Service Ceiling

[Cynic_Al]

The following I affirm to be an entirely factual aviation-related account.

Throughout secondary school one of my main acquaintances to whom I shall apply the pseudonym 'Dave', shared with me an interest in aviation, and it was at school one fateful day that he spotted a recruitment poster on one of the noticeboards.  I have to say that at first glance this poster's design conveyed to me very little, but Dave appeared to have seen something in it.  The poster was created by a well-known airline, whose identity in the light of what follows cannot be disguised.  To summarise what happened next, Dave applied successfully for a position of apprentice aircraft mechanic, and disdaining what I considered to be far more illustrious options, embarked upon his new occupation.

Following his first year of basic training, Dave transferred to 'the base' where he was actually exposed to aircraft.  He would regale me with how wonderful he thought it all was, never missing an opportunity to suggest that I might want to follow the same path.  In time, his youthful enthusiasm and eagerness to showcase his developing career, prompted him to organise a visit to the base for a small group of us, to include his father and one other person.

So it came to pass that on the allotted date we arrived, had our passes issued at the gate and started our tour of the airline's hangars.  This happened over forty years ago and all I recall clearly was being allowed on-board two of the period's significant passenger aircraft.  Appreciating the sheer size of the 747 up-close is not something one forgets, nor is being allowed to go on-board and into the cockpit.  That said, there was the feeling that although we had permission, our presence may have been making some people somewhat jumpy, particularly when someone came into the cockpit and warned us not to touch anything as it could result in killing someone.  Without going into detail, I've always regretted not receiving that warning about thirty seconds earlier.

On to another hangar in which we were allowed to board a different aircraft, that which at the time we still believed to be the future of aviation: Concorde. The contrast in size with the 747 was striking, particularly the narrowness of the supersonic airliner's fuselage.  In the cockpit I took the co-pilot's seat and Dave's dad sat in the captain's.  I'm not sure why, perhaps due to feeling cramped, I had an audacious desire to move the seat backwards, only to discover that it abutted the engineers panel behind it, so it wasn't going anywhere.  I felt sure any foreign plane would not have been designed that way.  We were just casually talking among ourselves when suddenly there was a loud beeping sound followed by all the instruments simultaneously lighting-up in orange, as I recall.  I think probably we all thought we'd accidentally touched something, but it turned out that somewhere behind me, one of the technicians had operated a circuit breaker to energise the cockpit for our benefit.  We were all pretty stunned by the result, not least Dave's dad who thought we were about to take-off.  He was not the technical type.

I don't remember any other details of the visit, but I think it was a few months later Dave suggested that he and I should go again; however I rejected the idea, explaining how I'd felt that we as visitors really should not have been there, and it never happened.

As time passed, it transpired that while Dave was content with his apprenticeship as a mechanic, he made no secret that he was harbouring ideas of becoming a pilot, which as a concept did not sit easily with me.  When one effectively grows-up with someone, one becomes aware of their characteristics, virtues and shortcomings, and Dave did not and has never struck me as the right sort to occupy a cockpit in any capacity, but at the time I saw no need to discourage him.

The airline for which Dave worked had a flying club offering PPL courses, and in pursuit of his ambitions he joined. For a slightly higher subscription, non-employees were offered associate memberships, so out of curiosity I went along for the ride and took a few lessons myself, although logistics and other circumstances made it impractical to complete the course.  Dave did many more hours than I, but for reasons I don't recall, did not complete either.   

