In the early
1990s our airline was operating from the St. Louis Lambert airport as an
express carrier for Trans World Airlines.
Trans World
Express, or TWE as we called it, was operating turboprop aircraft exclusively. I was working as a captain on the British
Aerospace Jetstream, a 19 passenger twin-engine aircraft. The BAe-3201 was built in Scotland and as
originally designed was a sleek, neat looking airplane. I suspect that it was originally intended to
operate as a corporate executive transport, but when the turboprop commuter
airline express carrier craze started BA took their existing design and adapted
it for airline use. The most evident
feature of that adaptation was a “belly pod” attached to the underside of the
central fuselage which provided space for the carry-on baggage. That pod also gave the airplane a pregnant
look. The checked luggage was placed
into an aft baggage compartment, which had the unique feature of only being
accessed through the main cabin door.
The main cabin door also was located at the rear of the cabin. The security rules require that luggage
checked at the counter, which has not been scanned at the security checkpoint
of the departure airport, must be isolated from the passengers. To accomplish this, the aft baggage
compartment door was locked with a key. Another
note, with only 19 passenger seats, a flight-attendant was not required by FAA
regulations, so we had none. It was just
two pilots and the passengers to experience the ride.
One night,
after a long day of flying, we were boarding our last flight of the day. We routinely flew seven or eight flights each
day, so needless to say, we were feeling tired and eager to get this last one
done and get to the hotel. This flight
was a late evening departure leaving St. Louis Lambert for the Topeka, Kansas
Forbes airport. That flight normally
took us around an hour and a half to complete.
The passenger boarding went smoothly as there were only two
passengers. They were two women who
looked to me to be in their mid-sixties and had all the looks of vacationers
returning from Mexico. They were wearing
sombreros and other garments full of color and style typical of Mexico. They were in good spirits and by all
indications, had a great vacation. I
welcomed them onboard and we started up and headed for the runway. As I was taxiing I noticed a strange bumping
sound which seemed to happen only as I was turning a corner, but not every time. After giving it some thought and reviewing
the instrument panel I disregarded it and we took-off for Topeka.
It was a
beautiful night and the flight was smooth as glass. One of my favorite features of the BAe-3201
was the fact that it did not have an auto-pilot. Whether the captain or the first-officer was
flying, he had to fly by the controls, or in another word, drive. I do not recall if I flew the leg or my
co-pilot did, but I do recall a nice, uneventful flight.
Upon landing
at Topeka I noticed that weird bumping sound again. I taxied to the gate and shut down the
engines. When I opened the curtain which
separated the cockpit from the cabin I immediately saw the source of the
bumping. The loading agent in St. Louis
inadvertently failed to lock that aft baggage door and it was wide open. The bumping was caused by that door swinging
open and closed as I
turned
corners. I then noticed that those
ladies saw that open door and through the opening recognized their checked
bags, for one of those bags was half opened and they had a bottle of rum with
them which was now down about one-third.
One of them cheerfully raised the bottle and proclaimed that to be, “the
best flight ever!”
Captain
William (Billy) Howe
Trans World
Express circa: 1994
April 27,
2013
