Getting your loved ones to fly with you?

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drotto

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drotto
The title says it all really. My dad is a pilot, and his wife has flown with him a handful of times, so he does not have the problem. I have gotten my wife to be OK with me taking lessons, but I can tell she is not 100% thrilled with the idea. If I can not get her comfortable with the idea, flying for me will never get to the point where it leads to really cool day trips and shorter vacations. You know those places just far enough from your home they are annoying to drive, but close enough the commercial flights seem stupid.

Her has worries about the safety of small planes, but she has said it on many occasions that she feels it will make her sick. She has on a few occasions gotten slightly motion sick on smaller commercial turboprop type planes, and think even small will mean even more sick. My son will also occasional get motion sick, but he is very unpredictable with it. I think either bonine, or the bands are a good pick for both of them (thy have been used successfully at amusement parks).

What have others done to get friends and relatives over their fears and reservations?
 
Nothing you can do. If they won't go, ditch them and have fun. Jealousy/convenience is the only thing that will get reluctant people on board. I know pilots that have 2 seat classics and minivans, they don't try to move the family at once, they sometimes take one kid and meet the wife/other children/their luggage at a destination. Can't justify it on practicality but they have fun.
For the folks that will chime in with the 'safe pilot,' 'licensed by the gov't' etc stuff I suggest they ride with a brand new pilot while sitting in a seat without controls. You get crickets.
Never forget you are flying for you, screw the family.
 
My stepmother took one flight with a CFI without my Dad. It did wonders for her. My CFI has also said I could have one passenger ride along later in training. I do think my wife will eventually go up with me, do not get me wrong, just looking for ways to make it easier to get there.
 
Use sugar. Take her to the beach or wherever she likes to go that usually has awful traffic. Don't expect her to geek out or care about the details of operating a flying machine.
 
The only time my wife has ever flown with me without us going somewhere is the day I got my license, and unfortunately she felt sick when we went up, probably because she was so nervous. I'm very fortunate though, because she is on board for using the plane now in order to take a trip somewhere, she just doesn't have any interest in flying for enjoyment. I do feel your pain however, because besides my wife, not a single member of either my family or my wife's family will go up in the airplane with me. Not one. I haven't come across any secret words that seem to convince them that they may be missing out on something they might enjoy or find useful.
 
Find a new family.

(In all seriousness, if it doesn't work then don't force it.)
 
My wife and two kids have flown with me 90% of the time after test flights. We plan trips that we all enjoy. I was sick the first week or so during training. My family occasionally gets sick in turbulence or maneuvers. I carry crystallized ginger, air sickness med, gallon ziplocks, paper towels. My pilot brother and his family, my mom, my sister will fly with me. A few other pilot friends fly with me. No biggie if they don't. That is why most four places are empty and Van's two place aircraft are much more popular. Plan a closer fun trip, then longer ones. Don't give up flying though, too many still enjoy it and will join you once they know or hear about your skills.
 
I have taken a few vacations where my wife drove,and I took the plane. Best of both worlds,then you have a car when you get there. Start with short flights to close airports with good restaurants .
 
drotto said:
The title says it all really. My dad is a pilot, and his wife has flown with him a handful of times, so he does not have the problem. I have gotten my wife to be OK with me taking lessons, but I can tell she is not 100% thrilled with the idea. If I can not get her comfortable with the idea, flying for me will never get to the point where it leads to really cool day trips and shorter vacations. You know those places just far enough from your home they are annoying to drive, but close enough the commercial flights seem stupid.

Her has worries about the safety of small planes, but she has said it on many occasions that she feels it will make her sick. She has on a few occasions gotten slightly motion sick on smaller commercial turboprop type planes, and think even small will mean even more sick. My son will also occasional get motion sick, but he is very unpredictable with it. I think either bonine, or the bands are a good pick for both of them (thy have been used successfully at amusement parks).

What have others done to get friends and relatives over their fears and reservations?
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The problem with Bonine and the rest of those pills is they ruin the rest of the day.
 
