Ever give someone an intentionally scary ride?

Weekend Warrior

Weekend Warrior

Pre-takeoff checklist
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Mr Madman
Early in my flying, I once gave a co-worker an intentionally scary ride. Not long after, I was the recipient of a scary ride, and from that ride I swore never to do it again, and so far, I haven't.

Giving the Scary Ride:
I had a co-worker that was interested in flying, and he had asked me to take him up some time. Thing is, the co-worker was known throughout the office as being VERY intentionally annoying. He would constantly berate people because he thought it was funny, and he was always playing silly practical jokes (I like a good practical joke, but this guy's idea of a practical joke was to stand behind you with his outstretched finger right near the back of your head, yell your name, and see if he could get you to turn your head so his finger poked you in the eye. Stuff like that). He even kinda looked and spoke annoying: imagine a taller version of Pee Wee Herman.
Well, when I finally took him flying, I waited until we were up about 3000 feet or so, then I pointed to a switch on his side of the dash, and I asked him to switch it (a nav light switch or something). When he did (and when his attention was focused on the switch) I quickly pulled the power back to idle and yelled, "What did you do!" I let the power remain at idle for 10 seconds or so, and during that 10 seconds he must of switched that switch back-and-forth 100 times! Very funny (at least funny for me and the rest of the guys/gals back at the office when I told them later).

Receiving the Scary Ride:
Just a few months later, I was looking at a local Cessna 172 for sale with the intention of buying it. The seller claimed to be a retired corporate pilot, and the old guy offered to take me up in the plane. We hopped in and I then received the scariest 15 minutes of my life: less than full power take off to "save the engine" and barely making it out of the field, low approach of his friend's house BELOW tree top level where we went UNDER the power lines, with the low approach ending with a nearly straight up zoom climb to a full power stall back to level flight (at about 750 agl), then an angled very low return to the grass strip for landing, with him saying the reason for the angle (instead of straight in) was to avoid trees (I'm not sure why we couldn't have just flown OVER the trees as the strip was plenty long enough).

I considered the second flight my "karmic returns" and I've sworn to never intentionally give a scary flight again.

Oh, and I passed on buying the 172.
 
Weekend Warrior said:
I had a co-worker that was interested in flying, and he had asked me to take him up some time. Thing is, the co-worker was known throughout the office as being VERY intentionally annoying. He would constantly berate people because he thought it was funny, and he was always playing silly practical jokes (I like a good practical joke, but this guy's idea of a practical joke was to stand behind you with his outstretched finger right near the back of your head, yell your name, and see if he could get you to turn your head so his finger poked you in the eye. Stuff like that). He even kinda looked and spoke annoying: imagine a taller version of Pee Wee Herman.
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You are far braver than I. Person like that, I wouldn't even let near the airplane.
 
Intentionally? No...sorry @Dave Theisen :(


For the story, go to the "most embarrassing..." thread

As for receiving - a couple of times. I used to fly with a friend (also my CFII) who was young and had nothing to lose. We'd be flying along with his girlfriend and he would intentionally try to scare her because she liked to sleep. I'd see something interesting on my side of his Arrow and he'd snap roll to the right to see it..stuff like that. The other time was a pilot who didn't fly all that often and wanted me to come along as his radio work needed a whole lot of tutoring. It was in a 172 with an O-300 which I had no idea that an under powered feeling take off roll was a normal thing. (and I fly an O-320 powered Cherokee) He chose a runway with a pretty stiff cross wind. On the roll, I didn't think he had full power in and I told him to abort the take off. I didn't feel as comfortable as I did when we got in the plane. We taxied back to the hangar and I never flew with him again. I have since been up in that airplane with two other pilots and then I realized the anemic take off power was normal.
 
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Weekend Warrior said:
Thing is, the co-worker was known throughout the office as being VERY intentionally annoying. He would constantly berate people because he thought it was funny, and he was always playing silly practical jokes (I like a good practical joke, but this guy's idea of a practical joke was to stand behind you with his outstretched finger right near the back of your head, yell your name, and see if he could get you to turn your head so his finger poked you in the eye. Stuff like that).
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I would never take a person like that for a flight.
 
