I'll Have The Chicken

By Captain Robert Kavula

I’ll Have the Chicken is a collection of engaging stories from former Navy and commercial pilot Captain Robert Kavula. The book gives readers an intimate look from the other side of the cockpit door and some of the decisions made before and during flight. Kavula tells about his journey to become a pilot, near collisions in the air

• Language: English
• Publisher: Authors Press
• Release date: Dec 16, 2019
• ISBN: 9781643141558

Book preview

Copyright © 2019 by Captain Robert Kavula

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

AuthorsPress

California, USA

www.authorspress.com

In this riveting collection of stories by a former Navy and commercial airline pilot, the reader obtains a firsthand view of the goings-on from inside the cockpit door. This is a genuine and often humorous account of the many trials and tribulations, moments of joy, and moments of stark terror, as Kavula puts it, that the pilot experienced during his decades of flying. Very much part of the reason for writing this book, the author relates, is the many times he would share a story from his years in aviation, only to be told, You should write a book.

These vignettes include inside pilot and cabin crew jokes and incidents, memorable passenger moments, flights with dignitaries and world leaders, and flights with famous stars(including, interestingly, the time Kavula’s plane carried the actual R2D2 robot from the Star Wars series from London to L.A.).

Kavula’s story is an intriguing one, which engages the reader from the very first page. One gets a true sense in reading this work that not only did Kavula love his many, rich experiences flying aircraft, but that he appears to find joy in sharing the stories of those experiences with the reader. His book is sure to not only entertain but often tickle the funny bone, as these amazing vignettes from his life as a pilot reveal for a general audience what it’s really like for those professionals who pilot the airplanes we fly. Buckle up, ladies and gentlemen, and enjoy the ride.

The US Review of Books

Contents

Pilot Talk

Escape 1

Saufley Field 2

Whiting Field 3

Choices 4

P2V 5

Wings of Gold 6

Billet 7

The Real Job 8

Bombs Away 9

Potty Problems 10

Murphy’s Law 11

Fuel Foolishness 12

Sextant Use 13

Special Cross Country 14

Bad Decisions 15

Mr. Lucky 16

Command Check Ride 17

P3 Acceptance Flight 18

Carrier Attack 19

Difficult Approaches 20

Assassination 21

Happy Easter 22

Sound Sources 23

Condoms for Survival 24

Shemya 25

US Grain Ship 26

Willeywa 27

Missile Ship 28

Generator Problems 29

Check Ride 30

Skunk Works 31

Sonobuoy 32

Microwave Problems 33

Starting Civilian Life 34

Secrets 35

Best Days 36

Hot Date or Money Loss 37

Black Day 38

Earned My Pay 39

Spruce Goose 40

It Never Happened 41

841 Into the Water 42

Screw Up at JFK 43

Can’t Happen 44

Fixin 45

Don’t Talk to Me 46

Detour 47

You Are On Your Own 48

Computer Program Errors 49

Saving a Million 50

Lost 51

Altitude 52

Five Engines 747 53

The Deer Hunter 54

Idiot Planning 55

Delayed Recognition 56

Star Wars 57

The Checkerboard 58

Athens Special OPS 59

Movie Credits 60

Marriage 61

Grandpa Goes to War 62

Long Way Around 63

Car Troubles 64

They Never Make a Mistake 65

Lavatory Stories 66

Insensitive Government 67

Overblown Press 68

Starving in Bombay 69

Berlin Corridor 70

Blue Water 71

Oven Check 72

Boston Girls 73

Small Small World 74

Tapei Machine Gun 75

Good Fellas and Moshe 76

Dreams 77

104 Million 78

Cheap Pilots 79

Cheap Paint Job 80

No Clothes 81

Picket Ships 82

Korean 007 83

TWA 800 84

Follow the Greens or Follow Me Car 85

Noise Violation 86

To Go Slow or to Go Fast? 87

Guam 88

Laser Light 89

Barry Seal 90

Morals 91

Middle East Dress 92

A Fleeing Woman 93

Near Misses 94

Drug Testing 95

North Atlantic Tracks 96

Category 3B Landing 97

Man on the Moon 98

T-Tail Aircraft 99

FAA Dumb Mistakes 100

Customs Thievery 101

Baggage Smasher 102

Interesting Customs in Bombay 103

People 104

The New King and the Movie Star 105

Better Planes 106

Blow Torch 107

Locked Brakes 108

Yellow Dot 109

Past Present and Future 110

I’ll Have the Chicken

In the golden days of civil aviation, when people were fed enjoyable meals, the evening standard meal served to the cockpit was one steak and one chicken dinner. Most captains would usually say to his first officer, What was his preference, knowing full well the first officer would pick chicken just to get on the good side of the captain.

One of the oldest clichés in aviation states, Flying is hours of boredom punctuated by moments of stark terror. This book opens up with some of those stark moments and many hours of fun.