I had the exact same issue. My wife was in tears (and terror) the first time she flew with me. She said she was fine until it came time to actually get out of the truck and start preflight, then the fear set in. Told her fine, we don't have to go -- I'm certainly not going to force anyone to fly!! We could cancel the flight, it was just a 45-minute trip for dinner. She decide she'd go. Was still terrified right up until we did a lap around our house at 1000' AGL. She slowly got more comfortable with it, even took the yoke for a while. Our next trip together was about 4-1/2 hours each way, and she slept half the way home.

Don't pressure her. Finish your training, and I would resist the temptation to tell her about all the slow flight, stalls, unusual attitudes, etc. WE might think that kind of stuff is cool and fun to do, and WE know why we learn and practice it, but it scares the crap out of most non-pilots.

And for the "to heck with anyone else, you're flying for you" crowd -- Not so in all cases. Flying solo is OK some times, but what I really love is loading a couple of bags into the plane and going somewhere together.
 
In most cases, yep, fly it like an airliner. In the case of my Ex Wife though I had to fly it like a crop duster lol. It wasn't the plane she was afraid of, it was the altitude. As long as I was between the trees and climbing for fences, she was just fine.
 
drotto said:
I have gotten my wife to be OK with me taking lessons, but I can tell she is not 100% thrilled with the idea.
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What have others done to get friends and relatives over their fears and reservations?
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I got her my girlfriend to fall in love with general aviation, then married her.:yesnod:
 
i just kept nagging my sister to come up with me. she told me she won't even go up with my dad who is a delta pilot. i finally convinced to go up with me the couple of days after i got my instrument ticket with a solid overcast layer!
 
Give her a job.
I said "you read the checklist"

Watch for traffic, listen for the squawk code, etc
and by all means take her up early or late when it is calm.

My wife was ok the whole time but our first flight, I flew her to a fancy FBO that lent us a mercedes and took her to dinner. After that, it was all she wrote. Now she wants to fly to dinner a couple times a week.
 
My wife only flies with me if it gets her someplace nice and avoids 5hrs on I95.

My kids otoh start bugging me if we haven't gone flying in a while

I didn't take any pax until I had 250 hrs or so. Never dragged anyone to the plane.
 
There is no magic salve or remedy.

Whatever you do, don't hand them the yoke and say "now don't let go or we'll die!"

They don't think that's funny. :no:
 
First, don't tell them that hour for hour, GA flights are 500 times more likely to get into an accident than a commercial airliner (from Jason Miller...The Finer Points...who has spent his life studying safety).

You can greatly improve those odds by being a good pilot...and not a "bold" pilot.

Then, here's a different approach. I'm sure it will meet with a lot of moans and sighs.

I have gotten many to go up in a Cirrus. Why? They and I like the fact that there's a parachute for emergencies.

Is a Cirrus really safer? That's been the subject of debate for a long time. My own opinion: No. They are less forgiving and harder to fly. But they are really nice, and the parachute makes people feel good. With proper piloting, they are safe.

Won't cure the airsickness issue, but the Cirrus does make people feel better about taking their first flight.
 
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I think the #1 thing is don't scare your passengers. Our ground school featured a few visits and stories from a former NTSB investigator. His stories were, of course, very interesting and illustrated a number of ways pilot error could result in a smoking hole in the ground. I, of course, passed on these stories to the family. Bad idea! :rolleyes:

My other habit is to mutter, "oops", or "d'oh", under my breath when I notice I'm slightly off course, or whatever. Just a way of prodding myself to stay sharp but I was informed that these little comments don't inspire confidence in my passengers. :rofl:

Finally, you may think you're being proactive by keeping your eyes peeled for emergency landing sites. Similarly, you may note situations in which, if the engine failed, you'd be totally screwed. Don't share the results of such analysis with those in the plane with you.

All that being said, my wife was a bit apprehensive at first but now enjoys flying with me. The first flight was only about 30 minutes. We worked up from there.
 
