Unfortunately, it's now only available on a few routes and planes:

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/united-airlines-mileageplus/...

I found it very comforting to listen to it during an entire flight, because you could find out what the pilots of your flight were actually saying about turbulence and flight conditions, including their ongoing efforts to avoid turbulence purely for passenger comfort. You could also hear from other pilots who had recently flown through the same region, discussing how turbulent it was and how long it was likely to last. Among other things, this can reveal that the pilots are aware of the situation and don't consider it threatening.

Part of the scary thing about turbulence can be wondering "do the pilots realize it's so bumpy?" or "are they concerned about this?" or "what are they doing about it?". Most U.S. flights don't really make a lot of passenger announcements about these questions, but if you listen to the ATC communications, you can get real answers (usually "yes", "not at all", and "trying to get a clearance for a different altitude").

In many regions there's volunteer ground-based coverage for live ATC streams:

https://www.liveatc.net/

It's obviously more complicated to identify the particular ATC region that your flight is in (and then manually change to a different stream every time you're handed off to a different controller!), but if you buy in-flight Internet access, you might be able to listen to some of these communications from the air even if you're not on a United flight with channel 9.

The biggest challenge is that ARTCCs (the high-altitude ATC facilities) have subdivided their airspace into sectors with different frequencies.

For instance if you look at

https://www.liveatc.net/feedindex.php?type=us-artcc

you can see the Denver ARTCC (ZDV) is subdivided into more than a dozen different sectors (and there's no guarantee that this list is even complete). So if you wanted to listen to these communications this way, you'd have to take a rather active role in selecting streams and accept that your flight would probably pass through regions with no streaming coverage.

(Edit: for example you might hear "(your flight number), contact Denver center one two eight point three two five, good day" in which case you would want to switch over to the "Denver Center (Sector 14 High): 128.325" stream. If you succeed in switching in time, you should then hear your flight call "Denver, (your flight number) with you at (altitude)". But if you missed this instruction, you might have to spend an inordinately long time listening to random streams in the hope of hearing your flight's callsign, or do significant research on FlightAware to figure out what sector you might be in. Quite a chore compared to United's service...)

https://channel9.msdn.com/About

Probably the cheapest value add the airline had, even for the relatively few that probably cared. Oh well....

https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/8939/can-i-fly-...

(It seems that the rules are meant to avoid having unexpected devices onboard using aviation-related RF energy, rather than to prevent passengers from monitoring aircraft communications.)

But if one can get an old analog FM radio, something can be done eaasily. The air radio band (118 to 136 MHz) is just above the FM broadcast band (76 or 88 to 108 MHz), and airliners use AM modulation rather than FM, but old consumer radio FM demodulators demodulate AM as well, so all one needs to do is retuning the radio on airband frequencies. This can be done by altering some values in the frontend and local oscillator LC stages, but sometimes is enough just to widen the oscillator coil to tune the radio a few MHz up. Nobody should object if you listen to an old FM pocket radio with headphones from your seat.

https://hooktube.com/watch?v=5kvxjNeWMxs

Not a word, nor even a wayward look.

I believe the existing rules would forbid even the use of an FM radio onboard.

https://www.liveatc.net/play/kfwa1_zau.pls

which in turn links to a resource like

http://d.liveatc.net/kfwa1_zau

which you can play in lots of tools (two examples are mpg123 and mplayer).

It taught me two things: what some of the noises, the vibrations, and the movements were; and how hard it is to actually crash a plane. Once you made it in the air, you'll want to try crashing your plane in the game (explosions! fun!), and it will be undoubtedly harder than you imagine.

I now have zero fear of flying. Before playing the sim, I knew rationally what you're also pointing out - that flying is extremely safe, yet I was still afraid. But after playing the sim, I actually believed it.

It's been probably 10 years since I played the simulator, but the effects last.

-Repeated exposure to a realistic flying experience (in our case, it goes gradually since it's designed for people with a fear)

-Specifically learning about some of the different noises planes make

-Getting exposure to the vibrations, noises, turbulence, etc that you'll encounter on a real flight

And on top of that, we teach various techniques for overcoming the fear, give new logical/rational approaches to reinforce how safe flying is, understanding the underlying anxieties and emotions involved in fear of flying, etc.

But we don't teach you how to fly! That would be a very neat addition.

The company is called Fearless. I put up a little Fearless for Flying survey here for anyone interested: https://goo.gl/forms/11dINvQlgSnvOaQE2

I have an Oculus Rift, and would happily pay for such a simulator.

Another major marketing platform is becoming a sponsor of height-based sports, such as rock-climbing and paragliding competitions, or their respective national organizations (such as USHPA).

Hell, some organizations like USHPA may even want to partner with you instead of necessarily you becoming a sponsor. A lot of these organizations could bolster their memberships using new methods of outreach with your help. USHPA is one of the many organizations that I can think of that has a hard time getting peoples' new interest because people think of hang gliding and paragliding as "crazy". Most people, when asked why they don't want to do it, have fear of flight or heights as the main reason.

In short, look to the industries that would benefit from people overcoming their fears. Partner with them, sponsor them, whatever. Create outreach material with them, such as brochures or videos about their sport or niche, and have a plug for your software. Offer a free x-month subscription to your VR app with all new organization memberships. Or do it the other way around: getting a subscription or purchase to your VR app automatically gets you X% discount with partnered trainers in multiple sports: paragliding, hang gliding, sky-diving, GA, etc. Have partnerships with trainers where you send referrals to each other. Use marketing terms like "Always wanted to try X but were always too afraid? Start living life!" I could see that being a successful Facebook or Instagram ad.

I just recalled I wrote an article[0] about my vision of the future in which I mentioned using VR for overcoming fears. If you ever want to chat feel free to reach out to me via the contact details there. Good luck!

[0] https://medium.com/@eblanshey/the-world-is-undergoing-massiv...

My first demo flight in a real plane, the flight instructor told me to do the takeoff. My hand was literally shaking as I advanced the throttle (this was in a Piper Cherokee). I don't think I even got us to full power, but it was enough for us to take off. Then we just buzzed around the Santa Cruz mountains (in the Silicon Valley) and I was pretty hooked after that. I don't even get fazed by big jolts on turbulence any more.

"The Way of the Samurai is found in death. Meditation on inevitable death should be performed daily. Every day, when one’s body and mind are at peace, one should meditate upon being ripped apart by arrows, rifles, spears, and swords, being carried away by surging waves, being thrown into the midst of a great fire, being struck by lightning, being shaken to death by a great earthquake, falling from thousand-foot cliffs, dying of disease or committing seppuku at the death of one’s master. And every day, without fail, one should consider himself as dead. This is the substance of the Way of the Samurai."

I've been told that the anxiety was created by my nearly passing out when getting blood drawn but the mechanism for nearly passing out is different from panic or anxiety. Still, my "exposure therapy" worked. The last time I had my blood drawn I watch a couple of videos the night before but probably didn't even need to.

I wonder if the visualization aspect of jumping out of a plan would also help my nerves. Maybe set a date and then watch YT videos for a few minutes a day on tandem jumping.

Put another way; you become comfortable with being uncomfortable. Believe it or not, you can actually enjoy those feelings.

For 2 out of the 3 people profiled, the OCD stemmed from a fear of something bad happening and that was their way to cope. For one specifically, her mother had a surgery gone wrong and almost died.

The therapy was to have a mock funeral for her mother, go to the hospital and watch her mother have blood drawn and essentially go through all of the motions of having her mother die so that she could process it.

By the end of the treatment (which seemed to be a little ad for only a few weeks) her symptoms were drastically reduced.

Imagine I asked you "Here's a 100 kg object, and it can produce 10 kg of thrust. Can it fly?" It seems miraculous that the answer is yes. I had always known this, but thinking about it anew was amazing to me.

the fear will decrease once the thing you are afraid of becomes more clear/detailed (as opposed to vague.)

