3green From Australia, joined Nov 2000, 144 posts, RR: 0 Posted (6 months 2 weeks 2 days 20 hours ago) and read 17194 times:
Hello everyone, i'm sure some of you would have read the Flightlevel 390 blog on the net, written by an Airbus pilot who worked for a major US airline. He appears to have removed it suddenly, so hopefully nothing bad has happened.
Does anyone have any idea?
Thankyou.
PHLJJS From United States of America, joined Oct 2005, 412 posts, RR: 0 Reply 1, posted (6 months 2 weeks 2 days 19 hours ago) and read 17311 times:
I've been enjoying Dave's blog for years. I too hope all is well with him. Maybe this is just some kind of technical glitch with the blog host? I just read his latest blog last weekend. No hint of trouble on the horizon.
JayDub From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 2, posted (6 months 2 weeks 2 days 18 hours ago) and read 17300 times:
Purely speculation but, with the increased scrutiny of employee use of social media, I wouldn't be surprised if he decided the risks of company reprisal just weren't worth it any longer. It was obvious who he worked for and where he was based, thus increasing his chances of being "outed".
It's a total bummer, though...it was the only blog I ever went out of my way to read. Very enjoyable to read and his use of both technical industry jargon and simple explanations for non-industry folks was perfectly balanced. I will miss it if it is, indeed, gone forever.
KBJCpilot From United States of America, joined May 2012, 96 posts, RR: 8 Reply 4, posted (6 months 2 weeks 2 days 17 hours ago) and read 17301 times:
My guess is that the PC Police at his airline asked him to take it down. He had some detailed experiences and I'm sure it wasn't very hard for his coworkers to identify those in his posts and possibly complain to the Chief Pilot or HR.
He is a great writer and his stories will be missed.
chrisair From United States of America, joined Sep 2000, 1774 posts, RR: 4 Reply 5, posted (6 months 2 weeks 2 days 17 hours ago) and read 17350 times:
PHLJJS From United States of America, joined Oct 2005, 412 posts, RR: 0 Reply 7, posted (6 months 2 weeks 2 days 2 hours ago) and read 17294 times:
Quoting KBJCpilot (Reply 4): My guess is that the PC Police at his airline asked him to take it down. He had some detailed experiences and I'm sure it wasn't very hard for his coworkers to identify those in his posts and possibly complain to the Chief Pilot or HR.
He is a great writer and his stories will be missed.
Entirely possible, but I doubt that's the case.
I remember a few years ago when fellow A.netter HAL started doing trip reports while working for HP/US. IIRC, he contacted HR or management at his airline and got the okay to do the trip reports. Dave's blog isn't any different than those trip reports and he is believed to work for the same airline. Although, things can change in a few years, Dave did a decent job of staying away from stuff that could get him into trouble or open up a can of worms and upset others at the airline, i.e. serious incidents that arose during a trip, union stuff.
Hopefully, he'll be back soon or someone who knows him will see our posts or the Facebook page and alert him to our concern, maybe shed some light onto what happened.
3green From Australia, joined Nov 2000, 144 posts, RR: 0 Reply 8, posted (6 months 2 weeks 1 day 18 hours ago) and read 17294 times:
Yes, i can imagine the concern among his followers, he had many from all over the world, i know he used to get a lot of messages of concern when he didnt write anything for a couple of weeks, so i'd hate to think what some of these people are thinking now. Some of them may well be on this site too.
chrisair From United States of America, joined Sep 2000, 1774 posts, RR: 4 Reply 9, posted (6 months 2 weeks 1 day 16 hours ago) and read 17302 times:
Quoting PHLJJS (Reply 7): I remember a few years ago when fellow A.netter HAL started doing trip reports while working for HP/US. IIRC, he contacted HR or management at his airline and got the okay to do the trip reports. Dave's blog isn't any different than those trip reports and he is believed to work for the same airline. Although, things can change in a few years, Dave did a decent job of staying away from stuff that could get him into trouble or open up a can of worms and upset others at the airline, i.e. serious incidents that arose during a trip, union stuff.
There's a HP/US pilot that has his own blog. It's good, but more of a look back on his career than it is current affairs. My only complaint about his blog is the font. It's dreadful. http://capnaux.blogspot.com
I don't believe Dave's blog was necessarily always factual--there were some routes he blogged about flying that don't exist at his alleged airline. Nonetheless, it was a very well written blog.
mcg From United States of America, joined Sep 2003, 671 posts, RR: 0 Reply 10, posted (6 months 1 week 6 days 20 hours ago) and read 17280 times:
Quoting chrisair (Reply 9): I don't believe Dave's blog was necessarily always factual--there were some routes he blogged about flying that don't exist at his alleged airline.
He mentioned once that he had to maintain 'plausible deniability', thus I think sometimes the routes were changed just a bit.
