Flying to Bangkok with T-Storms

[chispi]

Hi Royd,

I wll be flying Thai Airways from Madrid to Bangkok on Saturday. I am really scared about it, I feel lkike dying of anxiety, I have already had a panic attack and I think I will start with my tanquillizer pills tomorrow. But since things can always go worse they did go! I have just consulted the wheather forecast for Bangkok on Sunday (the day we will be landing in local time) and guess what: T-Storms!!! Most probably I will suffer them when coming back as well.

My imagination started to describe a terrible picture of a T-storm so I decided to read a real description of what a T-storm is... not much better. Now I am terrified. :cry:

Royd, do you suffer this kind of wheather conditions often. Are they really a risk for a flight? How do you handle them? Should I worry about it? (I already know you will be answering NO but...). Will the plan be able to land safely or will we be redirected somewhere else?

I would really like to know how a tipycal flight from Europe to Asia Pacific is... do they normally suffer turbulence? Is wheather nice during those flights? Is this time of the year with the monssons and so all a nightmare for flying?

Please help, help, help!

Thanks so much!

[Falcon]

Thunderstorms are violent but very localized. They are by nature focused in a very small area. we deal with them by flying around them or holding until they stop over our destination airfield. They are more likely in Summer as they need energy to get the vertical instability going that creates them so they are much less likely in winter in the Northern Hemishpere so any flight taken soon should be fine.

[chispi]

Thanks Falcon,


by the way... a friend of mine had a little incident in a plane the other day. They were inside the aircraft readly for take off when suddenly everything turned off. The pilots tried to re-start the engines the same as we would do with our car (same noise and everything) but after several attempts they decided to bring the people back to the terminal. Half an hour after they were back in the same plane ready to leave. She was terrified!!!
A couple of days ago she asked a friend of her who is a pilot and he told her that those kind of things are not important at all because in the event they happened during a flight the back up system would turn on automatically. The delay was caused because they preferred to have both systems (the main one and the back up) working before taking off. Is this true? Could this be the real reason behind the apparent loss of power? Do all the aircrafts have this back up system to provide power?

Sorry to be such a nightmare... I am just going crazy!

[Falcon]

Perfectly true and very sensible to pull up and check it on the ground. The 737 has two engine driven generators, if one of those fails we can start up the APU (Auxilary Power Unit) in the tail to provide power to replace one generator. The APU will also run one airconditioning pack.

[chispi]

Do all the aircrafts that operate in EU have that back-up system? Is it easy to start up during a flight in the event it is needed?

[Falcon]

All aircraft have back up systems. The APU can be started in flight.