Commercial airline pilots have reached a rarified pinnacle of trust and respect in modern society. They have a responsibility for our safety every time we board a plane and even though most of us have a fairly good grasp of the physics of flying, we believe that the pilot is competent enough to know what keeps that massive vehicle with us and all of our luggage in the air. And we trust he is well-trained to keep the aircraft safely aloft. But just like police and politicians who have occupied that same pinnacle over the years, when one falls from such a state of grace, that fall comes particularly hard. Such is the case of the two pilots for Northwest Airlines who recently overflew their destination by 150 miles before being alerted by a member of the cabin crew that they were scheduled to land in five minutes but had yet to descend from their cruising altitude of 37,000 feet. Certainly, piloting an airplane has come a long way since the days of World War I when pilots in open cockpits engaged in dogfights while their gunmen fired bullets at their adversaries. Today, commercial jets fly on autopilot for much of their journeys and could take off and land by computer if absolutely necessary. Pilots, some say, have become little more than glorified bus drivers. Pilots certainly deserve to be accorded their rarified status but they also deserve conditions of work that correlate with such status. They deserve high salaries and they deserve enough time to rest between flights. In return for that, they are obligated to stay in tip-top physical and mental condition and to follow airline safety rules to the letter. After all, in a time that air travel has become as common as riding a camel once was, the safety of passengers cannot be overlooked. __
