Morgans wrote:

Q. So what if it was a mechanical problem, with an airplane that was well
maintained, well equipped, with a pilot that was well qualified to
fly in
weather like the crash weather? Who is there to get angry at...?

A. The person who risked everything in his world for an insignificant
payoff, in a game widely understood to be especially designed to
snare the arrogant fool.

If he had lost the house and the car in Vegas, we'd be all for shuffling
him off to a 12-steps program for gamblers. But since attempted the same
thing that some of us do, we just convince ourselves that it was an act
of God, or use some other mechanism for diverting attention from
ourselves and our own foolishness.

The question to ask is not, "what are the odds of something going
wrong?, but, "what are the odds of things turning out well when it does
go wrong?" And it will go wrong. That kind of thinking is the difference
between the "civilians" and those who intend to do the thing, and keep
doing it, for 30 or 40 or 50 years. It's always a matter of "when?",
not, "if?" Things are equally likely to go to hell on your 10th flight
as on your 10,000th.

Just about every year, some fool puts his Piper or Cessna into Lake
Michigan, or even little Lake Erie, because they can't be bothered to
take a longer route or, at the very least, to climb high enough to
ensure a safe emergency landing "feet dry". Some of them even do it at
night in the winter. It's easy to say they deserve what they get, but
their passengers, and the families left behind, do not.


Jack