Would’t be my choice of someone to take flying. If your scaring your passenger,your probably not flying to your skill level.
 
When I was flight instructing I would take friends up to demonstrate a spin. I would give a thorough pre-flight briefing, explaining what I would be doing, what the plane would be doing and what they would see.

I think only one person didn't want to do it again.

Then again, years back I had two medics really worried when one engine lost oil pressure and I shut it down. The loss of pressure was not intentional, but the engine shut down was and that is what got them worried.
 
wouldn't say I given a "scary flight", but i did nearly scare my older sister to death (intentionally) once. 172 G1000 makes a super obnoxious alarm with autopilot disconnect, which alone had scared passengers for a second in the past before I explained what it meant. So taking advantage of this, I disconnected the autopilot right as I pulled the throttle back to idle and made a fake mayday call. wouldnt do this to anyone besides close friends or family though. Certainty would never bring someone I dont like into my plane
 
Definitely not intentional, but I've scared a few.

I took a friend flying once at night. He was a big guy. He seemed pretty comfortable flying until he asked me how high we were. I casually told him we were over 6,000 feet off the ground, so slightly over a mile. He instantly freaked out, pure panic. I was afraid I was going to have to fight him! One of the scariest moments I've ever had in a plane. He kept telling me to land I just kept giving him updates on how far out I was. I was happy to get on the ground.

Another time I was doing aerobatics in a Decathlon when I got a little slow and fell out of the top of a loop. Not a big deal, but I was mad at myself and said, well "F-word". My passenger started saying, "F what? F what? What's wrong?" I felt really bad and told him I was so sorry, it was nothing dangerous.
 
Only thing I ever did was to a co worker. All I did was say “watch this”, and I pushed the nose over maybe 30 degrees and he pulled back on the yoke and was like KEEP AIRPLANE STRAIGHT!!!

I told him after to never touch the controls while I’m piloting but I kind of feel bad looking back. I only do that after making sure who ever I’m flying with knows what I’m going to do and is ok with it.
 
Lowflynjack said:
Another time I was doing aerobatics in a Decathlon when I got a little slow and fell out of the top of a loop. Not a big deal, but I was mad at myself and said, well "F-word". My passenger started saying, "F what? F what? What's wrong?" I felt really bad and told him I was so sorry, it was nothing dangerous.
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Once I dropped a pen on the upwind leg and muttered the "s" word nonchalantly, I barely knew I even said that. Of course it freaked my passenger out. :)
 
Never intentionally.

Unintentionally? Countless...!

I think my favorite was my sister. I was doing a check-out flight with an instructor at a new FBO and invited her to ride along in the back.
At some point during the flight, the instructor pulled the power to idle and said "Your engine just died."
No one bothered to mention to my sister that this little emergency was a *simulation*!
To her credit, she remained completely silent while I lined up with a nearby road... until the engine was magically restored.
I only learned about this on the ground later. "You both were so calm!" she said...


All that said, that trick with the nav light switch is hilarious!
 
Usually a "hmm, that's odd" is enough to do the trick.
 
Weekend Warrior said:
Early in my flying, I once gave a co-worker an intentionally scary ride. Not long after, I was the recipient of a scary ride, and from that ride I swore never to do it again, and so far, I haven't.

