Jeremy Clarkson in The Sunday Times
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Jeremy Clarkson in The Sunday Times
Comment lifted from Sunday Times - Sunday 12 August 2001.
You can fly an awfully long way on patience
"I knew, of course, that a charter flight from some low-rent Spanish holiday resort to London's Stansted airport was never in a million years going to take off on time.
To make matters worse, it had a scheduled departure of 11.30pm which meant it would have had an entire day to get out of sync. And sure enough, when we arrived at the airport we were told it was still in Hertfordshire.
So what's the problem this time, I inquired with the world-weary resignedness of someone who has heard it all before. Technical problems? Wrong type of air? Leaves in the sky? No, said the rep. The captain got stuck in traffic on the M11.
I see. Because the hopeless git did not set off for work on time, I now have to spend four hours in an overheated, understaffed departure lounge with 70 children under eight, none of whom is mine. Great.
I don't know who you are, captain, but I sincerely hope you have a penchant for Thai ladyboys and that your colleagues find out. I am not a vindictive man but it is my fervent wish that from now to the end of time all your itches are unreachable. And that someone writes something obscene in weedkiller on your front lawn.
To keep us all happy and to help to while away the hours, we were assured that free soft drinks and snacks would be provided.
They were not. What was provided was a Styrofoam cup of hot. Hot what, I'm not sure. It could have been tea or it could have been oxtail soup. The snack was a sandwich filled with a piece of pink that was thinner than the paintwork on a 1979 Lancia. Then I discovered that the batteries in my Game Boy were flat.
To my left, a fat family clad from head to foot in Adidas sportswear had managed to find some chips. An amazing achievement this, since all the shops were shut. But you could put people like that on the fourth moon of Jupiter and within 15 minutes they would find a sack of King Edwards and a deep-fat fryer.
To my right there was a much thinner family, also clad in Adidas sportswear, attempting to get some sleep and using their Manchester United football shirts as pillows. Sleeping was difficult because every five minutes King Juan Carlos himself came on the Tannoy to explain very loudly that by royal decree smoking is prohibited.
Then it got more difficult still because a team of heroically lazy Spanish cleaners finally woke up from their afternoon siesta and decided that the floor needed a damn good polish, using a squadron of machines that were designed by the Russians in the 1950s and had been in service with the Angolan air force ever since.
By 1.30am I was reduced to reading the instructions on the fire extinguishers and contemplating starting a food fight. I decided against it because the bread in the free sandwiches was hard enough to kill and the filling was too light to fly properly. It would just sort of float.
At 1.45am we were asked by the king again to board buses which would take us to the plane. Yippee. At long last, Captain James T Berk had arrived. We were on our way.
Oh no we weren't. After 15 minutes of standing on the stationary bus, we were forced to endure 50 minutes of sitting on the stationary plane where there was no air conditioning and, worse still, no explanation or apology from the flight deck.
Only after we had become airborne and fallen asleep did Captain Fool come on the PA system to explain what had gone wrong. It had been too hot, he said, for the plane to take off and as a result, some of the bags had been removed from the hold.
Oh, that's marvellous. So you get us home four hours late, you separate us from our luggage, you never say sorry and then you come up with the worst excuse I have ever heard. How can it have been too hot, you imbecile? Because of your shoddy timekeeping, it was three o'clock in the bloody morning.
The thing is, though, that I (mostly) kept my temper because I knew I could come home, write this and therefore make his life as miserable as he had made mine.
What staggered me was the patience of my fellow passengers. They never complained. They quietly sat at the airport eating their meat veneer. They quietly stood on the bus, sweating. They didn't even squeal when the stewardesses poured boiling water into their laps, told barefaced lies about the luggage being on board and generally treated us as if we were a nuisance in the smooth running of their aeroplane.
