Time for another story ladies, although not sure if you'll be cleaning computer screens after this one
I flew in a surveillance chopper one day around the Torres Straits. The pilot usually did the whole flight by himself, writing the report with his left hand while he was trying to keep the chopper in the air with his right hand. (not an easy task!) I told him he could fly, I would write and we’d get the job done in no time.
Seeing as I knew a lot of the trawlers and fishing boats by sight and I knew their rego's I’d tell him to fly past them all anchored up at the islands. I could rattle off 50 rego’s out of 100 boats anchored in one spot, so no need to stop and hover over them. Plus the lads on the boats worked all night, so day time was for sleeping and the last thing they wanted was a chopper hanging around making a racket. The guys tend to get a bit titchy when their sleep is interrupted – I had been threatened before when flying past one too many times trying to get rego’s or check out a strange boat.
Anyway the pilot didn’t listen. (he knew best...) We’re hovering, real close...barely 10 metres off the water and 20m from the back of the boat, I’m writing the report and also asking him "please lets go, we’re going to annoy someone in a minute."
All of a sudden over the UHF comes “**** chopper, get the **** away ****before **** I ***** shoot ***** you”!
Lo and behold there’s a big hairy peeved dude in his undies on the deck of the trawler we’re hanging around with a shotgun in his hands. I could see the whites of his eyes we're that close
Hence - we're making a whole lot of noise the guys really don't need to hear!
“oh gosh” says the pilot “I think he’s a bit cross, time for us to go”
I gave the pilot the evil eye and got on the radio to apologise profusely to the bloke on the trawler, saying that this pilot was new and didn’t know all the rules yet. Would he please not shoot! Calmed the chap down somewhat and we had a good old chat about planes and choppers and how much noise we make and I told him that I would put the word out to not get so close next time. I finished the chat on a good note, the skipper was happy, I had made a friend in the trawler group – all good.
The pilot however, was not happy.
I got a serious “talking to” about how he was not new, he had X amount of hours flying choppers blah blah blah. And he was taking this higher. “Go right ahead mate, you have a lot to learn yet” was my reply!
So he took it higher, I stood my ground (I’d had a few more hours flying in the straits than he did at that stage and knew a whole lot more about it than what he did) and explained to the boss man what the go was and what happened. Boss man agreed with me, had a quiet word with the pilot and all was good.
Sort of.
I had to fly with that pilot again another time and figured I better sweeten the deal with some nice morning tea, so I took cake and coffee and all the trimmings next time we were flying. We landed on a little island, had a lovely cuppa and cake, a good old chat about the ins and outs of flying in the Straits. It worked, he listened and learned and I don't think anyone was ever threatened by a big trawler dude in his undies with a shotgun again!