Giving the Scary Ride:
I had a co-worker that was interested in flying, and he had asked me to take him up some time. Thing is, the co-worker was known throughout the office as being VERY intentionally annoying. He would constantly berate people because he thought it was funny, and he was always playing silly practical jokes (I like a good practical joke, but this guy's idea of a practical joke was to stand behind you with his outstretched finger right near the back of your head, yell your name, and see if he could get you to turn your head so his finger poked you in the eye. Stuff like that). He even kinda looked and spoke annoying: imagine a taller version of Pee Wee Herman.
Well, when I finally took him flying, I waited until we were up about 3000 feet or so, then I pointed to a switch on his side of the dash, and I asked him to switch it (a nav light switch or something). When he did (and when his attention was focused on the switch) I quickly pulled the power back to idle and yelled, "What did you do!" I let the power remain at idle for 10 seconds or so, and during that 10 seconds he must of switched that switch back-and-forth 100 times! Very funny (at least funny for me and the rest of the guys/gals back at the office when I told them later).

Receiving the Scary Ride:
Just a few months later, I was looking at a local Cessna 172 for sale with the intention of buying it. The seller claimed to be a retired corporate pilot, and the old guy offered to take me up in the plane. We hopped in and I then received the scariest 15 minutes of my life: less than full power take off to "save the engine" and barely making it out of the field, low approach of his friend's house BELOW tree top level where we went UNDER the power lines, with the low approach ending with a nearly straight up zoom climb to a full power stall back to level flight (at about 750 agl), then an angled very low return to the grass strip for landing, with him saying the reason for the angle (instead of straight in) was to avoid trees (I'm not sure why we couldn't have just flown OVER the trees as the strip was plenty long enough).

I considered the second flight my "karmic returns" and I've sworn to never intentionally give a scary flight again.

Oh, and I passed on buying the 172.
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Nah. If I did something scarier intentionally than I do unintentionally I'd scare myself to much
 
All the jackasses who want to propose in airplanes do it.

As for me, no. I don’t like cleaning up barf.
 
I had a non-pilot in the backseat of a CAP airplane (basically he was just ballast) - and in my defence, he was a jerk - it was getting dark, and we were still about an hour out, and he was nervous. Finally, he asked me, "Are little planes allowed to fly at night"? I told him I didn't know, since I'd never done it before. He tried to rat me out, and it took some convincing to make him understand he'd been had.

I got stuck with him once more - had to file to get through a low layer. Same thing: He said he'd never been in the clouds in a little plane - I told him I hadn't either. Heard later he'd said more or less the same thing, about rain, to another pilot.
 
Eh, never anything "scary", but I've intentionally been abrupt with a leveling off after a climb or descent, which obviously causes some momentary G-forces to be felt. Roller-coasters are fun, but my wife (fiance at the time) had a harder time with it since the tracks were nowhere to be found! I've also let a co-worker handle the controls once while in normal cruise, but as with most passengers, he wasn't aware of the rudder pedals. When the plane started swinging back and forth I just had a horrified look on my face . . . he got so panicked until I started laughing. Nothing like seeing a 300+lbs guy fearing for his life because he touched the flight yoke. :)
 
No. General Aviation is already perceived as a rich-man daredevil carbon-spew, rather than an amusing and challenging intellectual hobby. :D We need all of the positive advocacy we can get. Scaring passengers intentionally is ridiculous IMO and another little nail in GA's coffin.
 
I never intentionally gave someone a scary ride. But I remember there was this guy who wanted to go up. So we went up for a ride to penn state. On the way there he asked about a stall. Told him about it and asked if he wanted to feel one. He agreed so we did a power on stall. When that plane nosed over I think he crapped his pants.
 
Intentionally, never. But as long as everyone is tossing in their unintentional ones...

Scene: DA40XLS (i.e. ratcheting mixture lever) in cruise flight.
Me: Hm, I ought to lean the mixture.
*click* EGT rises.
*click* engine runs a bit better.
*click* EGT seems to peaking.
*click* EGT fell a bit but let's do one more to be sure.
*click* RUMBLE, COUGH, SPUTTER, SHAKE
Passenger: ARE WE GOING TO DIE?????!?
 
