The Flight From Hell

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            Have you ever had that moment in your life where you were sure that death was moments away? Perhaps you took a drunken dip at the lake with your buddies and began involuntarily hydrating yourself with dirty fish water before your pal T-bone pulled you out by your hair. Or maybe you fell off the roof of your parent’s house while dancing Gangnam Style to show off to your friends. I’m sure some of my readers have, on a more serious note, been in a car accident, were struck by lightning, sang Nickleback in public, and got dropped on their head doing a keg stand. If you haven’t had a near death experience, and I mean one that poked a turtle out of that puckered up asshole, then you had better believe it will happen. Your days are numbered friend.

            Perhaps your near death experience can be viewed as an opinion to you and how you felt at the moment you almost croaked. I’ve had a couple of moments where I thought the good Lord was taking me. The time I went swimming right after a big meal was a first. My buddy Bryan was there to rescue me after stomach cramps crippled my swimming. Then there was the time I choked on a hotdog at basic training. My TI came to my rescue while another one screamed in my face for choking on his food. Fuck me, right? Then there was the time I drank way too much water during Warrior Week (also at basic training) and almost drowned myself. It’s a real thing people. Fortunately a creepy flight member told me that he’d seen me drinking water all day but had yet to take a piss. I didn’t know what was the more uncomfortable, the fact that I had over a gallon of water in my system and hadn’t had to pee, or the fact that this dude was monitoring my pee schedule, either way I’m still alive. None of those experiences compare to my most recent brush with death, though.

            Those who know me well know that I am inconsolably terrified of flying. Yet here I was on my second flight of the day in route to the Dominican Republic where I would be half naked and completely drunk the whole time. I was trying to settle in but it was very hard due to the constant turbulence. I always do my best to stay calm when the plane starts shaking like a stupid kiddy ride out side of Wal-Mart, but I can’t help tensing up for every second it does. We were about an hour into the flight, Nikki was to my left, and I was playing Halo: Spartan Assault on my Surface. The captain came over the speakers and relayed the following information.

            “Yeah, uh, I turned the seatbelt signs on because we are expecting some slight turbulence up head, mmmkay.”

            Right. I was just given my free beverage, I chose Coke, and managed to take a few sips before the plane began shaking. I tensed up as usual, setting my tasty beverage down so I could focus on not crapping myself. That’s when it happened. The plane suddenly dipped. When I say dipped I mean it fucking went down and up in a not so nice manner. I literally rose out of my seat and at that same moment I saw my coke rise into the air. During the dip the plane also shook left to right causing the liquid to not only rise, but to spread itself out like a blanket. For some reason my only thought was to protect my precious Surface. I caught the cup mid air and tried to chase the spilled Coke that was still suspended in mid air. It must have happened so fast that I looked like a freaking ninja with the cat like speed I displayed.

            The plane dipped again. The entire plane freaking dipped again and this was just as violent as the first one. Now that I think about it, no one really screamed during the dips. Instead it was like we were on a roller coaster and everyone synchronized their, “whoaaa WHOAAA.” I was looking at the front of the plane where red lights were flashing and heads were bobbing while I was shitting all over my comfortable ADIDAS pants. My breathing quickened as I pondered how long this was going to happen. That’s when we felt the plane tip forward into a nosedive. Yup, we nosedived just like my worst nightmares concocted. I can’t remember the exact number; it was either 200 or 400 feet that we dropped in ten seconds. That’s insane to me. I know some of you are probably like, “oh that’s not a lot.” Yeah, well when you’re afraid of heights and claustrophobic at the same time, being stuck in a metal tube over thirty thousand feet in the air, any nosedive is horrific. As the plane nosedived I looked over to Nikki and uttered this one and only phrase.

            “We are going to die!”

            It sounds cliché, but that’s the one thing that popped into my head. My greatest fear was coming true. Fortunately the plane leveled out and five minutes later our captain came back and told us that it was not in the forecast. No shit, eh? We found out later that we hit a microburst, something I’ve never heard of, but apparently they’ve caused crashes before. I managed to keep my cool during the flight, but right after this incident occurred, a woman came walking out of the bathroom we were sitting next to. She looked terrified, not much unlike anyone else, but she was in the freaking crapper as the plane tried to crash. Trying to ease the tension, I blurted out the following.

            “Did you shit yourself in there? Because I shit myself out here.” Everyone within earshot laughed, she did not. I can’t blame her. She was probably in there with her pants around her ankles when all of a sudden the plane is dipping and nose-diving. I’m a big boy and I was flying out of my seat despite wearing a seat belt, she was in there without a seat belt. If you’re going to shit yourself during that kind of experience, there may be no better place to be than the toilet.

            That’s the end of my near death story, but do you want to know something messed up? We flew for another hour and a half after that and, before preparing to land, our pilot came on stating that we had to turn around and head all the way back to Orlando. We were twenty minutes from landing in the Dominican Republic. Apparently some asshat didn’t want to land the plane in a foreign country because it would be grounded for at least four days due to the inspections it needed. I’m sure that makes sense, fly us an hour and a half back towards the states so you can check to make sure your plane won’t crash in a more convenient manner. Don’t fly United.

            So what was your near death experience? I’d love to hear it.