Like in all thriller/horror movies, the less you see of the "scary creature" (in a dark place, behind other objects blocking your view, etc.) , the more your imagination will process the scary thoughts and amplify things.

Flight Simulator X is more than a decade old but it's still decent and has an unbelievably large third party library of aircraft, scenery, and other add-ons. The Lockheed Martin developed Prepar3d is an attempt to update the FSX code base and by all accounts is quite good but i haven't tried it myself.

A proper flight sim isn't much fun without at least a stick and it's worth buying one even if it's cheap and doesn't have a throttle.

http://home.flightgear.org/

For your flying example, that might mean to sit and think about just packing for a trip. How does that make you feel?

Then think about driving to the airport. How does that feel?

Then think about boarding the airplane.

Then think about flying calmly.

Finally, think about really rough turbulence.

The idea is to think about each step several times (over many weeks/months) until you are progressively more and more comfortable with the entire process. Often, anxiety about a specific event (turbulent flying) will start well before you experience the turbulence - so by progressively visualizing each step in the process, your mind will begin to better control your body over the entire experience.

This process works for all types of fears: spiders, bridges, going underwater, etc.

However! I’m not a professional - so if it is really bad, then I would recommend going to a therapist - even for just a few sessions - and they can better walk you through the process. Search for “CBT in [your area]” if you don’t know where to start.

Also - if you can’t get over it with just mental exercises, and you really need to fly somewhere - a doctor can prescribe medication that will relax you for the flight (though there are potential side effects - including addiction - so talk that over with your doctor).

Great comment!

1. No one solution will work for everyone, but it's always possible to find something that will help. CBT and its cousins work very well but aren't accessible to everyone (still waiting for a /good/ solution to that, HN) - in those cases I'd encourage people to try some of the distraction and visualization methods, and some of the exposure strategies, described in the comments. (I also like the lottery ticket strategy, it's a great reminder of the odds...)

2. After reading suggestions like these, and even books describing how to /do/ CBT with people afraid of flying, I wasn't better. I knew the right things to say to myself but didn't really believe them. I reluctantly did CBT, and to my great surprise it helped. My experience was that a CBT therapist was very much like a trainer at the gym: I know what to do at the gym, but having someone coach me through it made all the difference.

3. One cognitive strategy that has been helpful to me, in addition to many of the others already noted: force yourself to think, on any given day, about how many flights got where they were going, or at least got somewhere, safely. The answer is all of them. Yes, some were diverted, or returned to the airport - but they all landed. Now, remember that this happens every day - on days with huge storms in the midwest, tornadoes, snowstorms in New England, hail in Florida. For a visual illustration, check out a site like flightaware, and consider just how many commercial planes are in the air at any given time.

CBT helped me a lot and I would love to be able to share it with others.

My email is johnCbogil@gmail.com

I ended up missing weddings and job opportunities because the fear of flying was so intense.

I now fly regularly, and without issue. It took a long time, but I've found a few things that worked for me:

1. No caffeine on a flight day. This helps for any anxiety that may start to build for me.

2. Noise cancelling head phones w/ ear plugs. A lot of my anxiety came from paying attention to the sound of engines. Was something odd happening? Keeping the sound of the engine drowned out helped keep my mind off the mechanics of the airplane.

3. Neck pillow / comfortable clothing. Being warm and comfortable lets me fall asleep, completely avoiding any anxiety that may have otherwise come.

4. Timing flights to avoid common storm times. I'm in Florida, and the afternoon thunderstorms can be extreme. If I can, I try to fly out early in the morning, or late at night when the storms tend to not occur.

I went of my first flight recently, that was the bit that really stood out to me - a little before landing the engines sounded like they powered down to nothing. I had an (internal) freak out, while I watched everyone else continue on like nothing happened. After we landed safely I learned that same lesson - don't listen to the engine. Someone else is driving, and listening won't help.

In addition a couple strong cocktails right before the flight goes a long way to help me relax during take off. That's when I tend to be the most anxious.

Also getting a couple big bottles of water at the airport and bringing them on the plane helps me stay hydrated/comfortable and forces me to stand up and stretch in order to get to the restroom a few times during the flight.

This was a big one for me. I'd also add a 1(b): no alcohol the night before. I'm ok having a glass of wine or something while on a flight, but drinking the night before definitely has the same anxiety-inducing affect that caffeine the morning of has for me.

I was on a plane that experienced an "uncontained, catastrophic turbine engine failure" (Delta 1288) that killed two people a few rows behind me. It was traumatic, and I rented a car and drove home instead of flying, but it wasn't long before I was regularly flying again. Physically, I was completely unharmed, and I got to experience safely leaving a plane through an over-the-wing exit. I learned that even in a worst-case scenario, people can and do survive.

This was 20+ years ago now, but I remember being awed by the performance of the pilots and flight attendants. The plane braked hard right after the explosion, so the pilots clearly noticed it and took immediate action, even though I heard later that people in first class were so far away they didn't initially know why takeoff was aborted. In the moments that followed, one pilot was giving first aid and I saw him run down the aisle - blood on his hands and shirt - to get more help and medical supplies. Yet he was calm and professional throughout.

Some people yelled to "stay calm" or "don't panic", and people listened. Announcements were clear when there was no further danger and how we were to exit.

We were kind of dumped in the terminal at the end of it all, though. I remember an announcement that there were no additional flights that day, so we couldn't get rescheduled until tomorrow. Seriously? There were ambulances, news vans, and Red Cross vans at the terminal almost immediately. The airport was clearly completely closed down - I don't know for how long. And no baggage claim, of course: it took about a week to get our luggage back.

In the weeks that followed, the FAA sent a questionnaire that was extremely detailed. They wanted essays about every aspect of the flight and it took a long time to complete.

A couple of years later, I was on a cruise and met a young pilot who'd just got his first job with an airline. I mentioned this experience, and he said, "No kidding! We totally studied that accident in school!" I find that very reassuring... aviation seems to learn from mistakes and experience better than any industry I've worked in.

This is true, 'band A' throttle is used for takeoff and the first minutes of flight. Perhaps a pilot could chime in here, but I don't think there's any other non-emergency situation that band A would be used in flight.

It's also why jet engines are overhauled on a takeoff schedule. ie some parts have a lifetime of 20,000 cycles (takeoffs/aborted landings)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta_Air_Lines_Flight_1288

Mayday (Air Crash Investigation/Air Emergency/Air Disasters)

Very addictive show (if you like learning about how planes crash)!

That plane probably has had tens of thousands of flights since then without any incidents.

In the case of flying, I accept that these could very well be the last moments of my life and it's too late to get off/turn back now and I'll be damned if I'm going to sit there and spend my final moments suffering and wincing in fear. I relax my body, take a deep breath and try to suck in every bit of life within me - I enjoy myself and everything around me in the moments before (in my head) the plane crumples into a smouldering wreck. Hell, what an experience - to die! You only get to do that once. Twice if you're lucky! You might as well embrace it with open arms! I turn my excitement into curiosity. I rationalise that I'm here now, and I've trusted this pilot with my life, and if it was a mistake, so be it. What will be, will be. Que sera, sera!

Once I put myself in this mindset everything becomes a breeze.

Better not to worry about something I have no chance of controlling.

How does a person die twice?

This type of probabilistic thinking, combined with the acceptance of the lack of control I have over the plane's destiny, tends to be more than sufficient for me. Even if the plane hits turbulence, I know that trained professionals are in control of the situation, and that there is literally nothing I can do to help the situation at that point.

I've found that accepting your own lack of control over a situation is instrumental in confronting all sorts of anxieties. There is nothing I can do, therefore I sit back and relax while enjoying the novelty of the current event.

