Vueling - ex military pilot?

[Teddy engineer]

I recently flew with Vueling from Heathrow to Bilbao. I am slf but a licensed aircraft engineer of 35 years and now a very frequent flyer especially on 320s - BA, easyjet, Aer Lingus, Air France etc, so used to normal ops with all these guys.

A few characteristics of the flight - on take off, throttles slammed to full power, rotation seemed to be at higher speed than normal, then rapid rotation whereupon aircraft leaped into the air at extreme angle of attack. This hardy seemed necessary coming out of LHR. Banking always seemed erratic and rapid to extreme angles. Approach into Bilbao was nose down, throttles back, spoilers out and gear down, no flap and drop like a stone. Again was this strictly necessary going into Bilbao where we flew straight in and had no hills to navigate.

My interpretation was this was an ex military pilot who was still thinking he was flying an F16 or similar.

Be interested to hear your views.

[Narrow Runway]

Here's my view: I think your post is a lot of nonsense.

Why ex-Mil? Just as likely a rich Daddy's boy pay to fly zero to hero wannabe at the controls with a fatigued, maxed out training Captain.

What a lot of tosh.

[Clandestino]

There is a red warning at the bottom of this page; a lot of stuff in the post is blatantly ignorant and it seems that the original poster is after eliciting a certain reaction. Please don't let him have it and he'll go away unhappy.

[hetfield]

@teddy

It was me, but don't tell anyone.

[Hotel Tango]

All I will say from personal experience flying jumpseat on Spanish carriers with ex mil Spanish pilots (albeit some years ago now) they were sporty flyers. Weather & traffic permitting, they enjoyed any opportunity to hand fly a visual approach. Their flying was not erratic or uncomfortable just what I would term "sporty". Having said that, I think that departures from LHR can be subjected to ATC restrictions which can sometimes result in speed restrictions, step climbs etc. This can at times result in noticeable power changes. The Bilbao approach may indeed have been a visual approach. Reminds me fondly of the "diving" visual turns onto final on the jumpseat of Aviaco DC-9s years ago :)

[Cagedh]

Teddy,

I'm myself a captain flying the A320 and I can assure you that it is impossible to say anything about the quality or characteristics of the flight crew when travelling as a pax.

I will not try to comment on your "characteristics of that flight" because from what you're saying it's so obvious that you know nothing about flying an airliner.
(Even if perhaps you can fix them :O)

I'm not trying to put you down here, just pointing out that your comments prove your ignorance about the subject. Also it would be impossible for me to say anything about this flight/pilot as I wasn't sitting in the cockpit. (It was hetfield :p )

[Shack37]

I recently flew with Vueling from Heathrow to Bilbao. I am slf but a licensed aircraft engineer of 35 years and now a very frequent flyer especially on 320s - BA, easyjet, Aer Lingus, Air France etc, so used to normal ops with all these guys.


The most pertinent part of the post is "aircraft engineer". Have you ever reacted with a :rolleyes: when a pilot complained about something technical ie in your domain as an aircraft engineer?