Thursday, May 08, 2008

In my line of work I meet a lot of pilots. For the most part they are nice and cordial but then again there are some complete dicks....

The following is an account of a line call this morning.

6:10 am (radio goes off, Aircraft 218 requesting maintenance)

me: Good morning sir, what seems to be the problem

Mr pilot: the AP (auto pilot) indicator light is pointing in the wrong direction

the AP indicator is a dummy light that shows which person has the auto pilot engaged. This one happened to be pointing to the left. It is also a dummy light it has no effect on the AP.

Me: Well it looks like avionics was working on the auto pilot last night and and perhaps put in the wrong bulb. this is not something we carry in the maintenance truck

Mr Pilot: well this is not going to do we have got to get this fixed.

me: well it is not flight critical and it is just a dummy light it is not worth taking a delay over.

Mr (now rude) pilot: Just change the bulb and we will be on our way

Me: I just said we don't carry these in the maintenance van

Mr rude pilot: then get in your van and drive back to the hanger and get one.

Me: Perhaps if you called me earlier than 5 minutes before you where to board I could have taken care of this for you.. Like i said it is not worth taking a delay over

Mr extremely rude dick head pilot: Don't you tell me how to do my job just fix the dam system.

Me: Ok then I got and idea can I see the flight can? (flight can is a log book)

I took the flight can back to the maintenance van called maintenance control and deffered the entire auto pilot system.

The look on the pilots face when I handed him back the flight can and put the inop placard on the auto pilot indicator and pulled and collared the Ap circuit breakers..... Priceless

and the flight left on time
Posted by MrV :: 8:51 AM :: | ---------------oOo---------------