Also, I always remind myself that the higher up the plane is from the ground, the longer the pilot has to correct things or come up with a plan to land safely if something does end up happening. This won't help with anxiety about takeoffs and landings, but it may help for the large majority of the flight spent cruising at high altitude.

For dealing with turbulence, I gain an amazing amount of comfort by holding onto something rigid- the armrest, the tray table, or if all else fails the front of the seat between the legs. The higher brain functions know better, but this seems to soothe the beast within.

- In the US: In April 18th this year a passenger was killed on a Southwest Airlines 1380. This was the first fatality on major US airlines for 16 years (since American 587). In that period those US airlines carried 10bn passengers on 146m flights without fatality. In that period there were 645,000 road deaths in the US.

- World wide: If you took 2 flights every day statistically it would be about 10,000 years before you were involved in a fatal aircraft accident. You would have ~65% chance of surviving that accident. I note that in the last five years 12 commercial aircraft were totally destroyed with no fatalities or serious injuries.

It might be worth dropping your question into a professional pilots forum, here is one that I believe would respond positively:

https://www.pprune.org/passengers-slf-self-loading-freight-6...

FWIW I have felt fear in an aircraft, and a very good friend of mine was killed on a commercial flight (but not an accident). I still fly (nervously) so it can be done! Anxiousness about flying is far more widespread than most admit to so you are in good company.

Sources: Various including the annual Boeing statsum of aircraft accidents 1959-2016.

I told my doctor about my week long anxiety before flying and how I would cry on strangers randomly throughout a flight convinced they were the last person I would ever meet. He prescribed Xanax and suggested therapy. The drugs helped me keep to myself, but what helped the most was watching planes take off and land at SFO.

I was flying to SFO for work and staying at a hotel nearby, so I would sit and watch planes take off and land. Every time I heard the engines speed up for take off, I would get nervous (and feel myself getting nervous writing this), but after a while, it got to where I could distract myself from the fear when on the plane.

When I wasn't in SFO, I would listen to air traffic control (smooth calming pilot voices!) on my ham radio as prep for an upcoming flight.

Also therapy is amazing for helping me work through various other anxieties.

Good luck! Its not impossible and you are on the right track through looking into statistics and trying to give yourself something concrete and rational to think about.

On a side note, the best way to overcome any fear is to face it, repeatedly. In my fight with flying fear, I forced myself to fly often and longer and longer distances. Secondly, you need to stop negative thoughts in their tracks. Fear is exacerbated by an endless stream of "what if" thoughts that can spiral out of control. I learned to practice mindfulness and stop these thoughts. It takes practice and patience, but you'll find how free you can be from fear when you learn to reject these thoughts.

That's a very misleading figure. In 2017 there were zero (read: 0) accident deaths on a commercial passenger jet. That a Turkish cargo jet smashed into a village in Kyrgyzstan doesn't affect me in the slightest.

Flying on a jet in the USA had a zero accident death record for over a decade. In this millenium, not counting 9/11, American Airlines Flight 587 in November 12, 2001 and Comair Flight 5191 on August 27, 2006 were the only deaths involving a jet. Three more involving turboprops. That's it. In 2019 February we will celebrate the tenth anniversary of the last one. No matter what happens to the plane they land them. It's quite amazing how bad shape some of them are but yet land in one piece.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwest_Airlines_Flight_1380

There was also Asiana 214 in 2013, which caused 3 fatalities when landing in SF.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asiana_Airlines_Flight_214

Aside from those, it also seems disingenuous to exclude turboprops. 49 more deaths happened in America on turboprops during this millennium. That's not an insignificant number.

I said there were only three deadly accidents involving a turboprop -- although I admit not remembering the exact counts for each or are you saying there were more than three?

Regarding turboprops, your comment seems to be dismissive of those accidents as if they were not as important or relevant, which I disagree with.

For an extra $150, you can take a short real flight and return.

[1] http://airhollywood.com/events/fearlessflight/

I also had the luck with learning about flight dynamics, airplanes, and how most unpleasant sensations during flight are well within operational parameters for an aircraft.

1. Think about how many takeoffs and landings happen every minute around the world, and how little you hear about plane crashes. Similar to your random trick.

2. Investigate all plane crashes in the last 20 years and understand if they can happen again today.

3. Understand that everything on a plane has a backup. EVERYTHING.

4. Understand that you WILL die from other things at a 99.999% probability and that you should spend your CPU cycles avoiding them instead. More people died of sickness caused from flights than from actually flying.

5. Understand that turbulence is COMPLETELY natural and has nothing to do with crashing. It is almost impossible to crash from turbulence. (see here: https://www.quora.com/Are-there-any-plane-crashes-due-to-tur...). You are more likely to crash from turbulence due to pilot error who doesn't know what to do in the case of turbulence, compared to the turbulence itself causing the crash.

6. Choose the best airlines, those that you know they will do whatever they can to increase maintenance of airplane parts (which can incur material fatigue over time).

7. Think about the fact that people who fly for a living (e.g. flight attendants and commercial pilots) don't live less than you. Well, minus the sickness stuff.

1. I picture what will happen as soon as I land: who will pick me up or where I will go. Rental car? Hotel? Meeting? Dinner? I just keep picturing what happens after the flight.

2. Reading and podcasts don't help me much as my anxiety will just make me not pay attention. What does work is focused work (writing, programming) with loud music.

3. I always watch the flight attendants for signs of fear. Not once have I seen any, even through pretty rough turbulence. I just focus on their faces to look for anything that might make me nervous (this could, of course, backfire).

4. One strange thing that really helped me was flying in a small plane through bumpy weather. I could see out of the front window in the cockpit from where I was sitting and, for some reason, it was much more fun than it was scary. We weren't heading for a mountain, we weren't that high up, all was OK.

5. I've been told that if the plane rips open for some reason, you immediately pass out from the low pressure so all of the things you're fearing - falling from the sky, hanging on for dear life - won't actually be experienced, worst case. Other crashes are just straight into a mountain or water, in which case you're unlikely to survive. You mentioned not being afraid of dying, which is my feeling as well, so those are comforting thoughts, in a morbid sense.

6. I overheard a pilot talking to a woman on one of my flights and he said that the absolute best way to overcome this fear is to go take a flight lesson or some kind of class that lets you pilot a plane, even for a few minutes. I have not tried this but I'd like to.

That sounds like some kind of mild case of PTSD to me. It's not always super-dramatic shell shock or trauma from war; any fearful event can give you some level of post-traumatic stress. When I was twenty I was run over by a van running a red light and dragged along the road a good way. I was fine, but after that I had a very hard time crossing the street without getting jumpy and having my hair stand on end. If somebody edged out into the intersection to turn left instead of waiting behind the line, it made me freak out and run across or even turn back. It was an extremely physical sensation, like I was losing control of my body with fear. It looked really silly to other people, and I was kind of embarrassed.

I'm fine now. Even going to Southeast Asia and crossing the chaotic roads there which have no signals isn't frightening, where people must steadily walk through a mass of still-moving traffic. I think it was a case of exposure. I had to keep going out there and exposing myself to something I was afraid of. I lived in New York back then, so I was obviously exposed to it countless times every day as a matter of course. Flying might be different because it just happens so much more infrequently.

In any case, I'm not a professional; I hope you'll excuse my amateurish diagnosis and personal anecdotes. I'd recommend talking to somebody with training about your situation and seeing what they think. Don't be embarrassed because this isn't the kind of harrowing event typically associated with post-traumatic stress. It can happen at a lower intensity with everyday fears too.

Step 2: Drink a large beer or whiskey on-the-rocks. Repeat until well-buzzed.

Step 3: Enter the plane and get yourself doing something to take your mind off of it, like music, movie, or book.

