Oh, believe me I warned my wife we wold be doing maneuvers that might make
her sick, but she wanted to come anyway. I told her several times before we
got in the airplane I was worried she'd get sick. During the flight I did
ask her frequently if she was doing okay, and she gave me the thumbs up each
time. Afterwards she told me she was doing okay during the stall and steep
turns, but got feeling sick while I was shooting some touch-and goes at
Waupaca, Wisconsin. Then we flew back to Brennand Airport, which has a very
tiny runway, and on the first landing and taxi-back is when she told me she
needed to get out of the airplane. She's flown with me almost every time
since I started flying again a year and a half ago, and this is only the
second time she has been sick. The first time she was riding up front, we
were getting bounced around by turbulence quite a bit, and airsickness came
on pretty suddenly. She was convinced that time it was something she'd
eaten for lunch, and not the rough air that did her in.
Scott Wilson


On 7-Aug-2005, Dave S wrote:

Scott, I would be concerned that you took a non-pilot (ok, I am ASSUMING
the wife is a non-pilot) up on a flight where you were going to be doing
stalls, steep turns and slow flight. These can be quite uncomfortable
for a non-pilot, and they "feel" much different from the back seat
(different sight picture, different position relative to the "fulcrum
point" for the control surfaces).

I am just a low time guy with about 450 hrs or so, but the few times I
have been near airsickness have been in the BACK while someone up front
was doing maneuvers (or was a bad stick in general).


Whenever you take folks up, especially if its a rough day or poor
visibility day, check on them early and often for discomfort, and modify
the flight to the point of aborting if you have to. It sure beats
scrubbing puke out of carpets or washing it out of a flight bag.

Dave