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Tales from the cockpit

IT’S EASY TO underplay the incredible feats that aerobatic pilots perform in the air – they make it look so easy after all - but what’s it really like sitting in the pilot’s seat?

As the Red Bull Air Race barrels into Abu Dhabi this weekend, we take a once-in-a-lifetime flight inside the plane to experience the thrills and manoeuvres that will be on display

IT’S EASY TO underplay the incredible feats that aerobatic pilots perform in the air – they make it look so easy after all - but what’s it really like sitting in the pilot’s seat?

From skydiving and bungee jumping to even swimming with sharks, my appetite for the daring and extreme has taken years off my poor mother’s life – but a chance to experience the stomach churning altitude and stunts from inside the cockpit of a high-performance aerobatic plane opened up a whole new world of extreme sports to me.

You’ve undoubtedly enjoyed the comfort of a commercial airliner, and you might have even experienced the thrill of hovering above the world inside a helicopter, but nothing could even remotely compare to the adrenaline-inducing feeling of sitting in the cockpit of a plane that promises to test your nerves and physical prowess.

Ahead of this weekends return of the Red Bull Air Race on the Abu Dhabi Corniche, I was privileged enough to check out first-hand some of the manoeuvres that stunt pilots will put on display. What I took away was a rudimentary lesson on gravity.

The two-seat Red Bull plane - with a wingspan of less than 8 metres - is an overwhelming piece of machinery. It’s extremely light and features a host of gadgets you might expect from a high-powered aircraft. Seated inside, legs reaching deep within the plane’s nose, I’m protected by an acrylic clear shell that makes for some incredible bird’s-eye view. During the safety brief I’m reminded that in case of any emergency, I should pull the long, bright red lever to my side. I now realise why I have a parachute strapped to my back.

My pilot Dario Costa, the Air Race’s Flight Operations Manager, has been flying since he was a kid, and somewhere along the way he developed a major addiction to thrill seeking. There’s something exhilarating yet highly unsettling about a grown man treating his plane the way a kid might in their fantasies. I quickly learn that this is exactly the kind of mind-set that makes for an incredible pilot.

As soon as we make our way skyward I instantly begin wishing I had paid better attention in high school physics class. After a vertical loop manoeuvre that has the plane flying upside down, I immediately begin to feel the G-forces across my face and body. We managed to pull about six Gs - about half of what pilots may experience in competition - which can only be described as the feeling one might experience if an elephant (and her three calfs) were sitting on top of you.

What’s immediately clear as I hold on for dear life is that pilots must be incredibly fit and athletic to be able to withstand G-forces while precision flying - just imagine controlling a plane while the weight of the world is literally on your shoulders.

During the ten-minute flight, pilot Costa was loving my enthusiasm, and this apparently gave him licence to test my nerves even further with some barrel rolls and even a dive through the pylons at near-ground level. While it’s great to witness from afar planes soaring through those giant pylons at breakneck speeds, going through them feels sort of like a bullet headed back towards the barrel of a shotgun.

Co-piloting a Red Bull plane really is an experience that is impossible to forget. I managed not to pass out or get sick, and had I not loved my job so much, I might have considered diving straight into flying school. More than just the thrills that I walked away with is a deep, newfound respect I have for aerobatic pilots who conquer the skies and do it with so much style.

Now that I have my feet safely back on the ground, I’ll be sharing video recorded from the cockpit with my mother, and I’m almost sure she won’t be so forgiving this time around.