UALWN From Andorra, joined Jun 2009, 2331 posts, RR: 2 Reply 11, posted (6 months 1 week 6 days 3 hours ago) and read 17278 times:
I just realized Captain Dave's blog is no longer available! This is terrible news! I've checked in the past all the other blogs mentioned here: they can't hold a candle to Dave's. I really really hope he's back soon one way or another, telling us again how to land with finesse those looong A321s he so much loves.
Fabo From Slovakia, joined Aug 2005, 1111 posts, RR: 1 Reply 12, posted (6 months 1 week 5 days 23 hours ago) and read 17285 times:
Quoting UALWN (Reply 11): I really really hope he's back soon one way or another, telling us again how to land with finesse those looong A321s he so much loves.
I second that.
And in the worst case, at least let us know why there will not be any more blogging about the quirks of FiFi and captains wifes tiny hiney...
The light at the end of tunnel turn out to be a lighted sing saying NO EXIT
sturmovik From India, joined May 2007, 264 posts, RR: 0 Reply 13, posted (6 months 1 week 5 days 23 hours ago) and read 17295 times:
I'd made this blog part of the mandatory reading material for the interns under me, I don't think there's any other guy who writes about flying as well as he does. I hope everything's okay, and that he's back soon.
Thanks for the blog mention. I'll work on the dreadful font, LOL!
Dave never told me his real name, so not sure who he is at work or how to find him. I loved his style of writing, and is one of the reasons I tend to avoid talking about "real time" flights on my blog; he already fills that niche!
I did get in hot water over a vlog I did that went viral on YouTube ("A Day in the Life of an Airline Pilot"), so had to pull it. So I wouldn't be surprised if the same thing happened to Cap'n Dave....
Check out my new novel, "The Last Bush Pilots," available on my blog "Adventures of Cap'n Aux"
XFSUgimpLB41X From United States of America, joined Aug 2000, 3958 posts, RR: 36 Reply 15, posted (6 months 1 week 4 days 21 hours ago) and read 17287 times:
Fabo From Slovakia, joined Aug 2005, 1111 posts, RR: 1 Reply 18, posted (6 months 1 week 2 days 15 hours ago) and read 17270 times:
Quoting XFSUgimpLB41X (Reply 15): Wow! That is HORRIBLE! What an absolutely arrogant, self impressed tool.
Talk about that... the texts are kinda interesting, but while I would love to meet, say, cpt Dave, I would not really like to meet this one.
Quoting capnaux1 (Reply 14): Thanks for the blog mention. I'll work on the dreadful font, LOL!
Much better now, captain Aux Thanks, some good reading there.
Quoting capnaux1 (Reply 14): Dave never told me his real name, so not sure who he is at work or how to find him. I loved his style of writing, and is one of the reasons I tend to avoid talking about "real time" flights on my blog; he already fills that niche!
Too bad. I wish we could at least find out what happened, why was the blog pulled...
Quoting capnaux1 (Reply 14): I did get in hot water over a vlog I did that went viral on YouTube ("A Day in the Life of an Airline Pilot"), so had to pull it.
Bummer. Judging by your Zen& The Art of Landing video, must have been nice to watch...
The light at the end of tunnel turn out to be a lighted sing saying NO EXIT
wjcandee From United States of America, joined Jun 2000, 4557 posts, RR: 17 Reply 19, posted (6 months 1 week 2 days 11 hours ago) and read 17268 times:
Crap.
Never knew about this blog until you guys started discussing its deletion.
The Wayback Machine has done a truly-crappy job of archiving it.
Nevertheless, I am completely engrossed by what there is of it.
Have to wonder about the cause of deletion. I have looked all around the web for clues, and it's amazing how all the airline sites have discussions about the topic, but nobody really seems to know who the author is, despite little clues, particularly in the early, 2005 days where he thanks people by name who probably do know who he is.
The blog has been around for so long it seems truly-incomprehensible that the Company would suddenly give him a hard time about it. OTOH, the author does a nice job of documenting how change comes, and how fast and hard it comes, in the Company's positions on things.
They should, however, be proud to have a guy like this, who knows his stuff, has self-depricating humor, and seems to be just the right degree of paranoid about safety. (i.e. "I do my own little pre-departure checklist...")
Let's hope that he's turning it into a book or something positive, not that something happened to him or that the Company made him take it down. Was there ever a hint that the Company had had the slightest opinion about it?
strandedinbgm From United States of America, joined Jul 2007, 329 posts, RR: 0 Reply 20, posted (6 months 1 week 1 day 23 hours ago) and read 17265 times:
Quoting capnaux1 (Reply 14): Thanks for the blog mention. I'll work on the dreadful font, LOL!
wjcandee From United States of America, joined Jun 2000, 4557 posts, RR: 17 Reply 24, posted (6 months 4 days 11 hours ago) and read 16806 times:
Crankyflier met with US Airways executives on Monday (along with Holly Hegeman, ugh, is she still around?), to discuss various passenger and marketing issues and ideas.
