Celebrities in FBOs

[johnpeace]

Keeping with the subject at hand. My son handled Bill Cosby at the FBO where he used to work. Mr. Cosby was very rude and wouldn't even talk to him...his pilots wouldn't speak to him either. My son had a difficult time communicating with them.

<I'll let you guess why they wouldn't talk to him.>

He's a black teenager named 'Kunta' or 'Quifiri' or some weird sh!t, with baggy pants, $100 sneakers and a gangsta' attitude spewing profanity and misoginystic idiom all over the ramp?

Just a guess...Bill's not down with that kind of stuff.

 

[Huck]

PS, I almost left out two significant persons. First would be any one of the counter girls at MillionAir Addison back in the 90's.

Brother man, you just brought back some great memories! They were all blond, tall and stacked.

 

[414Flyer]

Brother man, you just brought back some great memories! They were all blond, tall and stacked.

Oh yeah. I made a few trips to Millionair addison too. All of those girls there were playboy material then

 

[VVJM265]

Princess Di

Met/hosted/flew lots of DVs from congressmen & women on down in my two tours in Italy. Have to say that of the representatives, the most personable was Tom Tancredo of CO.

The most memorable was some years ago ago, saw Princess Di up at Northolt getting onto the royal family's BAe 146. The poor RAF Capt that worked in base ops nearly had to mop up after himself he was so in love with her. With all due respect, she was quite the looker and had great legs.

 

[leardawg]

Chevy Chase: Average guy. Had several IDs, including one for "Dr. Rosen- Rosen" and "Don Corleone". When I asked if I could get him any refreshments before departure, he replied : "Yes; bring me a Diet Coke, a glass of ice, a cup of warm fat, and the head of Alfredo Garcia."

One day, we were stuck in Guadalajara Mexico, grounded due to dense fog. Our passengers were all stressed out about being stuck in the middle of nowhere, and with nothing to do. Suddenly, a merry gentleman by the name of Senor Mambo (bearing an uncanny resemblance to the late John Candy) showed up out of the blue. With puffy shirt, frilled cuffs, multi-colored vest, and Matador pants, he proceded to regale the entire crowd with his Maracca-shaking musical extravaganza: ("C'mon everybody! LET'S MAMBO!!!). All the passengers, line and FBO personel, corporate crews, freight dogs, airline types, and yes, yours truly, spent the next couple of hours in a never-ending conga line of leg- strutting, hip-swinging mambo-mania!

The J. Peterman guy from Seinfeld: Cool but strange. Said he was on his way to meet with the Sultan of Oba-ma-mau-mau! After my co-pilot made a particularly bad landing, he accused him of having a drug problem, and offered to get him help for his opium addiction. When Forrest said "whaaaaat?", Peterman replied "You know what I'm talking about!! The White Lotus! Shanghai Sally! THE YAM YAM! Get help now, or you're fired.""

 

[leardawg]

Flew Matt Foley, motivational speaker hired by IBT to drum up support for a Flight Options union and convince the remaining fence-sitters. He gave us his spiel on the pros of forming a union (as he grabbed his belt buckle and hitched up his pants): "Let me introduce myself. My name is Matt Foley, and I've been hired to talk to you pilots about why it's in your best interest to unionize. I too was once employed by a company similar to yours, and was a hard sell as far as a union was concerned. I waited until it was too late, and am now reaping the rewards. I'm hear to tell you not to wait and send in your cards now, or else you'll wind up like me LIVING IN A VAN DOWN BY THE RIVER!!!

He eventually got so wound up and excited that he fell on top of the folding tables and smashed them. He spent the rest of the flight passed out in the aisle.

Boomhauer from King of the Hill: "Hey man was wang fbo n' sawn this hochick say'n "wayn goin" n'I sed "saym place yin goin" n' she sed "o yeh then imgone wiu" n' hersheis n' canshe golong yenowatimean man!" I said "Yeah, sure, two's company as they say!"

Charlie Callas: old Borscht-belt comic and sometime regular on Hollywood Squares. Came up to the cockpit and started conversing with us when vvvvvvvvvvT! he slumped forward on the center console with an arrow in his back. Dead as a doorknob, the poor guy never stood a chance. (OK, kind of an obscure reference and an indication I'm reaching the end of my creative rope, but some older guys might chuckle).

Sayonara!

 

[cforst513]

hahahahaha!

 

[flyinlow67]

Flown some minor celebs, but met a ton of musicians back in my paramedic days when we would cover concerts. The best were Trisha Yearwood (super nice, wasn't such a porker then) and Sammy Hagar when he was with Van Halen. Sammy is the MAN! Drank red wine and kept telling us about all his cars. Eddie and Alex wouldn't even come out of the dressing room.
Def Leppard guys were all really cool as well. Back when they were doing their concerts in the round, they climbed into a couple of laundry carts, had towels piled on top of them, and went right past the fans to the stage. Thought that was kinda cool.

