What stupid stuff have you done?

Power washing a hangar floor (one of the stupid "busy work" jobs we get stuck with:() When the thing sputters and dies. Instead of checking to see if it had gas (I didn't even know what they put in it, either 100LL or Jet) I decide to go ahead and yank it to restart. I look for a place to grab it to keep it from rolling all over while I'm trying to start. Turns out the exhaust manifold isn't a good place to set your palm on. :rolleyes: Gotta love how "HOT" is every bit of size 12 font carved in in the same color as the exhaust. I had "CHAUD!" branded into my hand and ended up going to the emergency room since it was a second degree burn. Pretty much healed up a week later. The little hand symbol with the X over it (as in don't touch this, jackass) was branded in there too. I kinda wish that was permanent, it's kinda funny.:D
Then the other night I got done topping off the Jet A truck and got back in feeling like I was forgetting something. Yeah... the hose was still connected. Not really a big deal since the truck would die when I tried to put it in gear if I didn't catch it.
Then there was cleaning the coffee pots and dropping one. Thing shattered into a million pieces all over the lobby and was loud as hell. :laff:
Fortunately my brilliance hasn't broken anything important/expensive yet. I think my paranoia pays off in that regard.
And there was the night that I heard the tail end of someone on ground saying they were taxiing to our FBO. I look out and see a Cessna sitting on the taxiway so figuring they can't find us, I run out there with the lightsticks and start directing them in. They taxi by and it's the flight school next door's 150. Felt like a real tard on that one.
 
I was always in the "don't do something unless you're sure or are acting under the authority of someone higher up than you" camp, so I stayed out of trouble for the most part. But:
- I've filled a 402's aux tanks instead of the mains. Not a big deal, but the pilot wasn't thrilled that I gave him more work to do in flight :D
- I've also taken one or two Jet A showers.
- I've fueled the wrong Northwest plane. Someone caught it long before the intended plane went to takeoff, but they weren't too pleased either, since they now had to do a new load manifest for the one I DID fill.
- My boss wasn't pleased with me once when I sold fuel to a guy who was already about $25,000 in debt to him.

I've also seen/heard a few things...

- FedEx wanted us to refuel their GPU, while it was running. Some engineer needs to be fired for this, but the refuel port is located directly above the exhaust (incidentally, this thing runs really hot), and you can't see into the tank when refueling. Well, as my supervisor is fueling this thing, it of course backs up, throwing copius amounts of fuel out, and in response, my sup decides to pull out the hose without letting go of the handle immediatly. Backed-up fuel + fuel from hose + really effin hot exhast = big fire!
- Apparently someone at the airport I currently work out ended up filling a Duke with Jet A. The pilot aborted the subsequent takeoff, had it checked out, couldn't find anything wrong, and then crashed on the next takeoff. The pilot lived, thankfully.
- Pulling a 172 too quickly on the access road into a strong wind, apparently the plane became airborne and was flying like a kite on the tug. It ended up winging over and busting up the wing.
- Mother nature can also play tricks. I saw pictures from this one, apparently during a severe thunderstorm, the winds from the storm caused a hanger door to open, sucked out and trashed the plane that was inside, and then closed the hanger door. Afterwards, the hanger looked normal, but the plane was at the end of the hanger row in pieces.
- A friend was working line, and tryin to stack planes too quickly one night, ended up jackknifing the tow bar while heading to a plane, and flipped the tug. He still hasn't lived that one down :)

Oh, and one thing on the nose gear pins...aren't those thing designed to shear off if you exceed the nose limits anyways? We kept a bunch in the drawer of our desk to replace them should they break. I never had to do it, but as far as I know, their cheap and easy to replace.
 
ChasenSFO said:
I'll keep that in mind during our next round of IROPS when the rampers have too much time on their hands.

Tell them about your boss's trip to Petco, Jordan.
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Christ, don't even get me started about that situation. I don't want them somehow seeing this post though. I had some guy get pissed off at me for taking too long to clean the PC-12 lav today. Turns out the guy who taught me how didn't teach me right, so I had to scramble around trying to find everything. They were in a rush to go on a 4 mile flight so the plane could sit in MX for 2 weeks. The guy that got pissed wasn't even one of the pilots, he was just going for a ride. :rolleyes:
 
One thing I learned from being in line service was that you should always be nice to the kid cleaning out your lav. Line service doesn't pay enough to put up with pilot prima-donna BS, especially not when you are handling said pilot's shiat.
 
