I maintain a fear of flying is normal and anyone who claims to enjoy it is lying. Virgin’s choc-ices aren’t that great. Aerodynamics isn’t that fascinating. I mean, please: sitting up in a truly weighty metal tube thousands of feet up in the sky being driven by someone you’ve never met? Jesus.
The irony is, from the age of 16 to 21, I lived in Chard, a small town in Somerset which happens to be the birthplace of powered flight after inventor, John Stringfellow, flew a model plane in a disused lace mill in 1848. Whoopydoo, Icarus, because having lived there, I can safely say that Chard is crap and ugly and nothing good came of it. Not even planes.
I haven’t always been afraid of flying. As a child, sure. I would hysterically sniff Chanel no 5 from a hankie for entire flights. But as a teenager, I was fine. So fine in fact that in my early twenties, when I lived in Italy, I virtually commuted from London to Turin on a monthly basis. Then, 9/11 happened (see above), I went to Morocco, and, like a nostalgic dormant STD, my fear re-found me
My symptoms are similar to those experienced during a panic attack. Heavy heart thumping, fast, hard, tight breathing, a dry mouth and a general sense of impending doom during which I whine like a small dog. Suffice to say; I know my fears are illogical. It’s not the claustrophobia, the vertigo (two very real fears which make sense), which scares me. It’s not even the lack of control – I’m a trusting person. It’s the FEAR that I fear. A mid-air explosion? What can you do? One engine failing when three will more than efficiently get us to B and then being told this? Fuck Me.
My fear pans out fivefold. Firstly, for around 48 hours before departure. To wit: I recently fainted in Clarins and sicked up some French toast out of pure terror. Then, en plane, as we journey from the slow runway to the fast runway. Then, as we begin our super fast runway bit (the WORST), followed by takeoff and finally throughout turbulence, a vile, vile thing, which usually makes me cry.
Naturally I turned to Dr Alan Carr, a man who really gave it his all in helping me overcome my fear, and who rather romantically calls turbulence ‘the potholes of the skies.’ (I try to remind myself but more often forget).
Alan wrote a very good book – much better than the smoking one – about flying. He aims to make you not only NOT fear flying, but actually enjoy it. A little optimistic, Alan, but still, there are some great facts (and I paraphrase): ‘there are half a million planes in the sky at any one time and none of them have crashed to earth’, and, some woefully ineffective ones: ‘Lockerbie was a one-off’.
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