Shmucks of the Week: Hammered airline pilots

Pilots are casual enough as it is. Whether explaining why you've been sitting on the tarmac for 45 minutes or forecasting the Hail-Mary-inducing turbulence ahead, they're always so relaxed. It's as if they're unaware that they're guiding a massive piece of metal through the sky. And now we know they're...

By Joe Tone

November 13, 2009

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Pilots are casual enough as it is. Whether explaining why you've been sitting on the tarmac for 45 minutes or forecasting the Hail-Mary-inducing turbulence ahead, they're always so relaxed. It's as if they're unaware that they're guiding a massive piece of metal through the sky.

And now we know they're so damn chill. They're all hammered.

Okay, maybe not all of them. But at least three have been arrested in the last year for trying to fly while trashed, including Lakewood's Erwin Vermont Washington, who got popped for FUI this week. And for the previous several years, about one pilot a month has tried boarding a plane while shit-canned.

Apparently these pilots -- these men and women charged with carrying us and our clothes around the skies -- are barely hanging on to their sanity. From USA Today:

One unidentified United pilot tells the Tribune's Julie Johnsson the recent incidents hint at an "industry that is running on the ragged edge... It's a completely different life than people think."

Super. So even the sober ones are on the verge of hanging themselves in the tiny bathroom.

In summary, pilots are hammered, and we're all gonna die because of it. So you can probably understand why hammered pilots are our Shmucks of the Week.

Meet more shmucks in our Shmuck of the Week archive.

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