On my second day we were fueling a King Air, and the caps were really tight. So the guy I was with told me to use a key - there is never a screwdriver in the cab. I used my car key. It bent in half. I was stuck there until someone picked me up and I got a spare key the next day. :banghead:

Like everyone else, I had my MU-2 incident. I went to fuel the mains but forgot the order, so I loosely replaced the cap, climbed down the ladder, laid it on the ground and went to the hangar to ask the owner what they wanted. I came back, picked up the ladder and went to the other fuel cap :rolleyes:. At this point the owner was there. The fountain of fuel shooting out of the first fuel port made a lake that reached the bottom of my ladder. I slipped when I got off the ladder.

One time I left an empty sump bucket in the shade under the 100LL truck. A few minutes later my coworker brought me a nearly flat plate that became of the situation.

In my first two weeks, a guy that was hired the same day as me was pulling a Beechjet 400 out of the hangar and forgot to pull the chocks. He hopped off the tug without pulling the parking brake and ripped the rear chock away from the wheels. The plane slammed into the back wall of the hangar and bent the tail into a mess. the plane was down for 2 months. The wingwalkers said it all happened too fast.

This one hurts for me to think about. The same guy was on a Mule tug and was riding shotgun. He was skipping his feet along on the side of the tug and the driver turned right sharply. His foot got crushed under the tug. I never saw any of it, but he was done after that. I never saw him again.
 
My favorite was one time the guy who works the night shift by himself (and has for years and years) came up with this nifty trick for one of the big hangars with electric doors. Before everybody else left for the day, he was to go around securing all the hangars. The preferred method is to go into the hangar and close the big doors...from the inside. Then, exit through a little side door and lock it. Walk all the way back around the hangar to go back to the FBO. Well to minimize walking, this guy decided his arms were long enough to grab the lever with 1 finger on the electric door motor, stand on the outside of the door and when it gets close to closing, jerk your arm out of the way last minute, time it right and it'll coast the 3"s or whatever you need to be closed enough. Well he didn't get the timing right once. I used to go to the corporate hangars and drink beer after hours in high school with the pilots and MX, so entering through the FBO gate with a key FOB (ah, the good ole days, before anyone knew what a $500 "failure to ensure the gate is closed" fine was) and simply drive to the corporate hangars. Well, I saw this guy bent over with his arm in the huge doors and said, "russ, you ok?" He was and told me what he did, after i got done laughing my ass off, i went to get some keys from the FBO and freed him. Needless to say, he still does it.

Not to say I did, but I had some friends that would tee golf balls up in the rubber in the cracks between the concrete slabs out on the ramp and play golf at night (again, only pre-9/11). Somebody would always wind up getting drunk and driving the tug down the runway to try to impress a chick. That all ended one night when we determined we were out of sober enough drivers and slept in a Falcon 20 at one of the corporate hangars where one of my friends worked on their line, more or less. We woke up early Sunday morning with the corporations director or flight operations or whatever standing at the top of the air stairs telling us to get the ef out. Apparently he forgot some keys or something. It sucked when that ended, great source of premeasured amounts of alcohol. Pre-9/11, under 18 YOA days were the best.

The stupidest thing anyone ever did was one night after a few airline sized whiskey bottles from the corporate hangar, we took a tug down to the FBO to harrass Russ. While sitting there, I came to the conclusion if you kept your downwind leg measured just right, you could justify flying over the high school foot ball stadium that night were the game was going on and have a nice view. Well, one of the line guys was there, heard this, and after I left he and a couple chicks jumped into the FBOs "borrowed" 172 and made a downwind pass of the football stadium a little lower than justifiable (as in he was about the same level as the stadium lights). Again, pre-9/11, so everybody thought it was cool...except the • manager of the FBO. He just so happened to go to his first high school football game in probably 20 years because his niece was a batton twirler or some crap. Well, after seeing a 172 with a "familiar" N#, he called the police and high-tailed it to the FBO. Dude got fired and had a series of "meetings" with the FSDO the next week. Don't think he got his license pulled. He was lucky: pre-9/11 and only 17.

The most costly screw up I saw back then was when a new guy forgot to take the tug out of gear and put on the break, etc. He backed a brand new Mooney into a hanger, hopped off the tug, and watched it get pile drived into the back of the hangar, totalling the plane. After that, 2 guys per tug at all times, amongst other changes.
 
badasscrustacean said:
This picture was from a year ago, but it still makes me laugh.