Moving-on to our mid twenties, I'm still in periodic contact with Dave and he's still a mechanic with lofty ambitions.  Whenever the subject of flying came up, he'd repeat the mantra: 'There's no point in doing the PPL because once you have it, you can't do anything with it'.  Despite this, it was not long before he decided to take it up again.  He would tell me how much it was all costing him and how in order to avoid using his savings, he had had to take out a bank loan, which had turned out to be insufficient.  If you have trouble following that logic, you're not alone.  Around the same time he had started hanging-out at the local aerodrome, attempting to ingratiate himself with aircraft owners;  I never asked him what backstory he was using, but surprisingly he did seem to pull it off.  For example he would say "I've met this guy who owns a Tiger Moth and a Chipmunk.  I'm going to get him to take me up in one of them.", which in due course he succeeded in doing.
Eventually Dave managed to complete his PPL course and finally gained his licence, for which understandably perhaps he wanted validation from someone.  Consequently he came round to tell me about it;  the trouble was he just could not bring himself to say it.  I should say that at this point, for unrelated reasons I had stopped calling on Dave.  After a couple of hours of strained conversation, Dave finally left and I went on with my business, not expecting to see him for at least a week if not much longer.  It came as quite a surprise therefore to see him back at the door the same day, just a few hours later.  In all the years I had known him, he had never come back the same day and neither had I when visiting him, but instead of asking the reason for his return, I admitted him silently, presuming he may have had something important to impart.

This second conversation followed a similar pattern to the first, myself struggling to think of topics to discuss with someone from whom I was endeavouring to create distance.  In time I managed to bring things to a close, but instead of just saying goodbye at the door, not unusually I chose to see Dave out to his car.  We were just stood around on the pavement in idle conversation, when finally Dave managed to summon whatever it was that had eluded him hitherto. "I got my PPL on Thursday" he squeezed-out mechanically, to which I made some non-committal reply that I don't recall.  I have often wondered what he would have done had I not gone outside with him.  Of course I was laughing to myself because it explained immediately not only the reason for his return visit, but more-revealingly his current state of mind, which I would not have cared to associate with any kind of pilot.

Fast-forward to our early forties and I had long-ago it made clear to Dave that I disassociated myself from him.  The Internet was now upon us, so to exploit the social media of the day, I posed as an emigrated classmate of ours;  let's call him 'Dick'.  My aim was to entice Dave without provocation into making bogus allegations about me, and the ploy was as successful as expected.  However what came as a complete shock to me was that Dave was still actively attempting to become an airline pilot.  What practical training he may have been under did not transpire, but he mentioned studying to take ATPL exams.  I could not believe that he still had not taken the hint, and consequently in my view still presented a potential danger to the public.  
It was easy to imagine the psychological effect upon him of constantly coming into contact with pilots, on each occasion thinking to himself "That should be me".  The adverse effect on his work that such thoughts may have had, was nothing short of horrifying.
In my guise of Dick, I pretended that I had passed-on what Dave had said about me and that I was now pasting my reply, the content of which reflected my views above.  Dave's reaction was along the lines of  "Just what I expected him to say. You know us both Dick, so I'll leave it to you to decide who's lying."  Clearly the only person with whom Dave was really communicating, already knew the answer.

Commercial aviation can be a volatile industry with airlines collapsing all the time;  for that reason I was not entirely surprised at the circumstances surrounding the next occasion I came upon Dave, some five years later.  I had reason to be present in a certain North London shopping mall, a place that normally holds no attraction for me, and had been loitering therein for a couple of hours when it occurred to me that I had not met anyone I knew, which for this place was quite unusual.  While walking through the halls, I had noticed a few people wearing a discreet type of uniform that I did not recognise;  I could not tell if they were connected to one of the stores, or just worked in the common areas.  It was as I contemplated leaving the centre that I noted someone wearing this uniform, as he stood against one of the balcony rails.  I'm not sure that he would have been recognisable to anyone not knowing him as well as I, particularly as for whatever reason he was completely bald at the time.  I don't think I was noticed, but the look on his face for me conveyed nothing less than sheer despair.  Had I been tasked with captioning his expression, it could only have been "I'm not actually here."

In time it seems Dave did gain another position as an aircraft mechanic.  From what I can discern via the Internet, he is or was recently with a southern hemisphere airline, still toiling as a grease monkey and likely to end his working days wearing overalls.  Although I never considered Dave to be pilot material, I have always dreaded that some unthinkable sequence of events would allow him to slip through the net and gain a flying job with some desperate outfit.  However, with our seventh decade looming on the horizon, I'm now quite sure that the danger, if ever it truly existed, has now long passed.  

So why have I chosen to tell this tale?  At some time most of us have ambitions, but these need to be tempered with resignation to one's own limitations.  While it is always a mistake to underestimate oneself, there always will be inherent dangers in doing the opposite.