Autobiography

was in the middle seat, and the 25-stone
disabled lady was in the aisle seat. It also went
through my mind that it was not an impossible
situation. We were at 34,000 feet at Ortec and
less than 50 miles from Bournemouth,
Southampton, and a disused military airport on
Thorney Island. I had landed on all these
airports at some time in the past. I struggled
to do the sums in my mind, but I believed it
was possible to glide to safety at one of these
airports. Descending at 3,000 feet per minute,
it would take ten minutes to reach the water,
and at 300 miles an hour, the aircraft could
travel 55 miles. I was wrapped in total
confusion as everyone around me scrambled
into their life vests. My mind was full of
contradictions. On the one hand I was telling
myself there was no point struggling to put on
the lifejacket because I wouldn’t be able to get
out anyway; on the other I still couldn’t
believe, as a pilot, what was happening. It
simply did not make sense. If the engines had
failed, why couldn’t we make it to one of the
airports close by? Or even go back to
Cherbourg on the French coast no more than
30 miles away with its massive 8,000-foot
runway?
For ten minutes there was an eerie silence in
the aircraft. A few passengers sobbed quietly
and a number were praying, but there was no
panic, just a heavy quietness. Then, to
everybody’s immense relief, we discovered
that the stewardess had inserted the wrong
tape. She had meant to put in the tape saying,
‘Ladies and gentlemen, we are about to start
our descent . . .’ Not only had she played the
267