Do you get a sensitive stomach in turbulent weather when flying? Do you wonder whether you eat lunch before takeoff when the weather may be questionable? There's a web site   that offers free turbulence forecasts for airline passengers.  I have not flown with it yet but I'll let you know when I do so.  Link was broken, now fixed. 

One of my problems with flying these days is that I'm old enough to know it doesn't have  to be the largely awful experience that it is. That said, it is extremely safe and that is a major accomplishment. 

Captain Shults is the pilot for Southwest Airlines that calmly landed her craft in Philadelphia after an explosive decompression on a flight from NYC to Dallas. Unfortunately, she has had to withstand a considerable amount of sexual discrimination . There is one issue with the linked article: the description of "smoke" accompanying the explosive decompression is incorrect. It was actually cloud or, if you prefer, fog. At the bottom of the article is the audio of the flight. It is stunning: Captain Shults really does have "The Right Stuff." I'm really looking forward to reading her book.

I just finished a magical week in all aspects except one: Delta Air Lines. You'll recall (per my Tweets) that I decided to give Delta another try after a five-year absence. That five-year absence was due to several consecutive bad experiences. Because of the extremely special occasion, I went ahead and purchased first class tickets for Kathleen and me. They were $200 extra. One of the reasons was because our flight left at 11:10am (arrived in Atlanta at 2:20pm) and it said they served "lunch" in first class. Here's how it worked out: Dirty, sticky tray table. It required both wet napkins and a wet wipe to clean. It is amazing that Delta expects its customers to clean its tray tables.  Broken seat. My seat kept 'reclining' even though I didn't want it to.  Sat on the tarmac in ATL for 45 minutes even though the weather was fine throughout the region. Mis-installed seat belt. I rang the flight attendant call button: no response. I flagged down ...

likely said the crew of the idiots who flew across the severe thunderstorm complex in northern Oklahoma yesterday evening Friday morning. I wouldn't want to have had that conversation with the company's chief pilot. Amazing how every other pilot figured out that flying through it would be a very bad idea.  This is yet another case of what I call aeronautical malpractice . Addition, Friday, Sept. 6:  I received some pushback on this post by a person in Washington, DC, who said there likely wasn't turbulence in this area. The above is the spectrum width data from the WSR-88D located at Twin Lakes, Oklahoma. Higher values of spectrum width are associated with turbulence (something I have, unfortunately, personally experienced). Orange is moderate to severe turbulence and reds are severe or even extreme turbulence. The plane is flying in a dangerous location. 

A slice of flying these days. Every one of these things has occurred to me except the tripping of the drunk guy. Addition: My brother and sister-in-law were on my our least favorite airline, United, coming back from Europe yesterday. Their flight was 1.5 hr. late leaving Brussells, which caused them to miss their connection in Newark. So, they were sent to Denver (overflying their destination of Kansas City). Of course, since it was United, the plane they would take from Denver to KC was 2.5 hours late coming from California to Denver. So, they arrived in KC at 2:37am, which was 3 hours and 15 minutes late. And, of course, United lost their bags.