The First Flight

Flying!

A feat that has been humankind's fantasy since time immemorial. No wonder, I had the fantasy too. It was indeed a surprise and a mystery about how the things down below would look when seen from sky. The closest experience I had was with a Flight Simulator programme , I used to play on my PC. Subsequently, Google Earth came closer.

Plane Gazing:

My house in Pazhavanthangal, in Chennai, was hardly a kilometre from Chennai Airport and I could watch the flights landing and taking off from my sky. But most of them being domestic ones, would be the small Airbus 300, 310 & 320 or Boeing 737s, Paramount Airlines' Embraer E-Jets and an few occasional ATRs. They provided a variety to the eyes.

The magnificent ones however are the international ones that fly the huge Airbus 340s, Boeing 747 and the Boeing 777. Most of these however stick to the night schedules. Some do fly the day times like the Air France Cargo - a B747, Emirates - A330 and a weekly Thai - B747. But then, there was one plane that I admired the most. It is a Singapore Airlines Boeing 777-300 (though I believed it to be an Airbus 340). Oh! the introduction is taking too long, but if I don't describe this, I will not be doing justice to this topic.

This is a late evening flight and lands at Chennai at about 10:45 at night. It is easy to identify the bigger flights even at night since, they unlike others approach the runway so slowly, sometimes even appearing to be still. It is a beautiful sight as she turns around her left as arriving from the Bay of Bengal and positioning herself along the runway. She would glide down gracefully and silently. At a kilometre before the runway, she would turn on her main lights and a few lights below her wings illuminating the herself and the trees around the airport. It is a marvellous sight to see the huge, long and magnificent bird gracefully touching down and then vanish between the trees - a sight I would see almost everyday without getting bored.

Events leading to my flight

It was late January and I received this interview call from Tata Chemicals in Mithapur, Gujarat. Attending an interview in Gujarat and returning back to work in Chennai was nothing short of a nightmare. HR of the company will be paying the equivalent of AC train fare from Chennai to their place. The biggest problem I found out with trains was that there are no good trains to Ahmedabad, that reaches on time and that I had to go another 500 km west of Ahmedabad to this place. I checked a few websites for the flight charges to Ahmedabad and it turned out that Air Deccan fares came a about Rs. 1000 higher than the AC train fare.

Given that my current job profile was not so glamorous coupled with a bureaucracy in the company that links everything from the cup you have tea in, internet access and the class of travel to your position, there was no way, I would be travelling in a plane in the near future. Though the position offered at Tata Chemicals was quite good, but then I that is something still far. So I decided to take go ahead. As I sat at Thrisulam railway station opposite to the Chennai Airport, with the e-ticket in hand and gazing at the new hoardings put up by GoAir, KingFisher and others, a few friends were discussing about their US visa interview and plans to go to USA. I looked at the destination on my ticket, Ahmedabad and laughed at myself.

At Airport

That day was the Sunday, 19th February 2006. The flight was scheduled at 12:50 I believe. I did not have much to carry, since, it was for a day or two, I just had 2 sets of clothes and a few essentials and then a camera. It was quite nervous. It is not the fear of heights but a sense of disbelief and an unknown tension. I reached the airport very well ahead of time. Being the first time, I asked the information centre what I am supposed to do. They directed me to the check in counter, and the scanner. I went to the scanner with the display "Air Deccan" and tried to put my cabin baggage into it. The personal over there told me that is for checked in baggage, I nodded as if I understood and proceeded to the check in counter. Then I completed the security and moved to the gates.

I was quite early and add to that the flight was declared late. I sat at the departure lounge looking at planes taking off and landing. There was one Indian Airlines plane to Mumbai, with a bridge attached it. Every five minutes there would be a "last and final call" for the passengers boarding that flight. Perhaps the crew were afraid of travelling alone. As the display kept updating the departures of other flights, my flight status was a static "delay".

I was watching and observing every smallest things and the activities over there, since I may not get to fly in the near future. Perhaps due to the reason that Chennai did not have enough gates, most airlines were carrying the passengers up to the plane in their buses. A cabin crew will be at the gate with a list and a security officer would be checking the boarding passes and letting the passengers into the bus.

Where to sit?

When you are going to fly for the first time and perhaps the last time, would it not be wise to have the window seat? And that is exactly what I wanted too. And not just that, I wanted to sit exactly on the side from where I can see my terrace at Pazhavanthangal from where I gazed all the planes. So I observed the direction the planes were taking off, before I left home and decided that I should be sitting on the right side to have a glimpse of my home. Since low cost airlines don't assign seat numbers, it is first come first served for seating on board.

I was in for a shock. There were couple of announcements going on. One about the late departure of my flight and another the late arrival of a flight of the same airline from Port Blair. Perhaps the flight from Andaman goes to Ahmedabad as the next flight. I was shocked to see an ATR from Andaman landing. A sense of despair ran down. I am not going to travel in a flight that resembles a Kerala transport bus with two fans on its sides. But it is too late.

As the boarding time neared, people started crowding near the gate which seemed most probable. Without losing time I jumped into the line and managed a decent 10th position, well not a bad one. But with a last minute announcement and change of gates, they ensured that I landed up in the middle of the newly formed line. Luckily that made me amongst the last persons to board the first bus and I ended up being among the first few people to board the plane.

As the bus moved on towards the ATR, all my excitement vanished and I wished I could evaporate in thin air. The bus went a few hundred metres of the ATR and made a U turn, and lo! there stands an Airbus 320, with a few staff on the tarmac and is being refuelled. So this is my flight. I was jubilant. It was exiting as I boarded the plane. I felt like it was all gloomy inside and cold and filled with smoke, but I did not fail to notice the beautiful flight attendant.

In the excitement I ran to the right seat on the fifth or so row but then realised that it could be over the wings and does not serve the purpose.

The take off

I wasn't sure if camera may be used on board so did not take it out. As the plane taxied down the to runway, I leaned against the windows to see the world outside from the air. It positioned itself and pulled forward. As it accelerated forward, the g-forces were pulling be back, I have never been subjected to this before. I cannot forget the moment the landing gears were lifted and my first moment in air. I said to myself "You did it".

On board

Soon, the familiar landmarks were zooming past, so fast that I before I could decipher them, they are gone. I did not find my terrace, all I could see was a matrix of streets and trees and concrete rectangles. The plane soon crossed the St. Thomas Mount Railway station and made a sharp turn to left before I could have a glimpse of Guindy. Further it was all uncharted territory and could hardly make out anything.

Once it crossed the Chennai suburbs and reached its cruising altitude, nothing was hardly visible on the ground. It was a clear day with blue skies and huge clouds "below". It was like flying over a garden with cauliflowers lying around.

When ever the ground was visible, I could make out cities and towns by the roads - roads would be radiating out from some points which obviously should be urban areas. It is amazing to see how illogical and round about many of the highways are when looked up from the sky. The rivers shone like strands of silver wire. At a few places, I could see large dams, identifiable with a straight edge on one side and other sides rivers running into the reservoir resembling fingers and the palm.

Thus two hours literally flew past.

After ten months, I crossed the seas in that Singapore Airlines B777-300, which I used to admire every night from my terrace.