What's the Coolest Thing You've Seen From the Cockpit

This is a question that most pilots have been asked numerous times by passengers, friends, and family. It is a question that we pilots have certainly debated during those many hours of boredom during cruise. Cruise is the middle portion of the flight that begins at the top of climb and ends with the beginning of the descent into the arrival city. While short flights between New York and DC don't leave much time for boredom, I have certainly had plenty of time in the middle of the ocean on a transatlantic crossing to think about some of the amazing things I have seen in my career.

I have been treated to some amazing sights during my aviation career. Many of them happened prior to my time in the cockpit of an airliner. Some happened very early on in my flying, including during the time I was earning my pilot's certificates.

The first that I remember happened when I was studying for my Commercial Pilot certificate. I was doing a cross country flight from rapid City, south Dakota to Grand Forks, North Dakota. This lesson required that I do a flight with my instructor that included 4 hours of day flying and 2 hours of night flying. We planed the flight down from Grand Forks (GFK) to Aberdeen, SD, Pierre, SD and on to Rapid City. We arrived in Rapid City just as the sun was starting to set. We had hope to fly a couple circles around Mt. Rushmore, so the controller was kind enough to give us vectors to the monument. We couldn't see a thing out the front window with the sun right in our eyes. After passing the monument, Air Traffic Control (ATC) turned us around and got us headed in the right direction. As soon as we rolled out of the turn we could see it...it helps not having the sun burning holes in our retinas. There in front of us was Mt. Rushmore. As amazing as it looks on TV or in history books, nothing could prepare us for what it looked like at eye level as we circled it a few times. We then landed in Rapid city, had dinner, and prepared to leave for the flight back to GFK. We departed Rapid City after dark and climbed out to the Northwest toward Bismark, ND. About 15 minutes after takeoff, we were treated to one of the most amazing natural sights I have ever seen. the Northern Lights appeared right in front of us from as far left to as far right as we could see. If you've never seen them before, I hope you one day get the chance. They are associated with the solar winds, a flow of ions flowing outward from the sun. the earth's magnetic fields trap these particles, where they react with atmospheric atoms, causing energy releases that we see as the Northern Lights. They are only seen in the Northern Hemisphere and usually during the winter months. The picture to the left is courtesy of the Internet. I did not have a camera with me at the time, which is one of the reasons I now have one with me whenever I fly. Many times, they are only visible for a few minutes, I watched them during this flight for over two hours.

The next experience I usually tell people about is the time I saw the comet Hale-Bopp. I was flying from Chicago to Leesburg, Virginia. I had just departed the Ohio State University airport in Columbus, OH, where I had stopped for fuel. I had just leveled off at my cruise altitude when I remembered that Hale-Bopp should be visible to the Northwest. I looked over my left shoulder, and there it was. The benefit of seeing it while airborne, is that you are above most of the pollution that is nearer to the ground. It looked much bigger and brighter than it appeared when you looked at it from the ground. Hale-Bopp was discovered in July of 1995 and was visible for a record 18 months. The discovery was shared by Alan Hale and Thomas Bopp. Hale was tracking known comets from his driveway in New Mexico, while Bopp didn't even own a telescope. Bopp was in Arizona, looking through a friend's telescope while out with friends observing star clusters and galaxies. They both checked for known comets, and when not finding any in that area, notified the Central Bureau of Astronomical Telegrams. The CBAT verified the comet the next day and named it after the two men.

Just a year ago, I was flying across the Atlantic on a trip to England. It was near sunrise as we approached the Irish coast, when the Captain thought he saw a satellite moving across the sky. Most of the time, we have the cockpit light on full to help stave off the effects of flying through the night. If it is a clear night, we sometimes turn off the lights to take a look at the stars. The Captain noticed movement in the sky and told me where to look for it. I found the object he was talking about and was amazed at the speed of it's movement across the sky. Even though we are flying at over 500 mph, we see very little relative movement due to our altitude of around 7 miles above the ground. This object was obviously in space and moving at thousands of miles per hour. After about a minute, this object flew over the horizon and out of sight. It looked larger than your average satellite and was more orange in color. After discussing it, we realized that we had been looking at the International Space Station.

These are just a few of the amazing things I have been fortunate enough to see during my flying career. While these are the most memorable, I am always amazed at the view out my office window. Even if it is raining or snowing on the ground, I am almost always guaranteed to see blue skies or bright stars. I only wish that I could leave the cockpit door open, so that you could come up and see what I get to see every day.