Cheaper alternative would be to get little sample shots from your local liquor store before you fly - those are allowed past security, and you can toss it in your orange juice while in-flight. Its a standard part of my carry-on now.

Benadryl will also work if booze isn't your thing.

The thing is, fear of flying is not a rational fear, which you already know. In my experience, irrational fears are best conquered by either chemical means, or embracing the fact that we can't always pick when we die, and for that reason you should always live life to the fullest. The chemicals also help with that idea.

That said, I think it's actually rational to have a fear of flying. It's unnatural and we've only been doing it a hundred years, so our bodies naturally say "this is weird and dangerous."

I think the best thing to do is to use the time flying as an exercise in letting go of the desire to control. Barring you doing something to force a landing, you literally cannot control anything about the outcome of your flight as a passenger.

So, the moment the door closes on your flight, you should focus on how everything following is out of your control. I find it liberating.

Although it seems dangerous, turbulence is really nothing to be afraid of. I would recommend reading either Flying with Confidence [0] or SOAR [1] to learn more.

Think about how often pilots and flight attendants fly and how routine every flight is for them. Commercial aviation is incredibly safe. Even in the very unlikely event that you experience a plane crash, it's quite likely that you survive that crash.

Consider these statistics[2]:

> "In 2016 there were about 163 aviation 'accidents' worldwide, including those involving business jets and military transports as well as jet and propeller airliners.

A grand total of 24 resulted in fatalities, meaning only about 15 per cent of all accidents in this grouping - which themselves are extremely rare events - actually resulted in lives being lost."

I wouldn't recommend avoiding flying since that won't do anything to help your phobia. In the past 3 months I've gone on 11 flights and have 3 more planned next month. I'm actively working on getting over my phobia by flying often so that my brain gets desensitized to flying and doesn't perceive it as a threat.

You can also talk to your physician about your fear of flying and they'll most likely prescribe you something like Xanax to help. There are lots of tools out there to help you get over your fear and I'm confident you'll find something to help you :)

[0] https://www.amazon.com/Flying-Confidence-proven-programme-fl... [1] https://www.amazon.com/Soar-Breakthrough-Treatment-Fear-Flyi... [2] https://www.thesun.co.uk/travel/2535002/plane-crash-survival...

it's totally a night-and-day difference, i used to be terrified of planes and now they're just a mild irritant.

Some airlines will run a "get over your fear of flying" course.

Here are two, but there are others: https://www.britishairways.com/en-gb/information/travel-assi...

https://www.flyingwithoutfear.co.uk/

I was afraid of flying at the time, but was never particularly scared of a plane crashing head first into the house oddly enough. In fact during the time I lived there I got quite into watching Mayday/Air Crash Investigation episodes. Pretty morbid considering.

I lived there for several years, and while I'd like to say that not a single plane crashed in that time, one actually did. It was a small 2-seater prop plane, lost height and crashed into the woods a block away from the house. No survivors. I did not witness the crash as it happened but I did sneak into the area and take pictures of the wreckage (thankfully crews had already removed the bodies). Quite a thing seeing the torn off landing-gear of the plane sitting upright on the ground.

Anyway while I'm sure that tangent didn't help you feel any better, for me the fact that constant commuter air traffic crossed my house for years on end (mostly) like clockwork made me feel a bit more confident about not dying in a plane crash if I ever did fly again (which I finally did, quite relaxing actually). Still not sure how I'd feel about flying on a tiny single-engine prop plane or the like though...

Unfortunately, it's difficult to find good information on it on the Internet (there are both bad descriptions and other things with the same name out there.)

However, since you should engage a knowledgeable practitioner (rather than just reading about it online) to learn about it, this isn't a huge problem.

Just so you know what I'm talking about if you go looking for someone to do this with, I'll sketch the algorithm:

A typical sequence begins with imagining you're seated in a movie theater, the movie screen shows the events you describe, the flight, the turbulence, etc. from a disassociated viewpoint, meaning that you see yourself on the screen (as opposed to seeing what you saw at the time.)

Next, you imagine being in the movie projection booth, watching yourself seated in the theater, watching the movie. This is a double-disassociation, an important point.

Then, you run the movie in reverse.

This process should be done with an experienced and knowledgeable practitioner to guide you.

For some reason[1] this double-disassociation combined with reversing the original event stream completely erases the phobic response.

[1] It would be nice if somebody "did science to" this process, but in the meantime if you can find someone who knows it you can eliminate your fear of flying in about five minutes.

One is that, flight attendants develop reflexes in response to turbulence, so for it to send 2 of them to the floor it must have been some extremely intense and sudden turbulence.

My second thought is that perhaps one of the greatest sources of your anxiety in that situation was seeing them hit the floor. They’re in a position of authority, part of their job is to make passengers feel safe and to protect them if anything goes wrong. And you just saw the people in that role hit the floor and become vulnerable in a moment of extreme duress.

I would suggest letting the airline know during check-in that you have an irrational fear of flying due to this incident. This will cause the attendants in your class to be debriefed on your condition (this is a daily occurrence for them), and they’ll often give you some extra attention during turbulence, or have the pilot make longer or more frequent announcements reassuring passengers during turbulence.

Another thing I might suggest is meeting up with current or former flight attendants in person. Let them know you’re trying to overcome an irrational fear of flying, and they’ll probably have some stories to tell, and I think you might find that reassuring.

You may have already seen most of the world, but your daughter likely hasn’t, and you likewise have yet to see most of it together with her. So I hope you’re able to overcome this fear, because the world’s cities and topography may not have changed much, but there’s still a whole world of new experiences out there. :) good luck!

1) Consider the micromorts of the things you do in your everyday life. Chances are, many of them are higher than flying.

2) Look up flight accidents for recent years. Large airplanes almost never fall out of the sky. If they crash, it’s usually on the ground and survivable. Smaller aircraft are far more dangerous, but you can avoid them. Terror is somewhat localized geographically. You should also look up how many flights there are every day. It’s way more than I expected!

https://flyingwithconfidence.com/

https://www.flyingwithoutfear.co.uk/

If they are worried though... well.. then.. yeah. Also, if you do this, and your daughter is with you, even if you are worried, try and stay calm and not show it. This will comfort your daughter as she is looking to you first.

Edit: One more bonus! If you know someone who flies military aircraft, or know somebody who knows someone, try and talk with them sometime. Take them out for a beer. They'll tell you some things that will make bad turbulence in a commercial jet seem very minor =p Might give you a good relative scale of things.

It's based on exposure therapy / systematic desensitization. It has special sections for turbulence as well as other common underlying fear of flying issues.

I successfully overcame my fear of spiders using Fearless for spiders.

I don't have a cure for myself so I obviously don't have one for you, but here are some ideas:

1. Look at how many flights work out well https://flightaware.com/live/ there's something like a million people in the air at any given time. It's extremely unlikely that your plane will be the unlucky one. Take a screenshot and keep it on your phone.

2. Think through how horrible a crash would be and then just accept that you might die like this. You're going to die eventually and this is far from the worst way you could go. Your family will probably get well compensated which is a plus.

3. Sit in the stable parts of the plane, which I believe is towards the front and over the wing. The tail flexes which makes for much worse turbulence.

4. Consider drugging yourself. I can't do it but lots of people pop an anti-anxiety pill. Your doctor will probably give you some if you tell them you can't fly. It may completely solve the problem by altering your brain chemistry. Not a good idea if you're at risk of developing an addiction.

5. Fly on the high quality airlines with big planes. They don't want to lose those $500 million planes so they generally staff them with good pilots and do proper maintenance.

