Say A Little Prayer

 23 April 2024.

A sad day. During a Royal Malaysian Navy Day parade rehearsal flypass, there was a mid air collision between an Agusta Westland AW139 and an Airbus Helicopters Fennec. There were no survivors.

Aircraft crashes attract a lot of attention. That's a universal fact. Flying machines command awe, in the air and on the ground. And certainly irresistibly draw the mind's eye when they come flailing to earth.

It is always and invariably, a tragedy.

The officers and men involved were too far downstream of my generation for me to have encountered them, but I regard their passing into the next with the same sense of loss and regret as I feel in regard of the many of my friends who have perished in service to the nation.

It is also in such times when the remotest of peoples suddenly remember that I am a pilot but it's not to ask if I am alright.

They text me for comment with an opening salvo of the most unsavoury presumptions.

The abrupt loss of life is a standalone tragedy. But adding insult to the crew's training, their knowledge, skills, aircraft and even straying so far as to insult the navy's hardware by quoting submarines which can't submerge is the hubris of those whose breadwinning is from the shelter of a coccoon. And by the way those submarines are fully operational and have been since their purchase in the early 2000s.

I have nothing to offer to even the curious, let alone the judgemental.

Too many, way too many pass the most brain dead comments such as "obviously human error", from watching a 15-second cellphone video capture of that dreadful mid air collision. If that's all it takes to identify the root cause and probable cause of an air mishap, I should burn my certificates in aircraft incident and accident investigation. Besides, that professional market is obviously saturated judging from the many air accident investigators mushrooming all over my phone display. I'll never be able to pull off a side hustle in this field.

Here's the best you can offer the dead who had to leave not knowing it would be their last sortie: say a prayer if you have one to offer. Do not disseminate the video amongst your group chats. Do not judge. I do believe these take less effort than the kilojoules expended in spreading falsehood and prejudice regarding a profession so fraught with risk even in the highly regulated world of civl aviation, let alone military aviation where the undertaking of risk is inherent with flying an aircraft to its full envelope, because the aircraft is their weapon in war.

I have always held the belief that a pilot involved in an air incident is a true asset to his wing, or his squadron. He has seen and experienced something and carries a learning value which has come at cost. Yes, I have had a few of my own and they are in earlier blogposts from before 2010. And perhaps a few after.

I believe that the deceased in this incident are the same. It is sad that we will not be privileged with learning about flying from their incident directly from their account. I am sure they would want to for the benefit of all other same type operators. On that token, may they find their peace where they are now.

New-Awakened

Dark have been my dreams of late (image courtesy of the web)

I have been away from my blog for eight months now. For most times, an absence from writing reflects an absence from flying. This is in part true, as from September of last year the oil and gas clients took advantage of the calmer waters over here to mobilise their workers by the more economical Fast Crew Boats rather than our aircraft. Let's remember that "fast" is relative, just as are cost savings. Then came the monsoon and the pace picked up rapidly around November. 

The restart of the offshore routine was mundane and gave me little to write about. Weather remained predictable. The drilling vessel Noble Viking wandered into our waters once again, operating up north in the Pekaka oil field. One aircraft captain had resigned from our tiny livery, upsetting the delicate balance of aircrew manning. HQ sent us a single set of crew to help on a rotational detachment basis while considering whether to make it a permanent transfer as uncertainties continued to hover over the longevity of our contract. Yes I hope you noticed what I did there.

But dark have been my dreams of late, since the final day of this leap year's February.

And I have since learned several important lessons. I have learned who my real friends are, as they kept in touch throughout this rather tempestuous time, providing encouragement when none was apparent. Accompanying that, perhaps friends in the place of those whom I believed to be, traditionally, lurking foes.

I have learned that many are those who present themselves as friends but when you are faced with calamity, they feed you to the sharks. Whatever has happenned to you is magically reinterprteted into being about how good they are, how elemental they are in the due process which determines your fate; how you have screwed up in a way that they could never have. Okay, admittedly it isn't "they". It's just one person actually but he's so full of himself he counts as "they". Pronouns, anyone?

Dark indeed have been my dreams of late. I have not slept. Each day rolled into the other in a tunnel with seemingly no end and no light thereat. 

I have seen what can happen to those who have faced the rigours of this unforgiving industry and paced hither and tither in their dungeons of depression. There is the being overtaken by health complaints, the refuge of comfort eating and the lives they share with loved ones coming to a standstill with no vista of rejuvenation. It is all too easy for an incident to take over the kind of life we should be living. However, Gollum was right.

But we mustn't let him have it!

Other than for training being a soldier's best welfare, mapping a busy routine breaks the chokehold adversity has on you. I know I am no longer a soldier but as I fade away, the tennets of soldierly foundation guide me. Yeah right.

We took a trip to Chiang Mai. We explored new eateries. We got all three kids over here on a Raya visit and ate lobster. We walked both ways over the Jambatan Tamparuli. We reaffirmed the value of us. 

A tail end of life crisis

And "we" bought a bike. After nineteen years of being out of the saddle, it is very daunting sitting on one.  What a terrifying way to deny adversity getting a foothold over our lives. And almost as if by wizardry, I gained an immediate new perspective. I guess it is true what all committed riders claim: their therapist comes on two wheels. Part of me acknowledges that I must at some time, seek a certified therapist, not so much for answers, but to just speak unhesitantly about being cradled in the arms of The Grim Reaper for about 90 minutes on my daughter's birthday, but this Vulcan s650 will do handsomely for now.

It's not what I am. It's who I am. How do I teach that?

In all fairness, I am not slurring my rediscovered therapist on two wheels. I now have an utterly dangerous steed to befriend and in that, something to look forward to which I had long shelved in the name of paternal prudence. Also, I had erred in thinking that there is only one manifestation of myself, that the sum of all my parts, however paltry, or short on dignity, was being a pilot. Having been in this business since 1992, I suffered from Maverick-itis. I had allowed being in the cockpit to define my very being and whence comes my fulfilment. 

We never get over our first love, right? But also, while we don't all and sundry marry our first love, we move along. And we find unumaginable happiness.

That's it for today's waffling. I have a fearsome orange beast being delivered home as I write.

Sleep has returned to my once restless head. Please forgive both the waffling and the Top Gun Maverick/ The Lord Of The Rings references.

That is because dark have been my dreams of late. But I feel as new-awakened.