Scare In Air

An Air Asia plane went missing, making the year 2014 one of the worst ever in the history of civil aviation. So far it looks like bad weather. The pilot reported severe thunderstorms and wanted to fly at a higher altitude. No other communication came from him ever since. Thunderstorms which can pour half a feet of rain in barely couple of hours with massive cloud vortex up to 50000 feet were located in that area. If the flight entered into it chances are the mother nature swallowed it and is likely to excrete the debris in future.

 

Once in July, 2007 at the peak of monsoon season moments before landing at Bhubaneswar dark clouds started engulfing the plane. The Alliance Aircraft ( a subsidiary of Air India) encountered severe turbulence as it was pelted with powerfully packed tropical air currents. Inside wafted in a calm female voice MAUSAM KHARAB HONE KE KARAN AAP KURSI KI PETI BANDH LIJIYE (because of bad weather please fasten your seat belts). The plane shook vigorously, shaking my confidence to the hilt. For a moment I thought the overhead baggage compartment will break open, spilling the bags on the hapless passengers. The shaky roller coaster ride which lasted a few minutes seemed like eternity. It was enough for the agnostic in me to suddenly turn into a believer. I closed my eyes and started remembering all our 33 crore Gods and Goddesses, whom I had conveniently ignored for long.

 

Finally the ordeal was over as the flight touched the ground in the middle of pouring, torrential rain. Passengers rejoiced by whistling and clapping. Soon I could hear murmurs of HEY PRABHU (O Lord), JAI JAGANNATH from the passengers repeatedly touching their forehead with folded hands. As the flight came to complete halt, I was back to my normal self and my belief in agnosticism. It was so selfish of me. Thankfully winter flights are a lot better in the northern hemisphere. One rarely gets any turbulence beyond the turbulent zone which mostly stays south of the tropic of cancer.