I was walking to my car after an uneventful day of instructing and saw the nose of a jet past the top of a building. As I turned the corner, I couldn't help but laugh as I pieced together what had happened. Out of the shot is a fuel truck with a broken window and the kid sitting next to the Citation is crying...

Insurance claim? :rolleyes:
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That airplane just has bad luck, it puked an engine idling on the ramp at SJC 5 or so years ago. Does it still have the "pot leaf" on the tail? ;)

Another "small world" moment... we used to get a G-V in all the time and then it was scheduled in one day and never showed up... months later I found out that it had fallen THROUGH the ramp somewhere else... the airport was near a river and the river had undermined the concrete and when they parked the airplane on it it fell through, there's photos of it somewhere.
 
This one happened to my brother. He was driving a fuel truck with a subsequently faulty door. Anyway, he took a corner, the door flew open, and he ended up tucking and rolling while the truck kept going. One of the other line guys had to jump in the truck and apply the brake before it crashed into a hangar. He actually ended up going to the hospital with cuts, bruises, and an injured back. Funny as it sounds, it is quite a drop to the tarmac and at moving speeds it messed him up pretty good.

*Edit: Was just talking to my brother about posting his story on here, apparently it was a company pickup he was driving on the ramp when he fell out, and one of the line guys had to jump in a stop it before it crashed into a parked fuel truck. I guess the fuel trucks have an auto-stop mechanism that locks the brakes when the door opens, which is a very good idea IMO.
 
LatitudeDancer said:
The stupidest thing anyone ever did was one night after a few airline sized whiskey bottles from the corporate hangar, we took a tug down to the FBO to harrass Russ. While sitting there, I came to the conclusion if you kept your downwind leg measured just right, you could justify flying over the high school foot ball stadium that night were the game was going on and have a nice view. Well, one of the line guys was there, heard this, and after I left he and a couple chicks jumped into the FBOs "borrowed" 172 and made a downwind pass of the football stadium a little lower than justifiable (as in he was about the same level as the stadium lights). Again, pre-9/11, so everybody thought it was cool...except the • manager of the FBO. He just so happened to go to his first high school football game in probably 20 years because his niece was a batton twirler or some crap. Well, after seeing a 172 with a "familiar" N#, he called the police and high-tailed it to the FBO. Dude got fired and had a series of "meetings" with the FSDO the next week. Don't think he got his license pulled. He was lucky: pre-9/11 and only 17.
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Wasnt this on the news? I remember this story.
 
I have not done anything major, Only time I have messed up a airplane is when I hit a bird on approach and it messed up the wing pretty good.

Back in my high school dayz, we would have parties in one of the hangars, tons of alcohol and one night a city cop was on patrol throughout the airfield and saw us. I walked up to him since I know him and he got out and join us for a bit. I have never waken up in the pit of a G-III before.

Dayof the superbowl, some of the actors (Chris Rock, Adam Sandler, and Rob Schnieder) all kept their luggage in our hanger since their will be some one in there. During the game since no one could fly cause of TFR, I took Adams golf driver and start hit golfballs out into the airfield, ATC didnt care, they laughed and watched.

I have witnessed some things around the airfield I currently work at.

Mail tug driving behind a 737 during a engine test at the gate, I bet someone did not get their mail.

Port Authority's ops agent hat got ingested into an engine of a 767 while walking by.

Southwest pushes back into a arriving US air.

Belt loader went under a E-135 and left a nice gash on the bottom.

and many many more.
 
The other day I gave a captain a load sheet that I scribbled something out on then forgot to finish filling out.
"Here's your load sheet"
*points at chicken scratch"
"Umm... What's this?"
Felt like a real tard. ;)
 
One time a midget came up to the counter and started talking to me. He was so tiny I couldn't see him over the counter, so I started looking all around, pulled out my phone, checked if I inadvertently answered the phone on speaker, then finally stepped away from the counter. The midget at this point was offended. I apologized and he asked for the exit row. It was full, but why the hell would he need the legroom? Can he even lift a door that weighs half as much as him? When I pulled his ticket he told me to buy glasses. I REALLY had to stop myself from punting him out to his plane.

Ramp involved? No. But those of us above wing do stupid things too.
 
Tried taxiing an Arrow out once with one of the wing tiedowns still attached. Airplane starts moving, jerks to a stop. Instructor looks at me with a knowing "what was that" look. Probably the reddest I've turned in an airplane.
 
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