 

[leardawg]

Saw the Reverend Jessie Jackson waiting for a flight in Atlantic Aviation @ MSY yesterday (no doubt in town to stir up trouble).

I approached him and struck up a conversation. He replied "When you're hanging out in 'Lantic, there's no need to get pedantic! Now I take my leave to the crapper, unless you persist on being an insufferable yapper!"

I later heard him yelling from the john " Despite the presence of my noxious vapor, would someone Pleeeaze bring me a roll of toilet paper!"

 

[TX_Pilot]

Saw Nolan Ryan in GTU, very cool guy. Also saw Rodney Carrington at the FBO in ABI. Man, that guy was funny!

 

[Bob_Sacamano]

Robin Olds Didn't Want a 5th?!!?!?!?

While General Olds may have been one of the top fighter pilots in Vietnam is without question, saying that he didn't want a 5th MiG is nonsense. There were several instances of Gen. Olds coming home out of missiles, he was so desperately trying to get his 5th jet kill. The reason Olds left Vietnam was because he'd just been promoted to Brigadier General and had to report to the Air Force Academy to act as Commandant of Cadets.
Good Luck,
Bob

This is a bit dated, back when I was a ramper at Santa Barbara Aviation.

Met and chatted with John Travolta. At the time his pilot was Doug G., they flew a Citation and a JetStar. He used to hang around the FBO and was usually pretty down to earth.

Pamela Hensley ( Princess Ardala from Buck Rogers in the 25th Century ) and her TV producer boyfriend used to fly in from SMO in a red Beech Staggerwing. One of our CFIs was giving her dual at the time. Oh, what I would have done to give her some dual .

Bo Derek, both at the airport and in town.

Kathy Ireland back when she had a very high pitched voice and burped like a man. There's a story there, but I'm not telling it on this board.

Andre the Giant in the terminal at Dayton. Big lumbering giant walking down the terminal in the middle of winter sweating like a pig. Ended up in first class on my flight to PIT. I thought to myself, " that guys going to die of a heart attack soon ". Unfortunately I was right.

Steve Ritchie, top scoring ace* of the USAF during Vietnam, from IAH to CLT. Nice guy, gave me an autographed photo, woohoo . I like my Julie Clark autographed photo better.


TP


* Robin Olds was most likely the top USAF fighter pilot of Vietnam. He just didn't want a fifth or they would have sent him home.

 

[wxpilot]

Any Jimmy Buffett sightings??

 

[Captain4242]

I've flown some really nice people:
Matt Lauer, The Great Gretzky, Drew Barrymore, Caterine Zeta-Jones (most gorgeous eyes in Holywood).
I've also flown some real celebrity butt-heads (and their butt-head spouces). I'll keep those names to myself so as to not stir up too much trouble. Always remember people aren't always the way they act when you see them on the Tonite Show or the Senate Floor.

 

[Bob Runday]

I saw David Hasselhoff in BTL a year ago. Although I cant understand why they sent security after me. I only tried to get a lock of his hair!

 

[Rythm3]

Famous people seen:

Ben Stein - Million Air (NEW)
Ray Charles - Mercury Air Center (ATL)
Bob Dole - Piedmont (IAD)
Sen. Trent Lott - Mercury Air (JAN)
Jimmy Carter - Destin, FL

Famous people flown:

Sen. Fred Thompson
Tommy Lee
Little Wayne

 

[EastCoastLR35]

Have Flown:

Mary Tylor Morre
Danica Patrick
Buddy Rice
Dan Patrick
Dr. O. Wayne Isom

 

[pilotmiketx]

Have Flown:

Danica Patrick

She gives me morning wood in the late afternoon.

You are a living god. (or at least one lucky bastard)

 

[ORDRJDrivr]

There's a famous story about Oprah Winfrey in 1st class, who decided that the white #1 wasn't good enough to serve her, and demanded the African-American FA in coach trade places with the #1. Since I wasn't there, I can't vouch for the truth of it, but apparently Oprah is one of the most demanding, irritating passengers ever to grace a commercial flight.

First time here and first post ... but couldn't let this one slide...

Not only is it a true story, my sister was the #1 FA on that flight. American Airlines Super 80 from ORD to LAX. Oprah was in the window seat and her "assistant" was to her right shoulder. My sister, the white blonde FA works the #1 position usually and there just happened to be a black female FA working in the main cabin. My sister stops by to offer Oprah and her assistant a pre-departure drink and Oprah states, "I want the black flight attendant to serve me." My sister calmly informs Oprah that flight attendants bid for their position on the aircraft and that she would be the First Class FA for the trip to LAX. Oprah then gets all huffy and states to her assistant, "Well you just tell the white girl that I want a diet coke..." And that's the way the entire flight went. Oprah never talked to my sister again. All communication was through the assistant.

Evidently, Oprah placed her very large black feet on the cabin bulkhead and that upset my sister so at one point, she asked Oprah to please remove her feet from the bulkhead.

The story is much more funny to hear my sister tell it ... but nevertheless, it is a true story. She even saved a copy of the passenger manifest showing her name on it.

