Flying Kitty Surprise

Remember to store your kitty securely in the overhead compartment bins before takeoff!
Shepppardsays...

Some notes:

The cat is Okay, and is apparently a mascot for the airfield.

It also wasn't in as much danger as you'd think, it wasn't "On" the wing, it was "In" the wing. The wings are hollow, so it wasn't at risk of being blown off, the only danger would be if it tried to jump down.

MilkmanDansays...

To be fair, I don't see "check all hollow volumes for the presence of small stowaway mammals" in the pre-flight checklist:
http://flighttraining.aopa.org/students/presolo/skills/howtopreflight.html

A cat (or whatever) that doesn't want to be found probably isn't going to interfere with control surfaces working correctly, etc. This is exactly the kind of very infrequent, random event that human beings are likely to overlook when doing something like a routine check that comes back nominal 99.9% of the time.

So, I'd wager that the pilot probably did all of the checks correctly and they just failed to reveal the one-in-a-million chance of "cat in wing". And to swing the other direction a bit and praise him instead of admonishing, he was admirably cool as a cucumber while coming back in for a semi-emergency landing. So I guess I'd argue for "pilot win" instead of "pilot fail".

Ashenkasesaid:

So much for the pre-flight safety check... pilot fail.

Paybacksays...

I'd agree mostly, but if you'll notice, the wings are translucent and the big dark furry shape probably should have been noticed if he had been checking thoroughly.

Also, on a normal plane, wings tend to be full of fuel so internal wing inspections would be problematic at best, and the control arms and cables on an ultralight can certainly get blocked by a foreign body. Personally, the cat being where it was, I would have at least used that opening to check for visible cable fraying and would have most likely found him.

I'd also be looking for damage caused by the rodents the cat was probably hunting for to begin with.

MilkmanDansaid:

*lots of good points*

deathcowsays...

Love the pilots surprise look.

moment 1) omg what is that, is my passenger, airplane and myself safe?

moment 2) omg, I need to get this cat to the ground safe

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