Dangerous Flights Discovery 9pm

Oscar Bravo

A bit late posting but it will be on Discovery +1 at 10pm. New series dealing with a used airplane delivery service in the G.A industery....might be worth a look,might not!

phonypony

Oscar Bravo wrote: »

A bit late posting but it will be on Discovery +1 at 10pm. New series dealing with a used airplane delivery service in the G.A industery....might be worth a look,might not!

Good series, but full of produced drama as usual... Gets better as the series goes on! Worth a look.

knucklehead6

phonypony wrote: »

Good series, but full of produced drama as usual... Gets better as the series goes on! Worth a look.

Produced drama? Check

Decent enough? Check

Worth watching? Yeah. I'll give next weeks a go.

phonypony

knucklehead6 wrote: »

Produced drama? Check

Decent enough? Check

Worth watching? Yeah. I'll give next weeks a go.

You left out 'a bit of uncoordinated flight with altitude deviation to simulate <insert emergency here>'? Check!

bluecode

I don't know about manufactured drama, that 206 is a piece of junk.
That fuel leak really was bloody dangerous.

Not sure about the blonde though.

Besides you don't really need to manufacture much in the way of drama. Ferry flying is not exactly the safest profession in the world.

I remember seeing a ferry pilot once warming up his Cirrus in Rekyavik before dawn one icy morning. 'Better him than me.' I thought as I went back to my warm bed.

phonypony

bluecode wrote: »

I don't know about manufactured drama, that 206 is a piece of junk.
That fuel leak really was bloody dangerous.

Not sure about the blonde though.

Besides you don't really need to manufacture much in the way of drama. Ferry flying is not exactly the safest profession in the world.

I remember seeing a ferry pilot once warming up his Cirrus in Rekyavik before dawn one icy morning. 'Better him than me.' I thought as I went back to my warm bed.

Absolutely. But cutaways and 'B' Roll filmed after the event, cut together with unrelated cockpit warnings, falsified aural alerts, random ATC chatter and dramatic music is all designed to confuse and stimulate the senses. Clever editing goes a long way. The actual events are, of course, very risky and require some courageous, well prepared pilots.

(I feel like such a buzzkill....)

Irish Steve

If I was the owner of the 206, I would have been VERY unhappy with the report on the air worthiness originally produced, those fuel bladders didn't get like that overnight, and were clearly in poor condition, which should have been spotted, and now, there's an engine issue with metal in the filter that is going to be a serious overhaul or worse, which again, should have been spotted during a pre sale inspection. By the time that aircraft gets to Poland, it's going to have had a lot of money spent on it that should have been factored in to the original scenario, unless we've not been given the full story.

the other annoyance is when for economy reasons, they can't even get the right engine sounds on things. A turbo prop doesn't sound remotely like a dc4, but they clearly have a lot of audio clips to use.

Then there was the question of the "extras" to be carried. Those "extras" could well be the difference between life and death, especially on ferry work. I spent a month in California a few years ago, and was amazed at the cavalier attitude of some people, they'd launch merrily out across the desert to Las Vegas from LA with nothing in the way of emergency supplies, not even extra water, in aircraft that were quite old, and without so much as a thought that in the event of an emergency landing, it might be a while before (a) they were reported as missing, and (b) it might then take a while to find them. In very high temperatures, water is essential, but did they carry any? In a lot of cases, no. I've seen the same issues with over water flying here in Europe, very little awareness or preparation for the "what if" scenario.

The last niggles for me were the apparently dire performance of the exec turbo, which ended up flying some 8000 Ft lower than they'd planned, That should have come out in the wash long before they departed, and the other real WTF was a runway they were aiming for that was closed, with no real alternative available. Did someone screw up the flight planning, or not read a NOTAM, or just make a pretty fundamental FU. Whichever, arriving over a runway that's not open on a trip of that nature is a cause for serious concern.

Hopefully, the series will be good, the first program was at least a passable introduction, a lot will depend on how many "invented" scenarios we end up seeing.

