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Flying Blind, Staying Cool
By Neil Peterson | November 9, 2008
Imagine you are flying an airplane at several thousand feet. Suddenly, you go blind – you can’t see the controls and you can’t see the ground below or the sky around you. Below is a countryside dotted with towns and villages, and people unaware of the dangerous situation directly above.
Well that is just what happened to Jim O’Neill, a 65 year old pilot. He suffered a stroke while flying his two-seater Cessna aircraft from Glasgow Prestwick Airport to Colchester, Essex. Suddenly he realized he was not able to see the controls. He was cruising at 5,500 feet at the time. Mr. O’Neill told the Daily Express in an interview afterward:
It was terrifying. Suddenly I could not see the dials in front of me. All there was in front of me was a blur. I was helpless at the controls.
At first he thought it was just the sun blinding him. Then he realized the stroke had blinded him. He quickly radioed a mayday distress call to air traffic control authorities who tried to assist him with a landing at a nearby civilian airport.
When he was unable to land, the air traffic controllers handed him over to the Royal Air Force (RAF) for assistance. RAF controllers sent a fighter to rendezvous with him and guide him to an RAF landing site at Linton-on-Ouse. The video report below details how the story unfolded.
Wing Commander Paul Gerrard, chief flying instructor, flew his Tucano T1 to within 150 feet of Mr. O’neill’s Cessna to bring him down by telling him to turn left and right, to lower the plane and to do his pre-landing checks. In a report filed by the BBC News, Wing Commander Andy Hynd, commanding officer in charge of the landing site, described the landing:
At very short range he still couldn’t see the runway and it was only at the last minute that he could. He landed about halfway down and came to a halt just at the end.
The RAF routinely practices shepherding but we are usually shepherding lost aircraft, we are not used to shepherding blind pilots, which is what makes this amazing.
It was a fantastic team effort from all those involved and we’re proud that we could get him to the ground safely.
Though distressed at his inability to see, Mr. O’Neill, with 18 years of flying experience, remained cool, staying focused on the guidance being given by his RAF escort. It took him four circuits of the landing field before he was ready to attempt touchdown. But his landing was relatively smooth, with only two bounces. Later, his son Douglas, 37, commented:
It’s a massive credit to his years of flying how he kept his cool, but also the RAF, in terms of how they were able to talk him down and land him safely.
As soon as he can get back into a plane, he will be back up there flying.
Such stories remind us of the value that discipline and focus can have in a time of crisis. A tip of the cap to Mr. O’Neill’s courage and tenacity in a tough situation.
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