I was reminded recently that I have flown over 500 flights in just about 20 years, more than the average flyer. And I'm not a happy flyer really, although by far I have far more confidence in air crews than I have fears that they may mess up. I can recall a handful of flights when we came in too slow and one where we were too low to land, the pilots had the sense to abort and go about for another landing. I distinctly remember I was in a window seat and knew we were off flight path and descending too rapidly like a sinking elevator, I had a growing panic and almost yelled to my row mates to brace for impact, and the sense of relief I felt when the pilot applied power and aborted. I think veteran pilots deadheading in passenger cabins and passengers have a decent sense of this when it happens, definitely - but in my experience its rare to occur. Far more frequent have been weather emergencies, which can be scary as hell. I don't like turbulence, having sat through some really bad southern and Midwestern flights, one of which caused a spinal injury to a Delta attendant. Then there are mechanicals, like a dead engine, including two experiences in foreign aircraft i will not recount - I did sing my death song both times expecting to bite it. I've never had to evacuate under duress but have read the safety card probably on 95% of flights, you never know. One of my morbid curiosities has been reviewing aircraft crash investigations and those with fatalities are grisly and consistently random in their physical effects on passengers. I say keep your EMT shears. For about 5 years you couldn't pry me from the exit aisle now when I fly coach I tend to sit about 4-5 rows behind. Even then I'm just playing the lottery and hoping for a relatively low speed crash like Asiana. If you crash the odds of having a really great pilot at the stick are pretty good, its fair to have faith in your pilot most flights. There are just no really great options to crash land jets at speed. Those passengers were lucky as hell to survive.

Sounds like lot of vivid memories but on the whole its been smooth air - thousands of hours of boredom punctuated by moments of sudden terror, like on a runaway roller coaster. Nothing you can do.

People aren't meant to fly otherwise they'd have wings, and feathers coming out of their assholes. A wise old TWA pilot told me that...