The problem is that we are used to all this, and more. We expect the tiny bit of road that isn't jammed solid to be festooned with speed cameras. We expect the train to be late and the Tube to explode. We know that the plane will make an unscheduled stop in Bogota and that if we complain we'll be taken off by the police, arrested and shot.
Naturally, we expect a charter flight to get us back to Stansted four hours after everyone else because, of course, this particular airline is the sponsor of the spectacularly hopeless Minardi Formula One team which, last time I looked, was just finishing the 1983 French Grand Prix.
[ 13 August 2001: Message edited by: Capt PPRuNe ]
You can fly an awfully long way on patience
"I knew, of course, that a charter flight from some low-rent Spanish holiday resort to London's Stansted airport was never in a million years going to take off on time.
To make matters worse, it had a scheduled departure of 11.30pm which meant it would have had an entire day to get out of sync. And sure enough, when we arrived at the airport we were told it was still in Hertfordshire.
So what's the problem this time, I inquired with the world-weary resignedness of someone who has heard it all before. Technical problems? Wrong type of air? Leaves in the sky? No, said the rep. The captain got stuck in traffic on the M11.
I see. Because the hopeless git did not set off for work on time, I now have to spend four hours in an overheated, understaffed departure lounge with 70 children under eight, none of whom is mine. Great.
I don't know who you are, captain, but I sincerely hope you have a penchant for Thai ladyboys and that your colleagues find out. I am not a vindictive man but it is my fervent wish that from now to the end of time all your itches are unreachable. And that someone writes something obscene in weedkiller on your front lawn.
To keep us all happy and to help to while away the hours, we were assured that free soft drinks and snacks would be provided.
They were not. What was provided was a Styrofoam cup of hot. Hot what, I'm not sure. It could have been tea or it could have been oxtail soup. The snack was a sandwich filled with a piece of pink that was thinner than the paintwork on a 1979 Lancia. Then I discovered that the batteries in my Game Boy were flat.
To my left, a fat family clad from head to foot in Adidas sportswear had managed to find some chips. An amazing achievement this, since all the shops were shut. But you could put people like that on the fourth moon of Jupiter and within 15 minutes they would find a sack of King Edwards and a deep-fat fryer.
To my right there was a much thinner family, also clad in Adidas sportswear, attempting to get some sleep and using their Manchester United football shirts as pillows. Sleeping was difficult because every five minutes King Juan Carlos himself came on the Tannoy to explain very loudly that by royal decree smoking is prohibited.
Then it got more difficult still because a team of heroically lazy Spanish cleaners finally woke up from their afternoon siesta and decided that the floor needed a damn good polish, using a squadron of machines that were designed by the Russians in the 1950s and had been in service with the Angolan air force ever since.
By 1.30am I was reduced to reading the instructions on the fire extinguishers and contemplating starting a food fight. I decided against it because the bread in the free sandwiches was hard enough to kill and the filling was too light to fly properly. It would just sort of float.
At 1.45am we were asked by the king again to board buses which would take us to the plane. Yippee. At long last, Captain James T Berk had arrived. We were on our way.
Oh no we weren't. After 15 minutes of standing on the stationary bus, we were forced to endure 50 minutes of sitting on the stationary plane where there was no air conditioning and, worse still, no explanation or apology from the flight deck.
Only after we had become airborne and fallen asleep did Captain Fool come on the PA system to explain what had gone wrong. It had been too hot, he said, for the plane to take off and as a result, some of the bags had been removed from the hold.
Oh, that's marvellous. So you get us home four hours late, you separate us from our luggage, you never say sorry and then you come up with the worst excuse I have ever heard. How can it have been too hot, you imbecile? Because of your shoddy timekeeping, it was three o'clock in the bloody morning.
The thing is, though, that I (mostly) kept my temper because I knew I could come home, write this and therefore make his life as miserable as he had made mine.