6. Don't fly when the weather is bad, just because it might feel scarier.

7. Try to avoid flying at night, just because it might feel scarier.

8. Watch pilot videos on youtube to see how incredibly stable modern airplanes are. These machines are incredibly fault tolerant and capable of recovering from severe problems in many cases. They're not flimsy or weak. They're really badass.

I wonder if "developed fear" would be worth studying.

I wonder how widespread an increase in flight anxiety is as airlines add seats to planes and increasingly fly planes at max capacity.

Can that work against a fearful mind though? Look at all of these planes flying safely! Statistically, in a strange way, the chances of a crash are only increasing in light of all of those safe flights I'm watching on Flight Aware.

Spoiler alert: they snap at orders of magnitude more flex than you've ever seen.

Even for very severe turbulence (like you experienced), it's very comforting for me to know (via that video evidence) that even if I haven't seen turbulence this bad, the people that made the airplane definitely thought about it.

Then I watched the video above, and I was like - huh, I've only ever seen the wings move maybe 1% of the max stress test amount, and that was in really bad turbulence.

I stopped worrying that the wings would fall off. Once you know the wings won't fall off, I found it very easy to picture a safe/glide recovery from any other basic accident, and I stopped worrying altogether.

Of course, I can't travel with my own therapist so now I take a half gram of Lorazepam at the start of each flight, a drug that magically removes my fears. I also always get an aisle seat.

I went to the doctor and got a small prescription of anxiety medication and it helped me tremendously. I take a small dose once I get in my seat on the plane.

It doesn’t make me drowsy or feel very different but the extreme levels of terror that I felt before don’t affect me now. I still have to be calm and rational as I’m preparing for my flight but the fear is completely manageable now.

I’ve even taken flights without any medication since and feel so much more at peace. I would have never believed that would be possible before medication.

Your mileage may vary but it has given me my ability (and desire!) to travel back.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benzodiazepine

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta_blocker

both of which are rather fast-acting and very effective for many cases of acute anxiety and other stress responses. Most mental health professionals and primary care physicians should be familiar with these uses. They may recommend trying out the medication before your trip so that you're familiar with its effects.

The benzodiazepines (such as Valium, which someone else in this thread suggested) can be addictive with frequent use, so it may be preferable to get small-quantity prescriptions occasionally rather than stocking up.

Maybe embrace your lack of enthusiasm to fly, it really is not mandatory or even necessary for a happy life. Develop your own perspective on the world and avoid wasting your life sat in airports being frisked by people in uniforms. Take trains, ride a bicycle and question whether you really need to find out about the rest of the world from 30000 feet. Perhaps let the world come to you instead, rather than go on holiday to India spend some time with the Indian folk you work with or live nearby to. Same for every other country, see this approach as better, more cost effective, financially and in time.

There are no pearly gates however, if you just don't fly because that is nothing to do with how you live your life then you need not feel guilt and shame for being complicit in destroying people's right to peace and quiet, not to mention the environment.

Flying isn't what it was, there is no romance in it, it is not special. In the days of Concorde, Trident and when the 747 was new flying wasn't for everyone, you had to be someone to be doing it. You could smoke at your seat then and buy huge bulk packets of cigarettes 'duty free' right there, on the plane. Better? Not necessarily. More exciting? Definitely.

There really is nothing 'time saving' about flying. You can live life to the full without spending a week or two of your year being processed by planes, getting to airports and putting up with delays. Plus there is the time required to pay for all those days flying and the taxi trips. Then if you are not working whilst being processed by Big Aviation then you are not earning. Give the whole lot up and if you do the maths then it is more like a month rather than a few days that you get back per year, time to enjoy living rather than being jet-lagged/flying. Plus those are guilt free happy times - you aren't trashing the skies - and you will be pleased you had this fear of flying thing. Obviously only chuckle to yourself at the antics of those ordinary people doing there ever so busy but tediously dreary flying stuff as they will never give up the Kool Aid.

All the techniques listed here are helpful and may solve your problem in the long term. But honestly there's nothing wrong with taking medicine, especially if it's just when you fly and it makes the experience tolerable. The only potential negative is you can't mix it with alcohol on the plane.

If the extent of your anxiety boils down to "I take Xanax when I fly" then it sounds like you're doing fine!

The second thing that helped me is telling myself that because of how the plane flies, there is effectively a wall of air underneath it propping it up. This wall of air is buttressed by such a strong force, that it behaves much like an actual solid surface.

Third, specifically for turbulence–I've read that the overwhelming majority of turbulence incidents are extremely routine for flight crew. They are nowhere close to any cause for concern. Whenever we hit turbulence, I tell myself that what we're experiencing is nowhere near the level that would affect our flight in any way.

That said, turbulence is always disturbing and in the moment it's hard to force your brain to accept it. What usually works for me is focusing on others–essentially people-watching. Making human contact in those situations always acts as a stress-reliever.

I am not afraid of much, I have sky dived (freaky but sooo fun), rock climbed (scared spitless, but did it) and crazy roller coasters (love the thrill). But as one of my kids was on a crazy coaster I was as afraid as they were.

Maybe seeing them being safe and feeling safe themselves, and seeing them in control (as they got older) is what helped we deal with the uncontrollable terror that struck me when they would shake the chair or lean over the edge.

My own fears, not a problem, I can face them all day long, fear of my kid getting hurt? Logic over emotions, just gotta face it repeatedly until it goes away? (that's the only thing that's ever helped me truly get over fears.)

Edit: This is a trite phrase, but... "the difference between fear and excitement is a smile". It's a little lame, but some people are adrenaline junkies and going to the edge is actually "fun" for them. When I "know" everything is ok, but don't "feel" it, I remember this phrase and try to channel my inner adrenaline-junky. It work often than not, and at least gives me something to do.

I have learned to actually enjoy some things this way. Silly, but when you are out of options, sometimes the ridiculous becomes the only option left.

A day before or the day of the flight purchase a lottery ticket. You'll bring this ticket with you on your flight.

Before you board have a look at the ticket and verbatim tell yourself this: as lucky as you would have to be to win with that lottery ticket, you would have to be even luckier for your plan to crash. You are not that lucky.

Repeat as necessary but do not change the wording.

This works for most people I've counseled.

But I would always have this uncomfortable worry while flying. Any bump would jolt me from an uneasy sleep. I got over my that by facing my fears and fighting the irrational ignorance that came with it by educating myself. I went to my local private airport and asked about a discovery flight. I sat up in the cockpit and saw how a plane works. I asked the pilot what those bumps are and what those sounds are when they happen. I saw his process for taking off and landing, and preparing the plane for each configuration. It contextualized all the noises and horrifically scary (and in hindsight silly) moments where I was certain that the plane slowing down to extend its flaps for landing (like the most normal thing a plane can do) meant we were crashing.

I ended up with about 12 hours of stick time, but I had done enough takeoffs and landings to know that bumps are normal, you don't freak out when your car drives over a pothole, you shouldn't freak out when your plane flies over a patch of bumpy sky.

Planes are built for turbulence- passengers are not.

I didn't use to fear flying until I got my first (and only) panic attack (not in a plane).

The trick I used to fight anxiety was walking around and it always worked for calming me down. But guess what, you cannot get for a walk on a plane so I started fear flights for a fear I might get a panic attack. Long story short after lots of workarounds and googling I found that there's a company called psious[1] (not affiliated with them other than using their product).

You cannot use their system on your own (I asked) you only use it with a psychologist/psychotherapist. Basically it works by exposing you to a simulated flight through VR and the psychotherapist helps you with tools like diaphragmatic breathing [2] and cognitive behavioral therapy [3] to ease your anxiety levels.

To be 100% open/clear I haven't flown yet since I started the therapy but I can tell my mindset has changed from trying to avoid flights at any cost to having booked flights and waiting (a bit anxiously :) but nowhere near at the paralyzing level) to actually fly.

