Fear of Flying

I learned to manage my fear of flying by this simple reasoning:

1. Commercial air travel is many times safer than driving a car
2. Most crashes occur during take-off or landing, not when the plane is at cruising altitude, and it's almost impossible for a plane at 32,000 feet to go down. Almost impossible, emphasis on "almost."

Close enough to get me to fly on airplanes. I figured, during takeoff, there were several minutes of danger, and all I had to do was hold tight for those few minutes, and then we were likely home free. I'd wait to hear the little ping that came when people were free to move around the cabin, and I loved it when we leveled off. As far as landing: it's hard to keep up being terrorized for hours on a plane; mostly you just want to get to your destination. I also figure if you made it this far, you're likely to make it all the way. So by the time we come in for a landing, I'm cool as a cucumber.

So what do I make of the recent spate of airline crashes? Sully's crash--that was birds: take-off.

The crash into the house in Buffalo? That was a small feeder airline with pilots getting $22,000 a year. So I'll avoid those little commuter airlines if I can.

But the Air France crash just off Brazil? This one rattles me. They were at cruising altitude. They were not supposed to crash. But they did.

So until I find out why this airplane fell out of the sky, I am hereby refusing to fly from Brazil to France in an Airbus.

What are you afraid of?