What staggered me was the patience of my fellow passengers. They never complained. They quietly sat at the airport eating their meat veneer. They quietly stood on the bus, sweating. They didn't even squeal when the stewardesses poured boiling water into their laps, told barefaced lies about the luggage being on board and generally treated us as if we were a nuisance in the smooth running of their aeroplane.
The problem is that we are used to all this, and more. We expect the tiny bit of road that isn't jammed solid to be festooned with speed cameras. We expect the train to be late and the Tube to explode. We know that the plane will make an unscheduled stop in Bogota and that if we complain we'll be taken off by the police, arrested and shot.
Naturally, we expect a charter flight to get us back to Stansted four hours after everyone else because, of course, this particular airline is the sponsor of the spectacularly hopeless Minardi Formula One team which, last time I looked, was just finishing the 1983 French Grand Prix.
[ 13 August 2001: Message edited by: Capt PPRuNe ]
Chief PPRuNe Pilot
Naturally, we expect a charter flight to get us back to Stansted four hours after everyone else because, of course, this particular airline is the sponsor of the spectacularly hopeless Minardi Formula One team which, last time I looked, was just finishing the 1983 French Grand Prix.
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Whilst Mr Clarkson is a most witty, humourous and entertaining writer, the truth may be a little overstretched. For example the Lightning which he placed in his garden 'as a monument' is no longer there and was only ever on loan. Is he really that good a driver? etc etc - very amusing guy though.
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Whilst it was unfortunate for Jeremy Clarkson and his fellow travellers to have been delayed, his piece does serve to illustrate that Joe Public is rather demanding.
It may not be unreasonable to argue that one is entitled to get from A to B pretty much as advertised. The problem is that the product (i.e. air travel) has been so devalued that it is practically impossible for most of the cheaper airlines to deliver.
I rather loath air travel now as a passenger because of all the hassle and inevitable delays.
I think it is time the industry put its house in order and stopped trying to squeeze a quart out of a pint pot, deliver a quality product at a fair (not give-away) price.
Jeremy can afford to pay a little more; others would too given a little education and decent marketing.
What do you think?
It may not be unreasonable to argue that one is entitled to get from A to B pretty much as advertised. The problem is that the product (i.e. air travel) has been so devalued that it is practically impossible for most of the cheaper airlines to deliver.
I rather loath air travel now as a passenger because of all the hassle and inevitable delays.
I think it is time the industry put its house in order and stopped trying to squeeze a quart out of a pint pot, deliver a quality product at a fair (not give-away) price.
Jeremy can afford to pay a little more; others would too given a little education and decent marketing.
What do you think?
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Some people of course just like to complain. I had the (dis)pleasure of sitting next to an intensely irritated (and irritating) woman on a BA flight LGW-EDI on Friday night. The flight left on time (as near as makes no difference). The aircraft was a standard issue 737-400, nice leather seats, very comfy. Annoying woman had row 1, so plenty of legroom, and no one in front of here. She even had a nice photo of Rome to look at if she got bored. The food was hot and edible, and served on time. And free. As was the coffee and the booze. Yet the miserable b1tch moaned endlessly saying what a miserable flight she was having. Getting more and more exasperated, I pressed her for a specific complaint - get this - all she could think of was that the "waitress" didn't smile at her as she served her free drink!
Yes people have the right to expect flights to be punctual, clean etc, but you just can't please some people.
Yes people have the right to expect flights to be punctual, clean etc, but you just can't please some people.
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I have a friend who works with the pricing of flights and I can guarantee no drinks are free on any flight. They are already factored into the ticket price and I can tell you your paying nearly three times the amount that the local pub. Next time as a passenger and you want a few bevvies, look behind you at the rows of pax and raise your glass to all the non drinkers, as they are all subsidising your liquid indulgence.
Senis Semper Fidelis
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That does it , anybody who is a grown up( by that I means has hairs were the sun dont reach) and plays with a GAME BOY must be a NERD, I have alway's thought the man was a Knock kneed long streak of P*$$, but now I guess we all know that, beside that he can't drive for toffee!!