Remember flying is boring if your not the pilot. Try to get your pax involved,like to let them play with the portable GPS
 
That's the flipside. You need different strategies to deal with bored folks vs. fearful folks. You can let the bored folks fly a little as long as there isn't a fearful one in the back seat.

frfly172 said:
Remember flying is boring if your not the pilot. Try to get your pax involved,like to let them play with the portable GPS
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My wife will only go if we are going somewhere for something. She doesnt see the point of flying circles in the sky or $100 hamburgers. But she doesnt like driving around "looking at stuff" either. My kids (12yo and 8yo) fight to go with me (and I give them jobs, "look for birds or airplanes...and call them out").
 
I would put my wife in the back seat while I was doing lessons with the CFI. By the time I finished up she had seen all the scary stuff and wasn't worried anymore.
 
People are weird.

My daughter is fine flying low enough to count the gopher's. Even after my lamenting that altitude is your friend.

And my wife is fine in the back seat, but about the front seat she says "there's too many buttons and stuff."

:dunno:
 
Before we got married and all the way up to when the kids arrived, my wife would fly with me verywhere. We would go the Bahamas, vacations, etc. Then the kids came and I stopped flying for around 10 years. When I started flying again she simply would not. She is afraid of flying regardless of whether its our Mooney or large commercial aircraft. I've put over 100 hours in the Mooney over the last year but not even 5 minutes of that with her. At least the kids love flying and whenever we go see the grandparents they want to fly rather than drive 6 hours, but its just not nice to let the wife do the drive alone. I have suggested lessons with a CFI, very short flights to eat (less than 30 minutes), but nothing has worked yet. I am convinced that now that we have kids it has triggered some survival instinct or a fear of leaving them without parents if something were to happen to both of us. That being said, she has no problem at all with the kids flying with me. Maybe next year....


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Make her drive the six hours with the kids, fly yourself in, fly out. Let her drive home with the kids, bet she will be cured.
 
txflyer said:
People are weird.

My daughter is fine flying low enough to count the gopher's. Even after my lamenting that altitude is your friend.

And my wife is fine in the back seat, but about the front seat she says "there's too many buttons and stuff."

:dunno:
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Yeah, my ex wife's dad was USAF and she understood the reality of altitude intellectually, just not emotionally. Oh well, I've got over 1000hrs below 100' lol, doesn't bother me to fly low either.
 
Henning said:
Yeah, my ex wife's dad was USAF and she understood the reality of altitude intellectually, just not emotionally. Oh well, I've got over 1000hrs below 100' lol, doesn't bother me to fly low either.
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I guess it's the fear of heights thing. Or, the higher they go, the more disconnected from the world they feel. :confused:

I think I'm married to one of those rare birds who no one could teach to fly. She's too scattered. And she would panic big time if anything went wrong. She's just that way and can't help it.

I have an ex too. Thank God :wink2:
 
Drotto,

It's best not to nag them into submission, the family will either come around or not. Plan a trip with your Bride to one of her favorite places for lunch or dinner or a favorite shopping place. You're in NJ, maybe a beach run or hop across the river and do St. Michaels renting a car out of KESN. Be creative!

Thankfully my Bride will jump in the plane and head off to a new get-away in a heartbeat. She also refers to our plane as 'just another form of transportation'. On occasion she will do a lunch run to meet our flying friends but for the most part its all about travel. She loves the beach runs every weekend [KOXB] and often points and laughs at the ground pounders stuck in traffic on I95.
 
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my girlfriend's requirement to fly with me is to not ask about weight...

we flew to Fredericksburg a while back and I asked her her weight so I could calculate how much she could buy at the markets there...

her response was, if I have to ask her weight then we will drive everywhere..

so now, I just make sure I only fill up to the tabs and take my time in preflight on the taxiways if we are going somewhere shopping.
 