[1]https://www.psious.com

[2] https://www.cmhc.utexas.edu/stressrecess/Level_Two/breathing...

[3]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_behavioral_therapy

Edit: formatting

You just needs some experiences without the anxiety to help your subconscious learn that fear is not a useful reaction to flying.

Simply breaking the fear cycle sounds like the key for you since you learned the fear recently rather than had it from some buried childhood experience.

Another good thing to try if you don't want meds is to accept the anxiety rather than overcome it. While panic comes on observe what it feels like, let it wash over you, acquiesce to it. This has worked for me in the past with panic attacks, it is quite effective if you can get yourself into enough presence to try it. You'll find that underneath the panic or anxiety is nothing, do some belly deep breathing to help, and maybe learn a bit of light meditation to take yourself deeper. But seriously, beating anxiety in general is more about allowing it than rejecting it.

It sounds daft, but I used to repeat a phrase in my head when flying: "safe, calm, happy". It's more of a psychological trick than anything else, but I found it helped me to adjust my thinking at moments.

Recently, I took a role which meant working abroad, and then I realised that I would need to be doing quite a lot of flying to get back for various events. In July I've flown 9 times, 2 of which were on a propeller plane (Bombardier Q400). The experience of doing that many flights means that I don't experience any anxiety when flying, but I still tend to strap myself in a bit more tightly whenever there's some turbulence.

Oh, and the other thing that helps is sitting next in the window seat - being able to look out the window when the plane is taking off, in flight and landing helps. You also get to see some great views.

Two things, the first being rationalization, the second being more immediate:

1. I read that a plane has never crashed from turbulence. If somehow this is not true HN audience, please don't inform me otherwise. A crash every X million miles or flights isn't that concrete for some reason, but "never" makes me less scared some turbulence is going to knock the wings off. Along the same vein, I think the last US commercial passenger crash was in 2009. That's more concrete than the statistics. Nine years since the last crash. Pretty good.

2. I got a prescription for some benzodiazapenes for flying. I was stuck in some kind of feedback loop, where I was initially kind of scared of flying, there'd be some minor turbulence, which would make me freak out, which would be unpleasant and give me additional anxiety about flying. White-knuckling a flight for however many hours is unpleasant enough to fear itself. Also, my primary fear was the same of yours, I was afraid of feeling afraid as I was dying. Taking the benzo made me think, "if I'm drugged maybe the descent won't be so bad," which helped acutely, and over time it made me have more tolerable flight experiences. After flying three or four times without a fear in the world I forgot my benzos and found that my fear of flying now still exists, but can be rationalized away much better than before. Unless you fly multiple times a week, drugging yourself through the experience isn't generally a bad idea. Flying sucks so much even without fear that it's kind of a preferable way to go anyway.

A few things cured me. I watched alot of aircraft carrier landings, especially in bad weather. Even in those conditions the plans land nearly every time. I realised that in contrast, passengers jets are nothing more than highly reliable, safe slow buses.

Also I came to realise something about courage. Fear of flying is being scared about something that has not yet happened. So I simply decided I would be scared when a plane was actually crashing. That's courage - not being overly concerned about something until it actually happens.

The other thing is to understand that the physics of plans is really on your side, especially during landing - these things are incredibly stable as they land and the design of the plane is forcing it down during landing .... it's really highly unlikely something will go wrong.

And finally I thought about the statistics - you are literally more likely to die in the car ride to the airport than on the plane.

My advice is learn and think about this on the ground, when you're not getting ready to take a flight, or at the airport, or on a plane - that way you're not having a psychological response and can think more rationally about these things. There's nothing worse than having a panic attack on a plane and having your companion urge you to think about probabilities :p

[0] https://newyork.cbslocal.com/2012/06/20/passengers-describe-...

I find that reading, or movies completely relax me because it takes my mind away from thinking about bad things that might happen, which are not in my control.

Maybe a puzzle, sudoku, cross word?

what is something you enjoy most? Find that out, and carry it with you.

get a better boarding position, pay if you have to. settle down, relax, stay hydrated, get some noise cancelling headphones.

if watching out the window makes it worse, dont do it. focus on whatever activity you picked up.

if a turbulence happens, my thinking goes like this - "if this were a bus or a car, would this level of turbulence make me worried?", the answer is always No. if it gets worse, allow yourself to be scared. dont hold it back, say it out loud to your neighbor or to yourself --- "ooh, that was rough. " verbalizing our fears help us stay less panicked.

hope my tips help you.

travel safe and enjoy the wide open skies

Now that I have a wife and live in Australia, I routinely have to take 14h flights to get back to Europe.

14 hours is a long time without touching the ground.

Lately, I have started developing a fear of flying.

I guess my problem is the lack of control. The thought to have to let somebody else be in charge of my life is a bit upsetting. No amount of rationalization can overcome my fear.

I have read the statistics and I still feel afraid. I Have started experiencing mild panic attacks. My head starts spinning, I am sweating profusely, my palms and wet and my heart is raising and I am grabbing the armrest in a desperate attempt to not die. Even the slightest turbulences now upset me.

I think I need some help, maybe therapy or medication.

My next flight is in 6 months from now and I am already starting to be afraid of it. Even just reading this thread made me feel uncomfortable.

Now, I still don't like turbulence, but my fear has mostly gone away. The reasons are 1) having been through enough insane definitely-gonna-die-now turbulence and not died to build my faith in the technology, and 2) knowledge about the statistics and rarity of airplane crashes. All I can suggest is hammering those two into your brain and letting your rationality take over.

Now if only I could figure out a solution to my fear of heights, which I'm currently convinced is pretty rational... (edit: fear of edges/cliffs would be more accurate I suppose since the height of flying doesn't bother me...)

I know how hard they train, how much they know and how hard it is to crash. I know a plane can land gracefully by itself, that there are at least three redundant navigation systems and at least two landing system, and that on a civil plane all these systems are duplicated because there is more space to put them. I know a plane can land with only one engine, and in some cases with no engines at all.

I know that when I fly I'm one inch to certain death, but I also know that that's an inch I'm very hardly going to cross.

I know all this but sometimes I'm anxious too. I guess it's normal, I just have to think rationaly or not think at all with a book or a good sleep.

When you realize you have a higher chance of dying in a car accident than a flight things are put in perspective. You won't have a choice in either case anyhow, shit just happens. Accept that some things are out of your control and you take a gamble at everything you do in life. Not everyone wins.

In the 1980s I was on a regional flight that had to come back around and land after a cracked engine manifold caused a small fire that burned a grapefruit-sized hole in the cowling. It was a wide circle and a smooth landing, but I didn't care for it. After that, I really didn't want to get on anything smaller than a 737.

Some time later I found myself on another puddle jumper. The fellow across the aisle was another nervous flier, it seemed. He was deeply unhappy to realize that the woman collecting tickets at the steps was the co-pilot, so that there was an all-female cockpit. That and the mild turbulence kept him unhappy for the duration of the flight. My amusement killed my nervousness, which has not returned.

What's helped for me is imagining how many flights take of and land safely around the world each day. It's very very rare that a plane crashes, I don't know what the odds are but they're very small. There's a higher risk of being involved in an accident on the way to the airport.

Someone once told me that in order for a plane to crash 16 critical mistakes have to made in a row or something like that. Very unlikely.

It may help for you to watch or read information that details all of the safety that's done around flying so you'll feel more confident next time you fly.

Ultimately you can only concur your fear by facing it.

Of course the safest way not to die on a plane is not to get on a plane. The safest way not to die of starvation is not not to eat. They are not equal.

The flight attendants got back to their feet and will do so again and again, and the pilots will train again and again, and the engineers with check and test every part again and again.

