It’s possible you’ve never heard of the legendary pilot, Ann Dearing Holtgren Pellegreno. But you should have. In 2019, Ann received the FAA’s Wright Brothers’ Master Pilot Award for a lifetime of aviation achievements. Swell, but who hasn’t? Me, for one and for good reason. The FAA, my favorite former employer I love to disparage, doesn’t give out this award just for attending Oshkosh in a shiny airplane without landing gear up.
Ther Brits have a term, “precautionary landing.” I have used it several times when faced with the choice of an open piece of terain against a potential plumbing failure. Well done as always!
An emergency pull forward on an aircraft carrier is a big deal. It happens when a launch cycle is stopped and all the aircraft fouling the landing area are pulled forward in order to land an aircraft in distress. I’ve seen it happen after a pilot declared a “personal emergency.” After the landing, the pilot, in a “shambolic crab-wise limp,” rapidly disappeared below deck.
I learned early in my Military flying career to go when you could so you might not have to when you could not. Before there were women on the flight line I always peed on the left main tire for good luck just before jumping in for engine start.
FWIW, there are those “Little John” - “Little Jane” things. You get a gold star if you manage to get at least 50% of the fluid ounces inside the thing.
“Your Analysis Of Priorities Matters. It’s not the quality of the facilities that matter, but rather the proximity to the ramp when they’re desperately needed.”
REALLY??? Guess, what? Us women have been pilots for more that 100 years now and have a considerably different take on this matter. Perhaps next time you write an editorial it might be good to keep that in mind since you had better believe that that’s how we grade an FBO. Not all of your readers have prostates.
The only time that any member of my crew ever had to use a collection device, SHE was glad that one was available.
Modern medicine has the ability to correct many congenital defects. You might want to consider having a sense of humor surgically implanted.
One of the first flying lessons I got was “Never walk past rest room without using it if you’re going out to the plane.” Another thing I learned, there is a Pavlovian bladder response to the sound of the wheels locking in the “up” position.
Of course, the salle de bain is the room with the bathtub (and traditionally with no toilet). What Lindberg ought to have said was, “Où est le W.C.?” (“doo bleh vay say”). I’ve found that even in countries that don’t use the letter W (e.g. Croatia), they still post “WC” signs.
Visiting in Denmark a while ago, I wrangled a day at a nearby soaring club, in a high performance tandem. Great group of pilots. Different experience than the US. My first winch launch for one, powered by - of all things - a humongous American V8. Great day, good cloud streets. Long day… Had to pee and we were still an hour+ away from home base. Fortunately I had along a wide mouth 1L water bottle which I’d gradually emptied during the day. A bit awkward but it worked. Only slightly embarrassing.
”Airport piss after dribble” cam happen because the bladder may not empty completely. McDonald’s napkins help, just saying, or maybe you’ve heard that one before. #2, in my experience, is a totally different thing.
During a different lifetime I picked up a Cessna 185 load of passengers at Ndjili International and after two hours enroute during the flight inland had deviate due to weather into an abandoned airstrip far from anywhere. So far from anywhere in fact that after landing I felt completely free to say “folks out here the entire world is a restroom. Ladies on the right, gents on the left”. Necessity was the mother of eager compliance that day.
I’ve always felt that it was the vibration of the seat from the engine running that massages the bladder and causes it to relax. Funny how, the more relaxed the bladder becomes, the more tense the rest of the body is.
Reminds me of a story Max Conrad–famous long-distance flyer–told on himself. Max had a number of world record distance flights–Casablanca to Los Angeles non-stop for example–or closed-course records for solo flight over 50 hours in a Comanche. The question most asked of him–“How do you go to the bathroom?”
Max mentioned one of his early trans-Pacific flights. I like milk. The airport diner had a dozen small cartons that they gave me. I was halfway to Hawaii before I opened the first one–it sure tasted good–I hadn’t realized how thirsty I was until I took the first drink. I thought that I’d just sweat it out–and a bit later, I drank the third, then the fourth one. By the time I was ready for the next one, the inevitable happened–I had to go. I couldn’t find my “emergency jug”, but thought “I"ll just go in the empty cartons. Hand-flying a Comanche without autopilot in the tropics PLUS the mechanics of filling the tiny carton takes ALL of your concentration! The biggest problem–How could I have more “Output” for filling the cartons than I had “Input”–all the empty cartons were full! I desperately drank another carton–it was starting to sour, but I drank it anyway, (all the while balancing the carton I was drinking, the carton I was “filling”–as well as flying the airplane)–and temporarily solved the problem–but the problem came back in half an hour.”
"I reluctantly drank the next carton–(which was getting more sour by the hour!) to make room for yet another. In addition to my normal time/speed/distance calculations, I added “range” as well–HOW MANY MORE HOURS, AND HOW MUCH MORE SOUR MILK WOULD I HAVE TO CONSUME BEFORE MAKING HAWAII? It was with tears in my eyes and holding my nose when I choked down the last carton of milk–only half an hour out of Hawaii–then RAN to the bathroom on arrival! People ask me "wouldn’t you insist on an extra engine for long overwater flights? I reply “NO BUT I DO INSIST ON REDUNDANCY IN RELIEF BOTTLES!”
Glider pilot “facilities” were mentioned. At our airport at Albert Lea, MN (just north of where Rozendaal holds court) we host a National Glider Contest each year. We get competitors from all over the world. On the years where we have the “big ships”–those that have ultra-long range (and wings to match!), they often carry water ballast. We get a lot of spectators coming to the airport (we’re adjacent to town) to watch them finish. When the glider had the field made, they would do a “high-speed finish”–dumping water as they flashed overhead. It often made a rainbow-like sheen as viewed against the setting sun.
As the gliders were being put away one evening, a family came out and said “we saw this fall off a glider when it was landing.” It was a piece of rubber attached to a tube. I didn’t have the heart to tell them that their “find” was a pilot’s relief tube–glider pilots spend HOURS under a baking aircraft canopy, so must stay hydrated–and what comes in must come out. They solve the problem with a condom-like relief tube, and rather than remove it on the ground, the pilot simply removed it and dropped it. I told them that it was “part of the launch system”–they asked if they could keep it as a souvenir. Rather than have it proudly displayed on a wall, I told them “I’ll return it to the pilot!”
Little John is your friend. My friend, at least, with a place of honor in my flight bag right next to Capt. Jepp’s big brown book. On one long flight he acquired a buddy: after consuming the contents of my water bottle, a second bladder emergency occurred, and there was no choice but to convert said water bottle into a backup collection container. When even that proved inadequate, I found that with very careful handling, those containers could be emptied out the small vent window that Mooney puts on the pilot’s side. Very careful handling.