Monpilot said:
my girlfriend's requirement to fly with me is to not ask about weight...

we flew to Fredericksburg a while back and I asked her her weight so I could calculate how much she could buy at the markets there...

her response was, if I have to ask her weight then we will drive everywhere..

so now, I just make sure I only fill up to the tabs and take my time in preflight on the taxiways if we are going somewhere shopping.
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Similar story.. Wife has only flown with me once, during a cross country flight with my instructor. First time I ever had anyone else in the airplane. My "We sure sink a lot faster with extra weight in the back" comment was viewed as "Attention everyone, fat wife in back seat." :lol:
 
My wife has a fear of flying and hieghts can't be explained. She will reluctantly fly in a wide body "white knuckles" but hates that. She has never and wll never flown with me. My three boys all like flying with me so they did not get that gene.

The only tip I can shre is the peanut butter jar. I have taken a few nervous friends flying and I took the jar along. They told me they felt better knowing it was there just in case, relaxed them. . Only one used it and turned out to be the perfect reseptacle. Wide mouth (can't miss) and good seal (contains odors well).

Good luck
 
****The problem with Bonine and the rest of those pills is they ruin the rest of the day.***

There's always pot - oh wait :goofy:
 
DaleB said:
She decide she'd go. Was still terrified right up until we did a lap around our house at 1000' AGL. She slowly got more comfortable
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My sister avoided flying for 15 years. I used to call weekly just to annoy her telling her I was heading out for fuel and did she want to go. One day she actually said yes, was nervous as all get out UNTIL we flew over her house and she stated videoing and taking pictures (must have done 40 360's as she wanted the dogs pictures too:lol:). She now flys several times a year and isn't afraid.

My wife was similar (terror wise) of GA flying, but she has come around as well. Her first flight was with my highschool buddy in a Luscombe ... because it wasn't her husband on the first flight, she relaxed immediately. They flew about 75 feet AGL over the pecan orchards. To this day, she still wants to fly LOW rather than HIGH

txflyer said:
People are weird.

My daughter is fine flying low enough to count the gopher's. Even after my lamenting that altitude is your friend.

And my wife is fine in the back seat, but about the front seat she says "there's too many buttons and stuff."

:dunno:
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My wife wants my son up front. She has only been upfront twice.
 
Dr. O said:
****The problem with Bonine and the rest of those pills is they ruin the rest of the day.***

There's always pot - oh wait :goofy:
Click to expand...

Yes there is, the oldest sea sick medicine known to man lol.:D
 
GMascelli said:
Drotto,

It's best not to nag them into submission, the family will either come around or not. Plan a trip with your Bride to one of her favorite places for lunch or dinner or a favorite shopping place. You're in NJ, maybe a beach run or hop across the river and do St. Michaels renting a car out of KESN. Be creative!

Thankfully my Bride will jump in the plane and head off to a new get-away in a heartbeat. She also refers to our plane as 'just another form of transportation'. On occasion she will do a lunch run to meet our flying friends but for the most part its all about travel. She loves the beach runs every weekend [KOXB] and often points and laughs at the ground pounders stuck in traffic on I95.
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My beloved wife was my 1st pax after getting my ticket. It was an overnight trip to KOXB. It was a night arrival. We stared out into the Atlantic on downwind after 2 or 3 missed approaches to another runway. After we got on the ground, she pointed out where to find parking, I was lost. We got locked in and had to figure out how to get out of the gate. The cab numbers in foreflight were wrong.

She loves me so much she actually flew back home with me:goofy:



Seriously, she's flown with me since.:rofl:
I love that woman!
 
My wife was the one who suggested that maybe it was time for me to learn to fly. She found out we could fly across the state in about 2 hours, as opposed to the 5 1/2 hour drive. She flies with me if we're going somewhere, but pattern work does nothing for her. OK. Then she decided that we had skipped too many flights across the state due to weather and said I needed to get my IR. I love that woman. 40 years and counting.

Now, I mentioned to my daughter that I was looking forward to taking my grandchildren flying when they were a bit older (she's expecting twins in July, we we're not talking about tomorrow) and she was not thrilled. She has flown with me once or twice, but says that small planes make her nervous. Something larger to Hawaii doesn't bother her a bit. We'll have to see how this goes in a few years.

Everyone is different. Do what you can.
 
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