Pilots Eye View

**KevinT** · 16-10-2005, 02:55

The captain on our Excel flight on Sept 29th took videos of the takeoff from Newcastle and the landing at Sanford and emailed them to me (and many others who gave him their email addresses). After being somewhat uncharitable towards Excel on these forums I have to say that on this occasion their flight crew have to be congratulated on a nice bit of customer service.

For those interested in seeing them, John has kindly created links:

http://www.villatools.com/avatars/ne...edeparture.wmv
http://www.villatools.com/avatars/sa...alapproach.wmv

Hope you enjoy the clips.

**ellie** · 16-10-2005, 03:26

Wow, that is brilliant, Kevin. [clap]

I was once totally petrified of flying, but through taking our children on flights and not wanting to ruin their future travel by passing on my fears, I now love it. My dream would be to be able to sit in the cockpit for landing or take-off, but sadly that is not likely to happen!

We flew with Airtours a few years ago and they have cameras too - it was fascinating to watch the take-off and landing.

Glad to hear Excel came up trumps. Recent guests said they had a great flight with them, so it can't be all bad, thank goodness.

**walden64** · 16-10-2005, 12:18

Kevin they are fantastic.

Must remember to show the children these when they get back from football[msnsmile2]

Michelle

**domster** · 16-10-2005, 13:22

Great Kevin. How did you manage to get the camera in?

16-10-2005, 13:31

Kevin they are great[clap][clap][clap]

The flight crew sound American?

I have so much footage like this this, I could watch it for hours[msnwink]

**emm** · 16-10-2005, 14:34

Excellent Kevin, particularly the landing at Sanford. I was waiting for the bump as the wheels touch down!!

**KevinT** · 16-10-2005, 14:46

Dom,
I was sitting on the front wheel of course ![msnwink]

Julie,
We've had an American/Canadian? captain twice now out of four Excel trips. Not sure whether its he same guy but he's a good pilot - nice smooth touchdowns. He seems to have a quirky sense of humour. On the flight out of Newcastle he asked everyone to keep the plane as clean as possible
for two reasons:
1."To give the Sanford cleaners a fast turnround time" and 2. "Because it's MY plane - not yours !"
Everybody looked at each other and said "Did I just hear that right?"

Glad you liked the clips. I've often wanted to see the takeoff or landing from the flight deck.
Many thanks to John for converting the video file so it could be accessed.[clap]

**lgordon6041** · 16-10-2005, 16:06

Good video. It is always nice to see things like takeoff and landing from the pilots perspective, makes your flight that bit more interesting.

Also well done to Excel on the willingness to make the video, good customer service that's for sure!

**LiesaAnna** · 16-10-2005, 17:11

welcome back Kevin, did you have a good time??
didnt see you at sanford tho!! did you see me on the stretcher???

great clips!! we too had excel and they were brilliant as was the plane and flight everything , could not find fault with anything on our way there, but coming back, sanford was a different matter, everything was garbled over the microphone, everyone rushing to board instead of being called rows by rows!!

would go again if i had to but only cos the plane was a 767 on way home and was soooooo cramped even tho it was leather seats etc, but there were many travelling with TCD and groups of 14 and more, very noisey!! all through the night!!! didnt have that with virgin!!
our plane is meant to be for canary isles not 8 hour flights!!