One of his readers asked him to put it to them about Captain Dave's blog, and, God bless him, he did. The execs told him that they didn't even know who Captain Dave was so they couldn't have, and didn't, ask him to take it down.
Of course, there are a lot of cooks in that kitchen, and the request wouldn't necessarily have come from the gang that Crankyflier met with, so maybe they did or maybe they didn't. But at least someone asked some level of management about it. I myself was going to ask at the next investor conference call.
This raises a couple of issues. First -- REALLY? -- even with some slightly-masked descriptions, NOBODY in the executive ranks at America West ever bothered to figure out who this guy was during the SEVEN years he was writing this blog? That's mind-boggling, highly-unlikely, and suggests a few other possibilities.
The first is that the author deeeeeply-buried his identity by changing way more of the details than we realize. Certainly, he would presumably be a FiFi pilot, but it opens the possibility that he was flying for NW, Spirit, Frontier, or United, for example. Yeah, not all those guys fly the Bus to the destinations he discusses, and only Spirit flies all the versions of the Electric Jet, but once you open the gates on what details might not be right, there are a lot of possibilities. United flies the Bus and 737, but his prior Steamer could also have been a 727 or a MD80. When he wrote that piece about doing a pro sports charter, it occurred to me that NW does a hell of a lot more of those than does US. You get where I'm going.
More pernicious, perhaps, is what is often revealed about anonymous authors -- sometimes their take on something is so detailed and their insights so powerful, that you just KNOW they have to be right where they appear to be, but they aren't. The best non-blog example is Joe Klein's book "Primary Colors" about Bill Clinton's first campaign for President, where the narrator is one of the campaign aides. Klein was a veteran political reporter who wrote the book, which he accurately called a Novel (i.e. fiction). But when it came out, it was attributed to "Anonymous". Klein's mastery of the tiniest details and knowledge of so many stories in the campaign made it look as if someone like George Stephanopoulos or similar had actually written it, particularly to the people who were *actually there on the inside*, and were freaking out that anybody was talking about this stuff, even in the context of a novel. It all just hit way to close to home. Accusations flew among pissed-off campaign staff until Klein, an outsider, revealed who he was. And folks were amazed.
Same thing for some of the scandalous Washington blogs. "Really? How did she know that?" But she did.
So maybe Dave is really just a fan or a non-pilot who nevertheless was in the business. And maybe he was about to be exposed. This seems doubtful because his first blog entries are really pretty innocuous. "I flew to X today. Cheeseburgers there are good." Not an exact quote but you get the point. His real gift for writing wasn't revealed until much later, and his fine development of characters like the Beautiful Supremely-Competent Female F/O or the Argentinian Kid came over time. Kind of like a Jean Shepherd of the blogs. If he had set out to do what his blog became, he went into it brilliantly-slowly to make it seem real. Most people wouldn't know or be able to be so restrained. But it's possible, I suppose.
Here's hoping that he's real, he's well, and that he is turning the blog into a book.
But it is amazing that, as widely-read as he turns out to be, nobody can put a finger on who he is or why he's gone.
KBJCpilot From United States of America, joined May 2012, 96 posts, RR: 8 Reply 25, posted (6 months 3 days 19 hours ago) and read 17890 times:
Dave is a pilot for US Airways and was with America West back in the day. He and I corresponded after one of his blog posts.
He had written a blog about a flight from CLT to PHX and he hit a line of thunderstorms across the Texas panhandle. He described making a 180 near Amarillo, then heading north, then east, before heading west again and arriving in PHX an hour late. He was grateful for taking on the extra fuel in CLT prior to departure as he thought there would be weather problems during the flight.
I read his blog, and with a simple Flightaware search found his flight and posted the link to the comment section in the blog. About an hour later I received an email from him telling me that he appreciated my efforts but that he needed to keep his company and information as discreet as possible and that he was removing my comment and link. He thanked me for my understanding.
I wrote back and told him that I hoped that he didn't get into any hot water and I'll stop posting the links on the comments.
I've read his blog since and try to go to Flightaware and see what flight he was describing as I knew his airline and aircraft type (yea, I'm a nerd sometimes) and have found the particular flight he wrote about.
I noticed that his updates have been getting fewer and fewer over the past year and maybe he just hit a wall and decided to stop. He is a great author and his blog is missed.
Fabo From Slovakia, joined Aug 2005, 1111 posts, RR: 1 Reply 26, posted (6 months 3 days 17 hours ago) and read 17156 times:
Hmm, maybe if you manage to pull out a flight number from similar description in his more recent post, Capn Aux can find out who he is and contact him?
