Please share your personal stories about flights with heavy turbulance. This topic sparked my attention when I heard about the Virgin Atlantic problem when the Flight Attendent shouted “We’re all gonna die” when the plane dropped 8000ft sharply. I know mine was in January when i flew to SAN from ORD on an AA MD-80. It was about an hour into the flight when the plane really started to rock back and forth and up and down. People were freaked but I enjoyed every second of it. It was by far the worst turbulance I’ve been in during a flight. I excitement stopped when my coffee spilled onto my lap. It was poured just before it happend b/c the flight attendents scurried to get the cart back to the galley b/c the plane was really rocking.
1967 on a World Airways 707 flight from LAX to Long Binh, RVN.
Details are too long to post here, suffice to say we hit CAT, plummeted 30K feet in a few minutes and lost an engine, complete with nacelle and pylon!
When I say “lost” I mean the engine separated from the aircraft due to wing snap as the pilots attempted to pull out of the dive we were in! Thought they were going to pull the wings off her.
Diverted to Naha, Okinawa where most of us, certainly all the pilots on board, kissed the ground as we deplaned.
Boeing builds STURDY aircraft.
Regards,
James
Few weeks ago in a Piper Malibu. Flying to BFE (not an airport, but a saying) Kansas. If you looked on a weather map, straight into an “L”. We couldn’t find smooth air to save our lives. From 3500 - FL175, getting tossed around like a rag doll. Even my FIL said that day was the worst flight he had ever had. Both directions sucked. I wound up with an IV for loss of fluids on the way back since everyone but my FIL got sick.
It was not a Flight Attendant but a passenger who panicked during the VS turbulence incident.
pika1000 wrote:
Few weeks ago in a Piper Malibu. Flying to BFE (not an airport, but a saying) Kansas.
Don’t forget to go to the LINGO thread and add the acronym…how could we have overlooked that one!
i was on Continental erj 145 from cleveland to orlando. i had to go to the bathroom so i did when i was in the bathroom the seatbelt light came on because of turbulance. So im in the rocking all around woundering whats going on. So i step out and walking back to my seat was a trip and a half i would rock one way and the plane would rock. finally i got to my seat and it was over with but still have a good memory of it. Luckly i had good aim and didn’t miss…much. 
From Cancun, Mexico to BWI - flying in a 727-200 over Florida (I would later learn that at the time, there was a breakout of several tornadoes in the area), we hit some pretty violent shuddering type of turbulence. I normally don’t give a second thought to typical, run-of-the-mill kind, but this had me a little bit “rattled” you might say. I was looking around the cabin at other passengers to see their reactions. Their reactions…? They were all pretty scared and looking around the cabin to see the other passengers’ expressions too! I know it lasted about five minutes or so, but it seemed like an hour!
On a Delta flight from CVG-RSW we were about 2 hours into the flight and we were starting our decend. Whe I saw the clouds below us I knew we were in for a bumpy ride! Sure enough as we were passing through the clouds the plane started shaking, and the fligh attendant came on and said “Ladies and Gentlemen we are experiencing severe Turbulence.” It was quite fun, but when my drink spilt on me things went downhill from there… Finally we got through the clouds and landed safely in Fort Myers!
I was climbing out of KPSP in a Citation. We had just dropped off two passengers and the ride in had been “sporty” but nothing terrible. I knew we were going to be rocked so I kept the speed back at the turbulent air penetration speed. Climbing through about 8,000 or so it started to get really rough. All at once there was a great upheaval and rolling moment followed by a zero g float. All the stuff in the pockets of the cockpit came out, floated for a second between us then shot down the aisle of the airplane. When we got home we also noted that the lid to the lav had opened and blue lav water was all over the bathroom. That was the one and only time in my life I have encountered by the letter of the definition “moderate” turbulence.
On an American Eagle two-prop engine from La Guardia to Boston 1991. The weather was awful and the pilot should have known better. No visibility. We were rocked inside the plane. One passenger didn’t have his seat-belt adjusted and he hit the cabin roof and then slammed down on an armrest at an awkward angle. I could hear many passengers losing control of their stomachs and bowels, the stench was unberable. I kept looking out the window and could see nothing but the heavy reflection of the landing lights in the rain and clouds. Lightning flashed, I thought it hit the wing, because the bang was so loud. It also turned out to be a very long flight, because usually it’s a fifty minute flight from New York to Boston. Not this one, it lasted one hour and forty-minutes. The landing at Boston’s Logan airport, was horrific.
Good Lord, I think we have our winner. That sounds like an absolute nightmare, Highflier1. Um…Congratulations? 