As I understand it, she is a real bi**h to deal with. One morning back in my charter days, I was sitting around MDW waiting for my passengers and Oprah's GIV (N540W) was sitting out front. Oprah arrives to the airplane in her black limo and there was some issue that the aircrafts china had not been brought on board yet. Oprah comes flying down the stairs and into the FBO yelling that the dishes were not on board and that she was in a hurry and was leaving NOW. Back out to the airplane she goes and some line servant goes running out there with the case of dishes for her plane. The door closes and off they go.

 

[Publishers]

We have a bunch of them all the time but one of my favorites was Bill Murray. We have a day a month when we cook hot dogs and hamburgers for whoever is around, the airport people, fire, police, tenants, etc...
He sees the food and asked about it. He went over and ate the hot dogs and talked with everyone who approached him.

 

[citabriapilot]

At 55J (Fernandina Beach Municipal), just northeast of Jacksonville, FL. The Ritz-Carlton Amelia Island is 2 miles away, so lots of celebs make there way to Fernandina, and dont' forget Superbowl... Travolta comes in a lot, but spent a lot of time there when filming "Basic". He flew his Gulfstream back and forth to Cecil Field everyday. Must be nice. Here are some that I've seen, to name a few:


John Travolta
Jeff Gordon
Bobby Bowden
Most of the owners of the Superbowl teams
Owners of lots of other football teams
Patty Wagstaff (used to base out of 55J before SGJ)
Robin Williams
Former Homeland Sec. guy
Chris Rock
Adam Sandler
Rob Schneider
Burt Reynolds
Bill Clinton
John Grisham
Sec. Treasury

Can't remember all of them. Anytime you get to northeast FL check out 55J and stop in to McGill Aviation.

 

[lowlycfi]

Have had as pax (as a F/A at SWA):
Chuck Yeager
LL Cool J
KC and the Sunshine Band
Kenney Chesney
Ralph Fiennes
Linda Evans
Barry Sanders
Tony Dorsett
Debbie Reynolds
Steven Baldwin
Tommy Lee Jones
Scott Weiland
Mickey Gilley
Laura Bush
Ron Jeremy
Nina Hartley

Seen at the FBO:
Metallica (came in on a Gulfstream I)
George Strait (see him all of the time....keeps his Lear 45 at the same FBO where I instruct)

 

[flydrummer]

Have had as pax (as a F/A at SWA):
Chuck Yeager
LL Cool J
KC and the Sunshine Band
Kenney Chesney
Ralph Fiennes
Linda Evans
Barry Sanders
Tony Dorsett
Debbie Reynolds
Steven Baldwin
Tommy Lee Jones
Scott Weiland
Mickey Gilley
Laura Bush
Ron Jeremy
Nina Hartley

Seen at the FBO:
Metallica (came in on a Gulfstream I)
George Strait (see him all of the time....keeps his Lear 45 at the same FBO where I instruct)

How cool to have Chuck Yeager on your plane!

 

[sydeseet]

Flew a VIP (HINT: he was once married to Elizabeth Taylor) into Frankfurt. About a half-hour out, “someone” on the flight deck cut some cheese that could’ve chased a maggot off a corpse. Everyone on the crew denied being the creative force behind this malodorous masterpiece and we soon troubleshot/isolated the cause to a defective VIP since he was the only one who didn’t deny it; but then, he couldn’t have denied it since he didn’t have a headset, right? We were yucking it up with the usual feigned-watering-eyes routines and the “open-a-window” and “let’s-get-on-oxygen” jokes. I turned around to discover that our brilliant engineer had taken it upon himself to issue the VIP a loaner headset (surprise!), but he appeared to be sleeping so maybe he didn’t hear us or he’d at least keep pretending like he didn’t hear us. When we got on the deck, he thanked us all and paid us some nice compliments and off he went with some general officers. We told our ops officer about the flight and the uber-flatus and all, and our ops officer says, “Well, now we know why Liz left him.”

Used to fly him a ton. One of my all time favorite passengers, just behind John Glenn.

 

[lowlycfi]

How cool to have Chuck Yeager on your plane!

He was a hell of a nice guy. I only had a private pilot certificate at the time but he talked airplanes with me like I was a P-51 driver! I neglected the rest of the passengers for the whole flight. The captain offered him the jumpseat in the cockpit (this was way before 9-11) but he politely refused. Funny, but not many of the other passengers recognized him. Now when I had Ron Jeremy on the plane EVERYONE knew who he was. Go figure.

 

[EastCoastLR35]

Ive flown: (also)
Dave Chappelle

 

[Publishers]

Another favorite was a country and western star who we would fly to concerts. He would drink so much going to the destination that he could not make it to the concert and we would fly him back.

We finally, at his managers request, were watering down the booze and keeping the quantities low so he might make it.

We also flew the the announcers back from the Memorial Tournament in Columbus and they would empty the aircraft of anything drinkable in the hour and a half flight.