sounds very much like nostalgic reminisces Albert Driver ;)

[FAStoat]

Nostalgia is A OK!!Reminds me of the one that goes like this!Remember Hornblower??Who???You know "Hornblower the well known sexpert and cunning linguist".The cunning articifer would know him ,I think!!

[Skipness One Echo]

Don't know about you, leisurelad, but our mob, flying the 'ole L1011' still enjoy going to work, the passengers all seem pleased, hardly ever a complaint, and the company makes a handsome profit.
All in all, quite a satisfying job.
Next question?
411A is offline Report Post Reply

Next Question : Who the HELL do you fly for that's still launching passengers on the L1011?

[411A]

Who the HELL do you fly for that's still launching passengers on the L1011?



At least six airline companies doing so, SOE, take your pick.
Having said that, I fly for three of them, part time for each one.
If all goes according to plan, one of these will start trans-Atlantic ad-hoc charter service in June.

[merv32249213]

Blacksheep
I know the feeling , horizontal rain and high winds, on a cherry picker around midnight trying to get a damned 737 APU to stay on line. Changing an anti collision bulb on top of the tail of a 707 on a turnround in same conditions. Shear pin break on a tow bar when under tow.
Wheel changes on turn rounds with hot brake discs hindering the job.
Converting a 737 to cargo and then back to normal for pax config,often three times in one week.
To cap all this, getting a rollacking because you incurred a tech delay of over 4 minutes, and had to make out a report, as to why.
The good old days regards the above , no thanks.
There were however the odd flights , Caravelle with its large boundary layer fences blocking your view, Comets with air conditioning like a sauna.
Inbound on a American Airline Lockheed Electra to JFK, sitting in one of the curved seats at the rear of the plane next to a miniskirted hostess , trying to get her boots on as the aircraft was on finals.
But the creme de la creme was takeoff with a VC 10, en route, LAP to Amman, partition curtains almost horizontal and pillows flying down the aisle, and above all the power that slammed you into your seat on climbout, wow!!!.
Perhaps they were the good old days.

[ZeBedie]

leisurelad, are you sure you don't mean 'will my youth ever return'? To the twenty somethings, these are the good old days, or they will be.

[norwich]

ZeBedie, Yes I agree completely with that ! As an older person, I am lucky enough to get a lot of feedback and feelings from younger people, although they may be 15 to 20 years old, this is their 'day', they accept life as it is now ! they do not have the ability to look back to what 'we' call the 'good old days' they accept today as it is and live with it ! Always remember that in 40 years time they will look back on today as their 'good old days'
I can go back to the 'good old days' of outside toilet, no bathroom, no central heating, no tv ? etc etc.

Don't always think they were that good compared with today ! but I was happy !!!

OK rant over ! back to aviation. Keith.

[411A]

Old days?
Bring back the DC-6B I say...the most economical 4-engine piston type (revenue pax/freight miles)...bar none.
A lot of hours in this very fine aeroplane...and my dear 'ole Dad was the engineering project manager on the type at Douglas.
Wait.
There are still at least 80 flying.
Therefore, the good 'ole days have not left us after all.

PS. The 1649 Constellation wasn't bad, either...as was the DC-7C.
Flew 'em all.
Fine aeroplanes.

[Orangputi]

This sums it up!

In the age of the 707 / CV880
Those were the good ole days. Pilots back then were men that didn't want
to be women or girlymen. Pilots all knew who Jimmy Doolittle was. Pilots
drank coffee, whiskey, smoked cigars and didn't wear digital watches.
They carried their own suitcases and brain bags like the real men that
they were. Pilots didn't bend over into the crash position multiple times
each day in front of the passengers at security so that some Gov't agent
could probe for tweezers or fingernail clippers or too much toothpaste.
Pilots did not go through the terminal impersonating a caddy pulling a
bunch of golf clubs, computers, guitars, and feed bags full of tofu and
granola on a sissy-trailer with no hat and granny glasses hanging on a
pink string around their pencil neck while talking to their personal
trainer on the cell phone!!! Zen music CD,face moisturezier amd sun block -not for beach but for glare!
Being an Airline Captain was as good as being the King in a Mel Brooks
movie. All the Stewardesses (aka.Flight Attendants) were young,
attractive, single women that were proud to be combatants in the sexual
revolution. They didn't have to turn sideways, grease up and suck it in to
get through the cockpit door. They would blush and say thank you when told
that they looked good, instead of filing a sexual harrassment claim.
Junior Stewardesses shared a room and talked about men.... with no
thoughts of substitution.
Passengers wore nice clothes and were polite, they could speak AND
understand English. They didn't speak gibberish or listen to loud gangsta
rap on their IPods. They bathed and didn't smell like a rotting pile of
garbage in a jogging suit and flip-flops. Children didn't travel alone,
commuting between trailer parks. There were no mongolhordes asking for a
'mu-fuggin' seatbelt extension or a Scotch and grapefruit juice cocktail
with a twist.
If the Captain wanted to throw some offensive, ranting jerk off the
airplane, it was done without any worries of a lawsuit or getting fired.
Axial flow engines crackled with the sound of freedom and left an
impressive black smoke trail like a locomotive burning soft coal. Jet fuel
was cheap and once the throttles were pushed up they were left there,
after all it was the jet age and the idea was to go fast (run like a
lizard on a hardwood floor). Economy cruise was something in the
performance book, but no one knew why or where it was. When the overspeed
clacker went off no one got all tight and scared because Boeing/Douglas
built it out of iron, nothing was going to fall off and that sound had the
same effect on real pilots then as Viagra does now for those new age guys.
There was very little plastic and no composites on the airplanes or the
Stewardesses' pectoral regions. Airplanes and women had eye pleasing
symetrical curves, not a bunch of ugly vortex generators, ventral fins,
winglets, flow diverters, tatoos, rings in their nose, tongues and
eyebrows.
Airlines were run by men who had built their companies virtually from
scratch, knew many of their employees by name and were lifetime airline
employees themselves...not pseudo financiers and bean counters who flit
from one occupation to another for a few bucks, a better parachute or a
fancier title while fervently believing that they are a class of beings
unto themselves.
And so it was back then....and never will be again.