Interesting Passengers

Most of the time when I take passengers it includes any number of kids, most of them not well behaved. Good parenting doesn't seem to be a high priority on native reserves. A couple days ago there was a particularly poorly behaved child on board, who was probably around 4 years old. Most of the time I've found with young kids, even the scared and crying ones, a couple minutes after we take off they end up passed right out, and don't wake up until the wheels start rolling again. This time I wasn't that lucky. The kid was probably big enough to have a seat on his own but for fear of him misbehaving and opening a door or something they had him sit on the lap of his mother in the middle row of seats, and his grandmother (I think) was in the seat beside. The entire flight he was fighting his mother and grandmother, crying, complaining, kicking the back of my seat, and generally making a ruckus in the back. It made me want to turn around and shout "Don't make me pull this plane over!".

I was glad when we landed, but my relief was short lived. We stopped and unloaded the passengers and no later then unloading the first piece of baggage I looked up and the kid was making a beeline across the apron. Ahh frig. "HEY! Come back here!" I turned to the mother and asked what his name was, but I could neither understand nor pronounce what she said. They started calling after him as well, but the kid never looked back. Sheesh. None of the parents seemed too on the ball for going after the kid, so the responsibility fell t0 me. Pilot, babysitter... same difference right? I took off after the toddler, who was still trucking across the ramp as fast as his stubby little legs could move. I finally caught up to him and scooped him up in my arms. The parents were laughing by the time I got back to the airplane, and if the kid wasn't driving me crazy the entire flight I might have found the humour in it as well, but at that point all I could do was shake my head.

The next family I picked up was headed south for vacation, and they were the most friendly, cheerful passengers I have had the pleasure of flying to date. It was sunday, and when I landed to pick them up, the gate to the airport was locked and there was no one around. They all ended up throwing their luggage over the fence to me and climbing over. Yet despite that minor inconvience they were still all smiles. The two kids were also very well behaved. When we landed they thanked me, and remarked that they were glad they flew with us. It was a refreshing change from hearing an exchange of harsh words in Cree between the passengers, kids who I constantly have to keep from climbing all over the airplane, and then being ignored as they unload and just walk away. It made my day.

Another flight we managed to cram 8 bodies into the Cherokee 6, 3 adults, me, and 4 kids. We had to put in the mini seat in between the two middle row seats to form a bench seat, which could fit 3 across. They had barely any baggage so we still came in under gross weight. When I dropped them off at the terminal I couldn't help but chuckle as they all climbed out, one by one, to form a crowd around the little Cherokee. The words "Clown Car" crossed my mind.

Another interesting aspect of flying up here is the rum runners. Every so often we get passengers who try to discreetly pack 50 lbs of hard liquor into their bags to bring up the coast to the dry reserve. Usually when we notice some suspicious looking bags my dispatchers will call the local police up there and give them the heads up for when we land. Sometimes they show up to search the bags, usually they don't. Today I took a couple passengers up with a couple suspicious looking bags. I have a problem with alchohol consumption when 80% (no exageration) of the community is on welfare. Welfare cheques should not be spent on bootlegged liquor at $100 a bottle. I was hoping the cops would show up this time. When we landed sure enough the passengers hopped out as quickly as possible, retrieved the suspicious bags from the back, and carried them to behind a dirt embankment to hide them before the cops showed up. I took my time getting ready to leave, hoping they would show up before I left so I could tip them off about the hiding place, but I couldn't wait forever, so the bootleggers won that round. Day in the life of a northern ontario pilot.