Welcome!

There's so many good commercial aviation blogs out there - mostly from the States and Canada. But none that I can see from this little island in Northern Europe. With the demise of a great blog by a BA Skipper that many I am sure followed (including me), I've decided to take on the challenge!

I hope you enjoy the commentary on all matters of civil aviation from my vantage point in the left hand seat of Virgin Atlantic's Airbuses!





Wednesday, September 29, 2010

It's not easy being in the press - ask Peter Burkill.


When you're in the limelight and not an "A" List Personality or even a "Z" List minor celeb, it's not easy.

Back in 1997 when the instant news phenomenon was either in its infancy and practically non-existent, G-VSKY under the command of our very own Tim Barnby brought his A340-300 to a perfect landing in the circumstances at Heathrow. He was given his 15 minutes of fame, time on Richard's pad on Necker with the rest of his crew and it was all pretty tasteful.

There's been a few - the famous Air Transat glide by Robert Piché and his FO  onto the Azores, good old Sully in the Hudson - both of whom did ok out of the PR. Certainly, the good old American hero made a fat wad of cash after losing both motors out of La Guardia.

And finally, there's some justice in the skies for Peter Burkill the Skipper of the BA 38 which limped home after losing all power on short finals over Hounslow. Turns out both he and his flight deck crew did everything right. And thank God for that.

I don't know Peter personally, but every professional aviator I've spoken with was disgusted at his treatement in the press, the treatment dealt out by British Airways after using him in their press damage limitation campaign and the well-known whispering campaign rumour mongering based on nothing but green eyed jealousy.

And finally, justice. After him losing his home in Worcester - no interviews with other operators because of an "incident" on his record - an incident of which the UK AIIB completely admonishes both him and his two flight deck colleagues, he is re-joining BA as a skipper on the Boeing 777.

So, Peter, everyone here at Virgin is  very very pleased with that news - and I am sure you are delighted to be back at BA and soon back in the skies.

Maybe see you on layover somewhere down route and we'll buy you a beer.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

"And finally, justice. After him losing his home in Worcester - no interviews with other operators because of an "incident" on his record - an incident of which the UK AIIB completely admonishes both him and his two flight deck colleagues, he is re-joining BA as a skipper on the Boeing 777."

I hope you mean "absolves" instead of "admonishes".