"Encore! Encore!"
June 21, 2018 10:51 PM   Subscribe

Four-year-old Léa Langumier has accompanied her father, Raphael Langumier, 40, on multiple plane rides near their Lachute, Que., home since she was two years old but always had one rule — her father was not allowed to put the plane upside down. Last Sunday, the girl overcame that fear — gleefully — when she took part in her first aerobatic plane ride.

That story is from Jun 17, 2015. More videos followed:

Jul 12, 2015: Léa experiences microgravity
Aug 10, 2015 Uninterrupted aerobatic figures
Jan 1, 2016: Bonne Année 2016
Nov 3, 2016: Léa's first inverted flight
Nov 27, 2017: "Oh my God!" [CW: Ed Sheeran music]
posted by Johnny Wallflower (8 comments total) 9 users marked this as a favorite
 
There is cuteness here.
posted by GallonOfAlan at 11:53 PM on June 21, 2018


That was pretty much exactly my response to my first aerobatic flight and all was joy until we touched down. At which point my stomach reverted, violently ejecting all contents. Didn't stop me going again though. Flying's ace.
posted by freya_lamb at 2:46 AM on June 22, 2018 [1 favorite]


That little flight suit in the 2017 vid!
posted by kimberussell at 4:12 AM on June 22, 2018


This is hilarious because it captures so perfectly a certain parental moment, that transition from "here's this thing I like to do" to "hey I'm really happy you also like this thing I like to do" to "no, no more, come on now that's enough for today, time to go home".
posted by chavenet at 5:24 AM on June 22, 2018 [1 favorite]


I've probably told this story before, but what the hell:

As a teenager, I worked at the local air field where I got my license. It was my last day at work before heading back to college, and the mechanic - short, stocky Norwegian guy - lumbers out to the front desk. He looks at me and tells me, "Let's go up in my plane. Go over to my hangar and find a flight suit that fits." I wander over and pick out a monkey suit from the 20 or so that he has.

The plane is this guy - A Nanchang CJ6. It's a Chinese military trainer popular in the States because it's a cheap way to buy a chair strapped to 500 horsepower. There was a group of guys in the area that had all bought them, and one of the mechanic's friends brought his over that afternoon as well.

Anyway, by the time I've pulled the flight suit on the mechanic has made his way to the hangar carrying two parachutes. He helps me get strapped in to mine, and then I climb in the back seat. The "seats" are really metal buckets that are shaped to hold the parachute parts - they act as cushions if you're, you know, not actively using them.

I'm getting situated, looking around, and the mechanic (in his heavy Norwegian accent) tells me, "So, if we have to bail out, just leave everything in the plane. Pull on this ball to open the canopy, and then try to climb out on the wing as far you can before jumping. Don't hit the tail on the way down." And then he closes the canopy on me.

The flight ended up being fairly tame - there was low cloud cover so we couldn't do too much high altitude work like loops - but two things still stick out at me. First was the formation flying. We flew point and the mechanic's friend was off our wing by, oh, about three feet. To accomplish this, he fixated on our airplane and did not look ahead ever. That was probably the scariest part of the whole flight.

The second thing that happened was that we did a high speed low pass over the runway. I was looking around, admiring the view, and then over the intercom I hear, "One... two... Three!" and suddenly we were in a high-G turn with the wings pointed at the sky. I was... not prepared for this. My head went into my lap and the world got very very small as I started to lose vision. We pulled out of it right before I completely blacked out.

And that is how I ended my summer working at the airport.
posted by backseatpilot at 5:27 AM on June 22, 2018 [11 favorites]


CW: Ed Sheeran music

You are good people, JW
posted by thelonius at 5:30 AM on June 22, 2018 [4 favorites]


I've always been an acrophobe, and during my one small plane ride--in my dad's plane when I was about 6 or 7--I white-knuckled it the entire time. But Lea's joy is infectious.
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:31 AM on June 22, 2018


My experience in small aircraft has deteriorated over the years as claustrophobia has increased, but I love aircraft, and this was delightful.
posted by lhauser at 7:48 PM on June 22, 2018


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