Oscar Bravo

the other annoyance is when for economy reasons, they can't even get the right engine sounds on things. A turbo prop doesn't sound remotely like a dc4, but they clearly have a lot of audio clips to use. 100 per cent agree!

bluecode

phonypony wrote: »

Absolutely. But cutaways and 'B' Roll filmed after the event, cut together with unrelated cockpit warnings, falsified aural alerts, random ATC chatter and dramatic music is all designed to confuse and stimulate the senses. Clever editing goes a long way. The actual events are, of course, very risky and require some courageous, well prepared pilots.

(I feel like such a buzzkill....)

Oh I know, worked in TV a bit. It's always perked up a bit. Have you ever watched a simple horse race on TV? The sound of galloping hooves? Do you you think they miked up all the horses? There's a swish when they clear a fence, faked. Even the sound of the excited crowd is often added and that's on live TV.

I'm guilty of it myself. Once I was involved when a crew were videoing a sequence using aircraft. I had to step in to prevent them using two separate aircraft in the same clip. But I was just as guilty, suggesting or setting up several shots for them. Looked good though. That's the important thing.

I agree though that it's really sloppy for them to use a piston sound on a turbine. It's ridiculous.

ChicaneAuto

The drama is a bit hard to stomach. Every bleeding takeoff consisted of the aircraft reluctantly lurching from the runway. Un the merlin 3 they made a huge deal about the extra fuel and weight but i doubt it even equalled a fully loaded regular flight. Also the first fuel leak on the 206 was quite clearly an open fuel strainer.id say the producers were delighted when a real leak occurred. Any one else feel the urge to shove the drummers sticks up his hole?
Its painful to watch but no doubt ill watch it over and over just to see the planes! I wish they still showed Flight Deck. It was excellent but mind bogglingly boring at times which is a true representation of reality. Apologies for the lack of good punctuation. Iphone user borrowing an android!talk about mashing the keypad to order a dialing cane.

dogmatix

Despite the manufactured drama and all, it was still an interesting and entertaining program. I'll tune in for the next show

It is still miles better then the laughable, inaccurate and cheaply produced rubbish that is "Aviation Stories" on Discovery History.

bluecode

I'd love to see my working life done on TV. Actually I've been suggesting it for a while. It would be a bit like Bush pilots without the bush, Ice pilots without the ice or the interesting aeroplanes. Ireland's greatest pilots it could be called or Flying wild Ireland or maybe Wet pilots or Bog pilots.

There'd be lots of drama, a couple of butt clenching moments, narrow escapes, soap opera style drama, walkouts, stand up rows, cock ups. Brushes with the Feds. Heartwarming stories and tragedy. Had it all this year.

The fame might go to my head.:D

But then again, maybe there's a book in it?

LeftBase

I had to laugh when the X-feed valve I think it was on the merlin was not working and they have fake aural warnings and a shot of the Alt alert and transponder interrogation lights!:rolleyes:
What was funnier was the fact that the valve showed inop yet there was no other fuel pressure or fuel flow deviations or warnings at all which to me would indicate the valve light on the panel was just acting the maggot.

It was all clearly manufactured drama. The Runway closure at New Caladonia(although I missed a part of that drama)was a hoot too. If I was on an ETOPs like flight like that and my only viable runway was reported closed and it was confirmed open when I set out(with my flight plan in the system advising them of my arrival) I'd be telling them to shove it and be landing on the bloody runway regardless!

EchoIndia

Strange also how the flying footage of the Merlin showed it with Australian registration VH-LDQ whereas it was ferried as N300AL (its original US marks):
http://flightaware.com/live/flight/N300AL

Also of interest is that the Merlin was ferried in September 2010, whereas the Cessna N2912Q did not make it to Poland until June 2011!
http://flightaware.com/live/flight/N2912Q

bluecode

Not really, clearly a lot of the flying shots were filmed after delivery. As soon as N300AL landed in Oz, it was stripped of it's US reg.

Seen it before after a delivery flight. There is a moment when an aircraft is completely unregistered. Quite strange to see. Totally anonymous. I have some photos like that. It's weird.

As for the 206, well that's no surprise. It was something of a basket case. It probably took that long to sort it out. Can't really understand why the Poles went for it all. I personally could have pointed them to several better aircraft.

It must have been really cheap, that's all I can say.