One coping mechanism I recently came up with is that I realized it's not so much the fear of crashing that I have (I've been able to rationalize about how turbulence != crash), but it's more that when the turbulence starts, I hate the unpredictability of it - I have no idea if the next bump is a small one, a big one, or one so big it will cause panic in the cabin. Thus even the smooth waits in between become angst-filled.

On a recent vacation, on the ground, I ended up playing with my kids on a "parkour" playground, running up and down hills, jumping on trampolines, getting the same feeling in my stomach and inner ear as a bumpy plane ride. So once I was back on the plane and we hit some turbulence, in my mind, I visualized myself running around that playground again. I know this sounds silly, but it worked wonders. When the bumps came, my mind was already prepared as it was pretending running and jumping on a trampoline. This helped me cope a lot, by taking me to a different place.

Many people mentioned hearing pilots attitudes towards turbulence helps and I can totally see that. However, one thing that I wish they wouldn't do is announce before the flight that a) it's going to be a smooth ride or b) there will be some bumps along the way. For me, at least, in scenario (a), if we hit some unexpected turbulence that makes it worse for me because I know the pilots weren't expecting it and (b) if they say there will be a bumpy ride, I'm bracing myself the whole time and I've been on flights like that where they ended up being 100% smooth :/

After several years, I still haven’t completely regained my former lack of flying anxiety, although avoiding smaller aircraft has helped. It’s not really even anxiety about flying itself, but about having another panic attack, and specifically anxiety about triggering it by falling asleep in-flight.

At the end, it all came down to three things:

1. Learning about aviation as a hobby

As software engineer, it was very easy to get invested into learning about these wonderful machines and how everything around them works. As soon as you understand what is going around you, all the safety measures, redundancies etc., you feel more in control of your environment. Weird noises don't come as surprises anymore[1]. To help you with this I'd suggest following some aviation related channels on Youtube.[2]

2. Flying a lot

I had to spend a couple of years flying 4+ times per month. Having a ton of positive experiences on airplanes does wonders to your uncouncious fears.

3. Flying upper classes

This is a lot harder to do, depending on your financial condition. I do my best to pick a good seat for my flight, hunt for upgrades, use miles to get business/first tickets. Flying on upper classes does wonders to "soften" your experience.

[1] Some examples:

- Airbus flap actuators are usually very noisy and you can hear them if you sit close to the wings.

- Hydraulic actuators on some Airbus models make a barking noise.

- While sitting upfront on smaller planes, you can get some vibration right after liftoff due to the front landing gear spinning before it is retracted.

[2] Suggested channels:

Captain Joe: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC88tlMjiS7kf8uhPWyBTn_A

Mentour Pilot: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwpHKudUkP5tNgmMdexB3ow

Reading this book will give you an understanding that probably the episode of turbulence resonated with some other past experience(s), and had a multiplicative effect on your fear. These effects are deeply engrained in the unconscious mind, and are hard to deal with through rational or conscious thoughts.

The book guides you through a process to work on these issues.

What helped me was the sight of the shuttle driving us from the airport to the city almost rear-ending somebody who cut it off. I realized then that aside from spacecraft the machines we use are highly dependable - it's the interaction with other people that's the most dangerous thing.

Currently the moment we're in the air I'm calm, but there's still some residue anxiety during takeoff and landing.

I don't fly a lot now though because the level of comfort comparing to a car is abysmal.

You need to accept your own mortality and that tragedy is an inevitable part of being human. Even your own family can experience it, and that tragedy could occur on a plane.

With that all said, the odds are very bad that you'll crash, but you only have two ways out of this: you convince yourself that it will never happen, or you accept that it could.

Try to think of it like a roller coaster: your reptile brain is freaking out but you know it’s not actually in danger.

And to certify an aircraft they hire pilots to take off and land for two or three years continuously. As well he said it is manually impossible to crash an airplane. Bad things can happen but you would need many in a row for anything to happen. All in all, lots of people work really hard to keep us safe.

[Edit] "Disorder" isn't really the best word for it. You're just kinda stuck in a little loop. It's really not that bad and you shouldn't feel bad or get down on yourself for feeling it. But, on the same token, the avoidance behaviors aren't going to do you any favors.

part of what helped me is my mother's job working as the business manager for a local hangar and airplane mechanic. hanging around the hangar i saw how many hours went in to maintaining even the smallest two-seat planes. i heard about how many hours pilots logged before they could even look at a small regional jet. the mechanics, pilots, and engineers working on those commercial planes are all the best of the best.

turbulence: when a plane is between 20-40k feet, what feels like a catastrophic drop is, subjectively, not a big deal. sure it's scary and the plane bounces around but the plane will not go down in turbulence. it may drop 10, 20, 50 feet. but you still have 19950 to go before problems arise.

finally, don't psych yourself up reading the manuals about what to do if things go wrong. don't even listen to the presentation. put some headphones on and look out the window at all the people working hard to make sure you and yours arrive at your destination safe and sound.

hope this helped even a little bit. flying is stressful even when you're not scared, but it allows for so much freedom.

I assume he has a pilot's licence by now.

The owners, insurers and operators do not want to risk that investment.

I've almost entirely lost my fear of flying since, even in turbulence. I take about 100 flights a year and 150k miles a year.

Then think how many car crashes there are.

Fun fact: on average 2 people die every day in an air crash. Wow... guess how many die in car crashes per day?

How do you feel when you get into a car?

What you gather after watching dozens of episodes is that almost all accidents happened many years ago before modern planes and regulations and/or due to an exceedingly rare confluence of events.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_training

Basically doing some instruction in a flight simulator with a real instructor seemed to help her out quite a bit when nothing else seemed to work.

Granted it is a small plane, but it crashed. Of my friends, 1 is paralysed and the other is dead. The pilot is dead too.

I've always wanted to take some aerial photos, but now I'm having second thoughts about being in a small plane. I have no reservations about getting on a jumbo jet though.

I travel a lot for work, unfortunately. I try to close my eyes and listen to the same music every takeoff, which helps a little.i guess. Never found a solution for bad turbulence mid flight though.

https://www.aviationweather.gov/

2) get a prescription for klonopin, and take 1/2 or 1/4 a pill 30 minutes before boarding. (not im not a doctor)

Why don't you try to take flying lessons ? Or at least the basics:

- Weather

- How a plane works, flies and such

- Wind, current, clouds, etc.

Often times your local flight school will offer an inexpensive "discovery" flight lesson for <= $100.

Alternatively, if you're in the SF area I've heard these folks are fantastic: https://www.fofc.com/

I tried a several different strategies that I researched, but I completely eliminated my anxiety by imagining that I was riding in a big Greyhound bus and we kept running over some really big pot holes in the road.

It seems silly to me, but it works great for me. I feel totally calm even during pretty heavy turbulence.

https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stall_(flight)

2) Airliners are designed as stable instrument platforms, so it's unlikely you've been in an airliner that stalled.

Read up on the science of turbulence and how robust these planes are. I occasionally still get waves of fear esp when they are descending fast with turbulence. But after really studying what turbulence is and how strong planes are engineered you will realize that it is very very unlikely turbulence would ever take down a plane.

I learned to fly from a lady who took her first lesson that way, on the recommendation of a therapist. She ended up an aerobatic instructor!

If that doesn’t stop me, then turbulence shouldn’t stop or scare you. Treat it like a roller coaster ride and enjoy the fake rush of nervious energy and live your life!

Pilots are like dentists: When they are about to do some work, and they tell you "it is going to hurt a little" you can be sure it is going to feel like hell. So when a pilot tells you you will get some light turbulence, you can be sure it is going to shake like crazy.

1 in 114 chance of dying in a car crash vs 1 in 9281 chance of dying in a plane crash. You can verify this anecdotally...we all know someone who has died in a car crash (I know at least 6 close friends and relatives who have), but nearly no one knows someone who died in a civilian plane crash.

