Deaths, alarms and broken cameras

I had a very varied and interesting day today. I was called to fly to Sandakan then Shenzhen - a gruelling 11 hour duty day starting at 6 in the morning. This sector is notorious for ending late due to Hong Kong flow control.

The first event took place on initial approach to Sandakan. We were descending through a layer of light haze - about 5000ft above sea level - when there was an almighty BANG. Out of nowhere a rather large bird had smacked straight into the Captain's windshield... Well I think it was a large bird judging by the 50cm x 50cm red splat it left behind. The startling thing is we didn't see it come and had it ended up in an engine I think we would have spent the night in Sandakan. I now have a newfound respect for the strength of our windshields.

The second event took place en-route to Shenzhen, about half-way, was the master warning going off as the Captain and I were both busy daydreaming. I don't mind saying my heart and book both made a leap for the ceiling. The FIRE - SMOKE IN LAV warning had just gone off telling us that some faggot had decided to light up in one of the toilets. Fire is a very severe risk on an aeroplane and smoking in the toilet is extremely dangerous due to the amount of flammable paper in the immediate vicinity. Thankfully the cabin crew reacted quickly, admonished the culprit and ventilated the toilet.

The arrival into Shenzhen was spectacular - the sky over Hong Kong was clear and the visibility extremely good for once. There plenty of amazing photo opportunities as we overflew Hong Kong Island, Victoria Harbour, the old Kai Tak airport (whose runway surprisingly hasn't been built on yet) and came very close to some heavy jets on approach to Hong Kong airport. On departure we overflew an equally clear Zuhai and Macau and got a stunning view of the runway in the middle of the bay.

Unfortunately I can't share anything I saw because today was the first day in 6 months that I didn't bring any camera with me Typical.

S.