Sleeping on the job is kind of a no-no, and you’d think that would be a given for a pilot approaching landing.
But, believe it or not, Ethiopian Airlines has been forced to suspend two pilots for just that. They both fell asleep on approach to the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, after departing from Sudan while flying a Boeing 737.
It’s well known that pilots do have allocated sleeping on long haul flights, but they are timed to ensure at least one is always awake. So the idea that both pilots could go for a nap on a what is considered a short-haul flight (it takes less than two hours to fly between Sudan and Ethiopia) is both astonishing and terrifying.
Aviation analyst Alex Macheras described the incident as “deeply concerning”. You don’t say!
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It turns out the pilots were only woken when an alarm went off because the autopilot system had been disconnected.
Note to self: Never fly Ethiopian Airlines.
World’s worst attractions
While we all love travelling, occasionally there’s a hiccup.
You visit a lookout for great views, but you are attacked by monkeys, you have a lovely hotel but you get food poisoning. And so it is with famous attractions. They have a reputation, but perhaps the reality is less than perfect.
While we don’t condone gambling, the gaming website Mr Q has taken all the hard work out of avoiding some dodgy attractions by compiling the most complained about famous attractions on TripAdvisor. Thanks, Mr Q.
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Here are the top five:
1. The Hollywood Walk of Fame. Heaving with tourists and people who prey on them and homeless people, one reviewer called it the “Walk of Urine”.
2. The Palace of Versailles. Too busy, a bit run down and expensive. Probably like it always has been.
3. Stonehenge. Really? I’m not sure what people were expecting but, apparently, it was the UK attraction to have received the most one and two-star reviews.
4. The Hollywood sign. Fair enough, it was only ever meant to be a real-estate promo decades ago, anyway, but somehow made its way into popular culture.
5. Big Ben. It’s been under scaffolding for years while they restore it, so maybe that accounts for the lacklustre reviews.
Read: What are the best snack to eat while flying?
Back in the day
Don’t you love the idea of how glamorous flying used to be? Everyone dressed up and treated like they mattered instead of being squeezed into increasingly smaller seats with increasingly meagre in-flight luxuries.
Of course, it’s easy to forget how expensive it was and how difficult to even book a ticket.
But photos of the catering of a bygone era always induce some sort of internal longing, even if the food looks kind of ghastly to modern tastes.
To fulfil your nostalgia quota for the day, please enjoy this slideshow of giant hams, seafood in jelly and women being fed grapes.
What do you remember of flying in the past? Why not share your experiences in the comments section below?
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