Scariest flight I ever took was actually my last flight review. The CFI, a former USAF pilot, taught me some new and interesting stall recovery techniques. Probably nothing that more seasoned pilots haven't seen before, but doing a 30-45 degree pitch up to a power-on stall, then rolling the wings completely vertical was new for me. Sure got my full and undivided attention. When he did the first one I about crapped myself. Then he had me do it, and after 3 or so I felt pretty comfortable with it. His point that it didn't exert a low- or negative-G pushover was valid, though I suspect a passenger would have found it just as unsettling if not more. I did the first couple times, and I understood what was going on.

I have a 20-something niece who is something of a thrill junkie and really wanted to do some aerobatics. We didn't -- neither me nor the airplane are able -- but I did show her the corners of the flight envelope that I'm more or less comfortable with. Again, nothing too extreme, but certainly more than she'd ever seen in an airliner. Steep turns, spiral dive, a little low-g pushover during our sightseeing flight.

I've never intentionally tried to scare anyone. I do, however, have to remind myself from time to time that even though the airplane is quite nimble and responsive, and I love flying it like something other than a lumber wagon, most people have never seen anything more extreme than a standard rate turn from an aisle row seat of an airliner. Those people tend to think a 45 degree banked turn -- or a normal base to final turn, for that matter -- are pretty scary.
 
Then there was the time my wife and I flew down to Gaston's and back. Departing in a light rain from slick grass got her attention... but the real fun was later on. She'd been asleep for a couple of hours, when we were cruising at 6500 or so. I was a couple miles from home and at pattern altitude when she finally woke up and looked out the window.

"AREN'T WE AWFULLY CLOSE TO THE GROUND???"

"Not as close as we will be in about four minutes when we land, sweetie."
 
I guess @DaleB has me blocked or something but I tried to send this in private...

Might want to take down a written confession of a bust of 91.307 and perhaps 91.303 and mention it to the instructor...
 
Scary, is subjective. I've given several Eagle rides. It's like a free discovery rides for those over 18 that the EAA offers. It is a one on one flight to talk about the costs of flight training and what Flight training entails. I will, usually, do an approach to landing stall and takeoff stall and a steep turn to demonstrate the kinds of maneuvers they would be required to learn. I have had the takeoff stall and/or steep turn make a couple feel ill-at-ease. I generally never do the steep turn to the right so they don't have to look out the window at the ground.
 
denverpilot said:
All the jackasses who want to propose in airplanes do it.

As for me, no. I don’t like cleaning up barf.
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I've seen a couple of those, and felt really sorry for the ladies. You're asking the girl of your dreams the most important question she'll probably ever be asked, and you scare her half to death in the process, intentionally. I have always hoped the lady would say answer, "No!".
 
Fallsrider said:
I've seen a couple of those, and felt really sorry for the ladies. You're asking the girl of your dreams the most important question she'll probably ever be asked, and you scare her half to death in the process, intentionally. I have always hoped the lady would say answer, "No!".
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I’m a jokester but that’s not the time nor place for it.
 
denverpilot said:
I guess @DaleB has me blocked or something but I tried to send this in private...

Might want to take down a written confession of a bust of 91.307 and perhaps 91.303 and mention it to the instructor...
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Wouldn’t he have to state he didn’t have a chute in order for it to be a confession?
 
EppyGA said:
I generally never do the steep turn to the right so they don't have to look out the window at the ground.
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i always do steep turn to the right when i have a pax... so that if the door opens and something falls off the plane, it aint gonna be me.



i kid, i kid.

OP - your scenario one, no one like that will ever be in my list of people to talk to, let alone drive to the hangar.

scenario 2: my first discover flight. young ass CFI. i told him to keep it simple and not do any crazy stuff... he showed me accelerated full power departure stall and zero G. i had a female friend in the back and i think ht was trying to impress her. net result, i didnt go back to teh FBO for anther year. when i started my training, i made sure that jack ass wasnt my CFI.

one unintentional scare:
flying with a buddy from work, we were talking about engine failure and the training we go through etc while flying. he kept asking so the plane is not going fall off the engine stops? after about 3 same questions, i said no as i closed the throttle .. lets just say there was a very long pause and silence in the cockpit ....
 
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