Inevitably when asked about my profession I try to avoid being too specific. “I’m in the transport business” is usually my answer when I don’t want to get too much attention.

Sometimes however there is no way I can avoid a straight answer and reluctantly I have to say I’m a pilot…unless there is some gorgeous chick involved in which case I do not even wait for the question in the first place.

Trust me, as a pilot you do not want to talk to strangers about your profession because, inevitably, they try to corner you and, gleefully, dissect your guts. Making money and loving your job at the same time is something that people really do not appreciate.

“So the autopilot does everything and you just stare, isn’t it?” is one of the comments that really baffles me. To me it’s the same like saying that writers do not write books anymore because they have word processors. Damn! The autopilot is just a tool I use to fly the airplane and, yes, if properly used it saves a lot of work in the end, but like all computers…if you put shit “in” you get shit “out”! It’s a machine that waits to be told what to do and the outcome always depends on the “user”.

“Were you ever scared during a flight?”. Sooner or later this question pops up and, internally, I start to scream as if my testicles were wired to a car battery.

There is no way I can answer this question in a good way. If I say “no” the person asking, rightfully, doesn’t believe me. If I say “yes” I get dismissed as a pussy.

Sometimes the inevitable example has to follow. But how to explain things in a simple way when a lot of it is technical gibberish? Nobody is waiting for a lecture in high-speed aerodynamics or static relaxed stability before getting to my succulent story.

They want blood, burning kerosene, screaming mothers and maimed children…and they want it from my mouth…now! Unfortunately for them, the sensation seeking auditors, there is nothing much to tell because 99.9% of the “near death” cases in aviation are properly rectified by the pilots who, in the end, go home and resume their jobs the next day. As if nothing happened.

And that’s why I really hate about that Nat Geo/Discovery way of explaining things to the masses where the “real” cause of the accident or the way the pilots solved the problem becomes a footnote in the show or, worse, gets omitted all together…unless your name is Sully and land an airplane on the Hudson.

And even then the media miss the point all together.