Guy Dies In A "Hard Landing" And I Think We Need To Talk About What Constitutes A Hard Landing
(CNN) A hot air balloon with 20 people crashed Friday in Egypt's ancient city of Luxor, killing at least one person and injuring more than a dozen others, according to Egypt's Civil Aviation Authority and a hot air balloon company.
At least one tourist was killed, according to a statement from the government agency, which referred to the incident as a hard landing.
Full story here.
I guess the point of this blog is to clarify the difference between a “hard landing”, and a “crash”
Let’s say that you come down in a hot air balloon and a sudden gust of wind makes you hit the ground a little harder than expected, and some folks get scratched up enough that they have to go get checked out at a hospital; that my friends, is a hard landing. Alright, new scenario: let’s say, in any mode of transportation, somebody dies; that’s a crash. That’s it. It’s not complicated. It’s apples and oranges. I don’t plop oranges in a pressure cooker to make orange-sauce and people don’t die in hard landings!
Here’s a conversation you should never hear:
Bartender: How was your flight today?
Pilot: Eh it was alright.
Bartender: Oh yeah? What happened?
Pilot: Ah not much, someone died.
Just can’t go together. Someone dying immediately demands a different description. You wouldn’t kill someone in a car accident and call it a fender bender! You wouldn't chop up your hand in a blender and say you cut your finger! A hard landing is when you get the wind knocked out of you, and a crash is anything more serious than that. This is the lamest attempt to downplay a situation of all time.
You botched the landing, dude! Wind or not, you’re a pilot and you fucked up! You crashed! You know the whole rough landing thing? I totally bought it until the dead guy! Semantics my ass! We want the truth!