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Pilot Talk

1. Knot equals one nautical mile.

2. One nautical mile equals one minute of latitude.

3. One nautical mile equals one and 1/8 miles.

4. One mile equals one minute of longitude at Greenwich, England.

5. The earth is a sphere and the shortest distance between two points is a great circle.

6. At flight level 350 you are seven miles above the earth, thus it is further between two points than on the surface.

7. Spherical trigonometry is used in our aircraft computers between two points. The computers must know your altitude to have exact information.

8. If I were to fly from 50 degrees north and 50 degrees west to 50 degrees north and 40 degrees west, at midpoint the aircraft computers would have you 6 nautical miles north at midpoint of 50 degrees north 45 degrees west. This is a great circle between 50 degrees west and 40 degrees west.

9. At low altitudes aircrafts use barometric settings.

10. Each country selects the altitude to change to flight levels. Flight levels are used over the arctic and the oceans.

11. To fly flight levels, you use the standard 29.92 inches of mercury setting in your altimeter. (For example your altimeter could read 35,000 feet using standard pressure but you would not know your exact height unless you had a radar altimeter.)

12. MACH 1 is the speed of sound of the outside air of the aircraft. MACH.80 is 80% of the speed of sound. Most civilian jets cruise near this speed.

13. North of the equator on long distance flights you try to fly in the prevailing winds of jet streams west to east. Going east to west you try and stay out of the strongest head winds.

14. There are three to five jet streams between the equator and the North Pole at different times.

15. We provide the temperature and wind at our flight level over a known position to the computer at Suitland, Maryland. Every twelve hours new routes are set up to try and fly the shortest time between two points. Time is money.

16. Before takeoff in New York going to London the computer will tell us the fastest route possible. Due to traffic we may not get our choice. I would have on a paper about 20 options starting with the fastest time on top. If I could not get my requested route I would be given several options. From the routes on my sheet I would select the fastest route offered.

I’ll Have the Chicken

Escape 1

Escape. That’s what many were seeking by joining the flight programs of the military. In my case my father was a first generation child from a large family whose parents were of Slovak origin. He entered the workforce after the eighth grade. His two older brothers entered the workforce after the sixth grade. At the age of nineteen, he and a partner scraped enough money together to rent a store and open a speakeasy. Thus he said goodbye to the barrel works at Tidewater Oil Company.

By working a defense job by day and the bar at night and weekends during World War II, he was able to save enough money to build and open a new tavern in 1947. We moved over the tavern and this ended our peace and privacy until I entered the Navy flight program in 1960.

Although my father wanted me to get an education, he desired that I join him in the business. Studying engineering and working twenty-five plus hours a week in his business was not an easy go. Constant interruptions, no salary, and the constant reminder that all this would be mine someday did not sit well with me. Navy pilot training was my way out. Many of my fellow classmates in pre-flight were also escaping. My dad, with a limited education, did not understand the study time required for an engineering degree.

The movie An Officer and a Gentleman explains my sixteen weeks of pre-flight in Pensacola, Florida, complete with a Marine sergeant. My experiences at pre-flight seemed less stressful than working at the tavern and going to college.

First week: hell week and indoctrination

Second to fourteenth week: classroom, military drills, tougher physical fitness. At this time no women were involved in the program. On the first day of class, the teacher’s desk was stacked high with books that we were told we had to read in fourteen weeks to graduate. Thus a speed reading course was given to us.

Unlike college, we gave grades to our teachers as well as receiving them. This continued for the duration of the whole flight-training program. We were told we were in the top five percent of the nation, and if we failed, it was caused by either bad teaching or a lack of studying.

Fifteenth week: jungle survival training. Eating a snake and berries until your shit was blue.

Sixteenth week: class officer week. Company commander was my slot.

On my original application, I informed the Navy I took piano lessons. During indoctrination week I was informed to report to the marching band director. Little did I know, my limited piano playing would lead me to becoming a member of this elite group. Thus I was given a choice of bass drum or glockenspiel. I chose glockenspiel because it was much lighter. Each week we had a different visiting military group from foreign countries, thus we had to learn to play the many national anthems of their countries. These groups had to suffer through our renditions of what we had never heard or played before. On one occasion while we were marching by the stands, I stepped into an unguarded drain hole, causing quite a commotion in the ranks of the band.

Saufley Field 2

Saufley Field was next. One solid week of ground school. Then about seven weeks of 1.3 hours of flight training and a half day of ground school. The T34 B was an excellent acrobatic aircraft. On my twelfth flight, the instructor and I would depart to a nearby airfield to make a few reasonable landings. The instructor would check to see if my landings were okay, and then the instructor would deplane the aircraft and from the ground observe my first solo takeoff and landing, which would be graded.

Flight thirteen would be my first complete solo takeoff and landing for the duration of 1.3 hours. The next phase of training lasted about two weeks, which would be one flight maneuver of acrobatics with the instructor per day, followed by one solo flight of this particular maneuver to practice.

I would be returning to Saufley Field in six months for Navy aircraft carrier landing qualifications. For these quals, I would be flying the T28C aircraft, similar to a WWII fighter. At that time the Navy was using a light system to help you set up a glide path for landing.