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Clarkson at his self righteous, egocentric & arrogant worst, honestly Jeremy,you gets what you pays for so quit the complaining. Anyway,wingeing articles such as that are simply boring & literary hot air. Someone send him on a one way back to Iceland with that other king cynic & his best buddy, AA Gill.
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[b[Capt Freo[/b] - obviously there's no such thing as a free lunch, especially on a flight, but given that she'd paid only a couple of quid more than travelling with Go fron STN, she hadn't exactly paid over the odds for her nosh & booze. She even got a free tour of West Lothian and Fife at low level, as we had to go-around due to the runway at EDI being occupied - never flown over my house in anything other than a spam can - that's value for money!
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Clarkson as an individual embodies all that I loathe. But every time I open the Sunday Times I turn straight to his pieces. He is paid to entertain, shock, and satirise. I think he earns every penny. I just wish I had his talent, without the personality. Keep at it, Jez; and AA Gill really is a kn@b! 
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I am sorry but if I had the problems that Clarkson had I would be complaining also. It dosnt matter how much you paid for your ticket, on time departure and information is not too much to ask. Just because he is well known and has a sharp and witty tongue and has access to a wider media dosn't give us the right to denigrate anything he has to say. Shouldn't we be putting our house in order?
Still behind the curtain
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If anyone but Clarkson had written that hilarious piece, half the PPruNers in the world would be after the poor sod because of journalistic bias. This was a tongue-in-cheek piece and he may have pieced it together from a number of experiences -- and it was funny. The guy may not know how to drive -- I don't know -- but he certainly has clout.
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Clarkson's problem is that he has a column to write week in, week out, and is has to be different from the other columns he writes in the motoring press, and somewhat dissimilar to what he says on the telly. So the imperativeis to make a drama out of an everyday occurrence, lard it with some hackneyed humour and send it in with his invoice. I can just imagine him sitting on an uneventful flight, his mind playing on the possibilities...
Yes - allright JC is an arrogant b*****d but
he's not afraid to make himself look a prat
on TV and his writing whilst often juvenile
is often very witty indeed. I was interested
to see the other week that his very expensive
book on Ferraris (£250 in cheapest edition)
is now being remaindered at a bargain sixty
notes. The real question of course is why
JC was flying with European in the middle of
the night - I would have thought that on his
wages he could have afforded a scheduled
carrier with business class...........
nb. Minardi may be slow but they are one of
the friendliest teams in F1.
he's not afraid to make himself look a prat
on TV and his writing whilst often juvenile
is often very witty indeed. I was interested
to see the other week that his very expensive
book on Ferraris (£250 in cheapest edition)
is now being remaindered at a bargain sixty
notes. The real question of course is why
JC was flying with European in the middle of
the night - I would have thought that on his
wages he could have afforded a scheduled
carrier with business class...........
nb. Minardi may be slow but they are one of
the friendliest teams in F1.
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The thing about JC is that he is at his funniest when he is complaining about something. Some of his best TV was when he was poking fun at the US on his show. No surprises that his witty newspaper pieces should have the same formula.
Got to say though, he makes me laugh, and the fact that many of his readers may have been able to identify with what he wrote suggests that occasions like the one he wrote of aren't that uncommon at this time of year. But that's aviation!
Got to say though, he makes me laugh, and the fact that many of his readers may have been able to identify with what he wrote suggests that occasions like the one he wrote of aren't that uncommon at this time of year. But that's aviation!
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Maybe the guy has a point. Why does everyone jump to the defensive when someone criticizes air travel? I've had some very unpleasant experiences on airplanes even though crew...(except they didn't know I was crew).
We are paid to provide a service and should expect to get judged on that, like any other service provider....expecting missiles overhead!
We are paid to provide a service and should expect to get judged on that, like any other service provider....expecting missiles overhead!