For Your Comfort and Safety

27 Feb, 2005 | TravelTdp

My parents are recently back from a trip to New Zealand, part of which was a couple of flights over various Lord of the Rings locations (it was a competition win). These were done in little four-seater planes. My dad was telling me about them:

Dad: He gave us a safety briefing before we took off.

Me: Oh yeah.

D: Yeah, he said if you see another aircraft, let me know.

M: Extensive then, and very reassuring.

D: He also pointed out that, in an emergency, the first-aid kit was under his seat and the fire extinguisher was under the co-pilot’s seat.

M: Oh-Kay.

Now, I was having trouble figuring out exactly when you step from a normal situation, to one that requires either the first aid kit or fire extinguisher without jumping straight to the Oh shit, we’re all gonna die stage, especially in an aircraft with only four seats.

They also got to wear life jackets for the duration of at least one of their flights as they were travelling over water and were told: it’s not a legal requirement, we just like to do it. And were accompanied by such immortal lines as: I’m just going to drop out of this cloud so I can see where I’m going (while at 8,000 ft surrounded by mountains up to 10,000 ft). And I thought my bungie jump was scary.