Not that I want him to surrender his privacy, but I (and I do believe I am not alone in this) would appreciate at least a simple "Yeah, I hit a wall and decided to close the shop"... Also it is a shame that the blog is not available for reading anymore...
The light at the end of tunnel turn out to be a lighted sing saying NO EXIT
wjcandee From United States of America, joined Jun 2000, 4557 posts, RR: 17 Reply 27, posted (6 months 3 days 16 hours ago) and read 17683 times:
KBJC Pilot: Thanks for that info. It's interesting that you could validate the description against Flightaware. And you're not exactly a nerd to know the airline and aircraft type. He tells the aircraft type in the blog, and the city pairs and aircraft make it clear to the newest newbie that he was flying for America West. (Dave, living in Phoenix, flying from places to PHX and LAS. Duh.)
This is why I think it odd for him to think that he was keeping his and his airline's identity somehow under the radar.
And it's also why I simply don't believe that, if he was real, which you seem to be able to verify, nobody at America West knew who he was. Particularly the folks that he thanks by name in the early years of the blog.
He not only stopped posting, he (or someone) removed the blog and deactivated the email address and then remained silent despite a pretty-impressive outpouring of concern in a lot of places.
This suggests a precipitating event. Let's hope it was a positive one. And let's hope we can figure it out.
Why don't you PM Captain Aux with a couple of dates and flight numbers and let him look into it, and let him use his judgment about what to say. Maybe he can just say that he figured out who Dave is and that he is still flying and is okay. And while he's at it, he can ask the copilot if she and Dave want to have a drink with a fan on their next NY overnight.
(Of course, just to say it, there could be another reason for not wanting flight numbers posted...like, you don't want the *actual* captain of that flight to say, "Hey, wait a minute..." Just sayin'.)
chrisair From United States of America, joined Sep 2000, 1774 posts, RR: 4 Reply 29, posted (6 months 3 days 8 hours ago) and read 17306 times:
Quoting wjcandee (Reply 27): This is why I think it odd for him to think that he was keeping his and his airline's identity somehow under the radar.
I don't. Ever notice how the posters on here who actually work for an airline (and make it known), say "My posts don't represent the views of my company?" Companies don't want people speaking to the media/general public without a handler. Ever wonder why you (generally) see the same fire, TSA, FAA, police etc people quoted in news stories? It's very hard to get a regular firefighter/cop etc to give you a quote for a news story--everything always goes through the spokesman. In fact, when I worked for a newspaper, the first thing I did whenever dealing with the police or FD was ask "where's the PIO?"
Plus, if you remember some of his quips about "forbidden reading material" on the flight deck, it makes complete sense that he wouldn't want to come out and say he works for XYZ airline since he takes photos up there.
Quoting wjcandee (Reply 27): Why don't you PM Captain Aux with a couple of dates and flight numbers and let him look into it, and let him use his judgment about what to say.
wjcandee From United States of America, joined Jun 2000, 4557 posts, RR: 17 Reply 31, posted (6 months 3 days ago) and read 16785 times:
And going to the PIO ensures that you get the party line quotable BS rather than info from someone who was actually there. Why should reporting be difficult when you can just parrot the talking points or reword the press release?
So let's not bother asking someone to do something that would resolve this whole thing, because we don't think he will do it.
Hey, Chris,
Yes, I am curious as to what happened to Captain Dave, too. As I said, he never revealed his i.d. even to me, so I'm sure there's a reason.
As I said before, I too got spanked for revealing a tad too much online, so I've been distancing myself from that, too. It's very important to (any) company for its employees to keep a low profile and let PR dept. handle whatever public stuff comes along.
So, yes, while I'm curious, too, I'd be remiss to reveal anything Dave obviously doesn't want revealed.
By and large my posts on my blog are about PAST experiences in my airline career, for the same reason. I love to write, and share my experiences, and as I know you've seen on my blog also write fiction novels about it. For obvious reasons, these stories can't be about "real" people or airlines, but certainly convey the truth of our profession.
Eric
capnaux.blogspot.com
Check out my new novel, "The Last Bush Pilots," available on my blog "Adventures of Cap'n Aux"
wjcandee From United States of America, joined Jun 2000, 4557 posts, RR: 17 Reply 36, posted (5 months 3 weeks 2 days 10 hours ago) and read 12665 times:
That's fantastic news, assuming that it's a reliable source.
Maybe Dave didn't realize the effect that dumping that platform would have on all his loyal fans. Hopefully, he has archived his material somewhere that would allow it to come back on a different platform. I'm also sure that, as with some volunteer aviation journalists who developed a following (e.g. Ostrower), there are companies out there that would be happy to host. However, I would think that an endeavor of this type is best operated in an environment where the writer has maximum control.
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Thanks, some good reading there.
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