GORDON SMITH
UK-BASED AVIATION JOURNALIST AND FORMER EDITOR OF AIRLINER WORLD MAGAZINE
“Cabin crew, doors to automatic and cross-check.” For most frequent flyers it's a phrase so ubiquitous it blends into the white noise of pre-departure preparations, part of a reassuring rhythm alongside inflight safety demonstrations and warnings about smoking in the toilets. For me, it had the opposite effect. Hearing this benign instruction on the PA system would send my already-jittery body into
