Just get us down

The great thing about living one mile away from one of, if not the highest located regional airports, is that on days like today when the cloud level is down to a few hundred feet you can hear the aircraft above your head circling around looking for the runway lights.

I've just been out in the garden to get my tools from the shed and in the few minutes that I was out there I could hear three seperate big jets passing slowly overhead, not landing, just moving around up there somewhere in the cloud.

And you just know that on board each of those aircraft are a hundred or so passengers all clinging hold of their seat arms, gazing out of the window and thinking "I should be able to see the ground by now", and there's at least a few of them starting to scream "Just get us down for gods sake".

There are several flight attendants smiling at the passengers in that way that says "Frightened ? Who's frightened ? This is all very normal, please climb down from the overhaead lockers sir and take your seat for landing so that I can go and get one of those rear facing seats at the front, the ones that are statistically much safer in a crash landing"

And on the flight deck there is a young first officer who has never done this outside of a Microsoft Simulator game who is staring out of the window so hard that his eyes hurt and his intestines have twisted themselves up into so many knots that he won't be able to shit for three days.

And next to him is his Captain who is not looking out of the window at all but is gazing at his gauges and silently chanting "trust the instruments, trust the instruments, trust the fooking instruments"...

"Can you see anything yet First Officer"
"No sIr, wait a minute....... errr. no sir.............wait a minute...................er, no sir.................wait a minute.........."
"Calm down First Officer, this is all very normal, we've done this many time before on the Microsoft Flight Simulator game, err, Easyjet very expensive simulator rig"
"Yes sir, wait a minute...................I can see something........... er, no sir.................wait a minute.........."
"Now sit back and stay calm First Officer, the instruments will not let us down, and they are currently saying what ? Read the instruments First Officer, what do they tell us ?"
"Er, they are telling us that we are five miles out, three thousand feet up and on the correct approach line sir, wait a minute, whats that, oh nothing.............wait a minute........"
"Yes thats correct, we are on the perfect glide slope First Officer, this aircraft will land itself even if we can't see the lights, but we are still five miles out, understand"
"Yes sir, wait a minute...........no, carry on"
"What was that bump First Officer, are we down ? Reverse thrust please, told you it would be a doddle"
"Yes sir, reverse thurst, are you sure sir, the instruments say we're still five miles out sir"
"Yes First Officer, reverse thrust please, before we hit those trees at the end of the runway please. Fooking instruments"