But his fear is irrational so I don't know if statistics will help. Most people are afraid of sharks, lightning strikes, and snake bites even those these events are extremely rare, and nearly no one fears heart disease or cancer which are the top two causes of death by a factor of tens of thousands. 600k people will die of cancer this year vs maybe 500 plane deaths.

1. Per hour vs per mile is a completely different stat. Every hour in a plane is possibly more dangerous than every hour driven by a cautious driver. Of course it's true that you can cover far more ground in a 500mph plane.

2. Most Americans drive a lot more than they fly so even if they were equally safe there would be far more fatalities in cars per capita.

3. You can do a lot to mitigate your chances of a fatal car accident, like choosing a safe car, practicing defensive driving, not driving in the rain, not driving drunk, not driving at night, etc. A cautious driver will have a far lower chance than the average stat.

4. Also, driving is quite scary. I can't wait for a world with computer controlled cars that rarely crash.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviation_safety

Can you provide a citation for the per hour stat?

> It is true that to drive 12,000 miles would take 12,000 hours...

Uh, what? No one drives 1mph. It's just 200 hours at 60mph.

> That said you are also more than 50,000x as likely to die in a car accident.

Based on what stat? The wiki page said that per mile traveled it's 750x times higher. But this still doesn't address the per hour safety. Or the fact that people probably drive 1000x more than they fly or whatever the number is.

It also doesn't address the main point which is that many fatal accidents involve drunk driving, etc. So your individual risk factor might be incredibly different from the average. Unlike with flying where you have almost no control over your own safety and the average is very meaningful.

I didn't do the math before, but let's try some back of envelope math. You can estimate it based on mileage. Assuming that a car averages 50mph and a jet averages 500mph, then you spend 10x as long in a car as you do in a jet per mile flown. So if you are 750x more likely to die per mile in a car than in a plane, then you are 75x more likely to die per hour in a car than in a plane.

Uh, what? No one drives 1mph. It's just 200 hours at 60mph.

Yeah I accidentally pasted the 12000 where the 200 was supposed to go

Or the fact that people probably drive 1000x more than they fly

This is actually an interesting question. It would be very difficult to compare because there is a population that drives extensively and perhaps never flies (e.g. taxi, delivery, truck drivers), and a population that flies extensively and never drives (e.g. Wall Street banker, flight attendant, student traveler). As an example, I drive about 14k miles a year and fly about 20k (round trip to the Philippines is 14k alone and I do that every year). I can see most of the population never flying at all, in which case they drive infinitely more than they fly?

A quick look at the stats show that most fatalities involve distracted driving, speeding, drunk driving, bad weather, not using seatbelts, etc. And there's even more variables like vehicle type, speed, urban vs rural, etc.

Another major factor is averaging short flights with long flights because the biggest danger for planes is in take-off and landing. 10x200 mile flights is far more dangerous than 1x2000 mile flight.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transportation_safety_in_the_U...

https://crashstats.nhtsa.dot.gov/Api/Public/ViewPublication/...

http://www.iihs.org/iihs/topics/t/general-statistics/fatalit...

I remember finding a government site with these kinds of stats decades ago when fighting a red light camera ticket and finding that something like 95% of red light accidents came more than 10 seconds after a light turned red, but that 95% of red light camera tickets were issued during the first 1 second after a light turned red. I ended up getting the ticket dismissed because I convinced the judge that my red light running was harmless because it was half a second after the light changed.

It's somewhat funny- we should be more terrified of cars than of planes!

For me, facts don't help. Visualizing it helps. See https://flightaware.com/live/. I love thinking about the fact that all of those planes that you see on that map will land safely because there will not be any airline deaths in the United States today or this month or most likely this year or for years to come. Many will go through turbulence worse than you've experienced. Some will have to return to the gate for little issues. But all will take off and land and be fine.

Until the recent Southwest accident this year there wasn't an airline accident in the US since 2009. If you fly in the US there aren't deaths per day, per month or even per year. The US went 9 years for 1 death on large scheduled commercial flights.

Even if one plane on that map had one accident with 1 death, today... You aren't lucky enough to be on that plane. If you told me that one plane on that map had Madonna on it, I'd tell you I'm just wouldn't be lucky enough to be on that plane.

Compare the turbulence you feel on the plane to the turbulence in your car. More often than not you will experience way more bumps in your car. The turbulence in your car is more dangerous to you than the turbulence on a plane.

If you want less turbulence than sit closer to the wings. The plane pivots around the wings and I often sit there and see people bouncing around in the front and back but barely feel anything from where I sit.

The larger the aircraft the more experienced the pilots are. The airline jobs used to be (not sure now) hard to get, so you are always going to have extremely qualified people flying your plane. Even when flying on (what my mom calls) a putt putt plane, the pilots on those aircraft have so many hours of flying it's insane. Airlines pilots are often just really boring people (sorry pilots). Your flight may be one of 4 they are doing that day and one of 12 they are doing that week depending on the distance.

Everything is planned out. I mean everything. Even the extremely rare idea of an engine failing during take off. You will be fine even if that happens. http://qr.ae/TUIWQI. Which it won't happen to you, again you just aren't lucky enough.

The turbulence you are scared of is not what brings planes down. They can withstand insane amount of turbulence, way more than you can imagine. That is why the wings flex. So even if you have turbulence that pops opens the luggage bins, it just isn't the thing that causes a plane to crash. A plane doesn't even bat an eyelid from that type of turbulence.

The things that have caused planes of the past to crash, have a really nil chance of happening today, because when bad things happen they fix them so they never ever ever happen again. Millions and millions of dollars go towards researching and fixing the problem.

Even small accidents cost airliners insane amounts of money and horrible PR. That recent Southwest flight accident will wind up costing Southwest Airlines > $100 million dollars. You can bet that they are going to research the crap out of that accident to make sure nothing like that ever happens again.

If all that fails, go to your doctor and tell him that anxiety is preventing you from living your live because of a fear of flying (it is) and he will prescribe you an anti anxiety medication to take ONLY on flights. After which, I promise, you will LOVE flying and you can live your life again.

1) Limit flying, of course. Find a job that doesn't require travel by plane. Keep family and friends in the same locale if possible.

2) Comfort yourself with statistics. Cars on fast roads with no barriers are pretty dangerous. There's a low chance that you will be one of the unlucky few hundred that die on a plane every year out of tens of millions of passengers.

3) Benadryl + sleep strategies. If I have a morning flight, I stay up all night before hand and then take 2-3 benadryl right before boarding. It takes about 40 minutes to work, and it hits like a truck.

4) Let go of things you can't control :) Hard one....

I'm a big plane buff so my problem used to be that I knew just enough to scare me - in my opinion, being rational rarely helps matters when you're in the moment. With that said, you should be aware of a few things.

1) Turbulence isn't dangerous to an aircraft. Very extreme turbulence is part of the design process of all aircraft - they test the airframe so that the wings can bend almost 30 degrees!

2) Even when going through turbulent air, the plane is not moving a significant amount compared to the height you are flying at. Very extreme turbulence might push you up or down several feet. You're traveling 30,000ft + above the ground. As long as you keep your seatbelt on you should be perfectly fine.

However, there are some things you can do to ameliorate these concerns when you're booking travel.

1) Fly on larger, more stable aircraft. Prefer A32X's, 737's and up over commuter jets or turboprops.

2) Pick seats near the wing. Generally turbulence is less well felt near the wings of the aircraft compared to the back or the front.

I recommend getting a window seat so you can distract yourself and watch the beautiful scenery. Plus it can feel more "synchronous" when you see your plane enter a thick cloud, then feel a few bumps. And as another poster said, don't drink caffeine.

Your bad experience was probably a 1e-5 event, so it probably won't happen to you again.