Now that was pretty cool!

[Way2Broke]

Stickied.... mostly because we need more good around here! Keep them coming.

 

[mbd]

What a great thread!

At sunrise seeing Lake Michigan perfectly reflect downtown Chicago.

Watching the end of a rainbow travel over the ground at the same speed as the aircraft.

Flying towards a rainbow that is in fact a complete circle in the sky.

Eastbound on a cold winters night and breaking out to see a bright orange moon rise.

Northbound at sunset and simultaneous watching the night sky rise in the east and dusk in the west.

Flying over the New York at night and thinking, what are 8 million people doing right now?

Flying any kind of approach to minimums.

 

[Q400 Gear Bitch]

The good stuff

We used to be able to go VFR on top, so blasting off from PDX-SEA I'd always ask for direct the west side of Mt. St. Helens and the east side of Mt. Ranier and then hook up for the Chins Arrival. Actually saved about 5-10 minutes especially if they were landing to the north in Seattle. The last couple of times I did it, St. Helens was still smoking a bit. I loved it, the pax loved it and it was way cool.

Also, northern lights and of course my very first experience with St. Elmo's fire.

 

[SkiFishFly]

Climbing out of Midway, breaking out above the clouds, the top portion of the Sears tower was the only thing sticking out above the clouds. It was like a giant ship in a sea of grey.

 

[Colonel Savage]

Seeing the Grand Canyon for the first time from FL 240 in a DC-9 on a beautiful summer day. Could not believe how big and beautiful it was.

 

[Flynfish]

My first flying job that included flying the "Flying Elvises" for a promotional jump in Vegas. Taking my family up after getting my private. The 700 trips over the "ditch" were pretty cool. Getting an "atta boy" after dealing with an inflight emergency. The most memorable trip in all my years was the one were I met my wife!

 

[Dizel8]

Flying across the Ice cap Gof greenland in a small prop plane. The ice rises to about 10K feet, crossed at 12K. So desolate, yet so amazingly beautiful.

Seeing a rocket launch, going from BQN to somwehere up north, green ionaization trail and a pin prick light.

Nothern lights never gets old, nor does seeing Greenland!

Imagining I saw the curve of the earth from 45K.

 

[trip]

Louisiana-Florida area late into the night. Scraping along the top of overcast @ 350 weaving between big thunder heads shoving way up above us. The Moon was bright on top while the lightning flashed continuous in all directions. At one point the St. Elmo's was so strong I reached up to make sure I had turned off the landing lights as the nose was lighting up the clouds below.

 

[tomgoodman]

Flying down the Hudson River during the Bicentennial "tall ships" parade.

 

[UALjan15]

Each and every time firing the 30mm GAU-8 cannon from the A-10. Smoke, noise, the smell and taste of gunpowder in the cockpit, and finally the "sparkles" from the bullets hitting their target.

From the airline side, I always enjoyed the "formation" approaches to 28L & 28R at SFO.

 

[CaptainSpaz]

Not so cool, but...

Seeing and hearing... nothing, save for a couple combat aircraft and their tankers. Operated 135 into New York, morning of Sept 13, 2001. And the view of Washington and New York that day? Never forget, folks.

 

[DC10]

Watching the sunrise over the Sahara Desert, across an unbelievably huge, endless expanse of sand and rock. No roads or any other sign of life on Earth for 1000 miles in any direction.

Watching the sunset over the Amazon rainforest the following night. Nothing but an unbroken blanket of green stretching as far as the eye can see for several hours of flight.

 

[Dan Roman]

Very long list, but I still remember landing at BOS 1976 after an all nighter. It was the morning of July 4th and the harbor was filled with tall ships gathered to celibrate our 200th birthday. Very cool sight as the sun came up.
At the other end of the spectrum was being one of the last 3 aircraft to land at DCA before it was closed because Palm 90 had just crashed. Than sitting next to a white faced guy in the commuter lounge watching the live coverage of the recue operation. Turns out he had been a flight attendant on the inbound leg of that flight and scheduling let him off early because they had an extra FA and he was just going to deadhead back home to the mid atlantic area after they landed in FL.

 

[Dan Roman]

Flying down the Hudson River during the Bicentennial "tall ships" parade.

How funny is that, I skipped to the end for my post and than I saw yours. Those tall ships were quite a sight from the air!

 

[cjdriver]

Landing a Hawker at Aspen with my dad on the ramp watching just prior to him retiring in the plane I currently fly.

 

[727C47]

the sublime ,serene joy of a sunrise observed after an all nighter with home port just an hour away.

 

[radarlove]

- At a big east coast airport, watching, as I sat left seat in a Boeing, a handful of guys with guns drawn running to and surrounding my airplane. They were postal inspectors and (I didn't even know this) there was mail in the aft cargo compartment and the mafia was stealing credit cards. I got down to the ramp and saw two guys spread-eagled on the ground. Weird call to dispatch. "Yes, I'm serious."

- Flying to DCA in a Cessna 310 charter as "captain" for some chumps that ended up running out on their bill. Did the cool-ass visual up the river, went to Signature and when taxiing out was told to slot in behind the 757. I had no idea which airplane among the crowd of airliners was a 757 (funny now). The tower was incredulous, "You don't SEE the 757?"

- Watching all of the cargo smoke detector lights go off, one after the next on departure.

- Watching the windshield on a Cessna 404 slowly ice over.

 

[Ticker]

Please put this back in the majors fourm...

Hey mods, please put this back in the majors forum. It was hot there and has promptly died here. I posted it there to begin with because that's a hot forum with a lot of guys who've been around the block a few times.

Thanks

 

[dhawk41]

-realizing its all on me on my first solo
-taking dad up
-3 152 formation flight 5ft above a lake
-buzzin around west texas looking for oil leaks
-inadvertently gettin into some bad storms making it out and thankin god i was still alive
-standing up the levers on a jet for the first time
-all the many amazing sunsets and sunrises
-being in the biggest and best frats in the world
-someone askin what i did that day after they got done telling me about their office politics and thinking i don't want to make you feel bad.
-and making myself sick on taco palenque for the first time

 

[lowtimedriver]

Being in the pattern at Ramona with an OV-10, an S-2 and a P-51. That was my lucky day.