Turbulent flight a painful experience

A TERRIFYING incident on an international flight recently which caused injuries to five people seemed like has it been simply swept under the carpet to be forgotten, with nothing reported in the media here or elsewhere.

The airline itself has not responded to queries about the episode, and had most likely just noted it as the outcome of bad weather and turbulence.

The flight which was almost full with passengers, including myself and a colleague from The Brunei Times, was travelling from Singapore to New Delhi.

Fortunately we were among the luckier ones to have escaped serious injury.

The first instance of the mishap occurred just as I was finishing a movie on the personal display and my in-flight dinner. I looked up to see a gentleman checking up on his infant daughter and wife in front of me, when suddenly the seatbelt indicator flashed on and as the gentleman returned to his seat, he slipped. Then, with his legs and arms flailing, his body was rising up instead of falling.

Soon after a tray of food flew into the emergency exit to my right. I saw items that were previously lying on top of the tray tables elevating, before they all crashed down as the plane began to level out.

I looked around, the severity of the situation only just beginning to sink in. I could feel myself being pulled against the seatbelt. My stomach felt like it had lurched up into my throat, and my heart probably skipping a hundred dozen beats.

The other passengers were also just starting to react, with gasps of shock and terrified shrieks. A British girl a few seats to my left burst out in tears. My colleague, who was sitting next to me, gripped the armrests so tightly that his knuckles began to turn white.

I tried to fasten my seatbelt, but that did not stop my body from bobbing up and down in my seat.

Eventually everything settled down, and the cabin crew began rushing to the galley where their peers were injured.

One had smacked her head against a cabinet, while another had been thrown up so high into the air and cut her leg as she landed.

"Blood began flowing everywhere," said a stewardess, adding that she had never been through anything like it in her five-year career on what is regarded as one of the best airlines in the world.

The announcement for a doctor came shortly to aid the injured.

I admired the physician and a senior crew member for keeping a calm head; I myself was in such a state of shock that I only realised my neck had developed a strain after arriving in New Delhi.

We had four more hours to go before our landing, but the turbulence was not the end of our troubles. In New Delhi, a storm was waiting for us. Because of the bad weather, the plane was not able to land for another hour.

When it finally came time to land, the lights dimmed and this seemed to amplify the worried sobs of anxiety. When we finally landed, relief flooded among the passengers and cabin crew.

It would be five days before I took another flight, this time to Bangalore.

I was extremely nervous, to say the least.

For the most part, I felt quite normal, except when we encountered turbulence. Then anxiety washed over me.

Thankfully it was the last time that sensation would ever come to the fore.

Two flights later and a week back home has given me time to deal with the trauma caused by that flight.

If there is anything to be learned from my experience, it is this: always buckle up.

The Brunei Times