Well Snapaduece I have a story for you!
I took a flight home this year from LAX to DTW for Thanksgiving on a A319 for NWA. The flight started out fine typical accent over the pacific and turn over the LA metro area as we swing twards the mountains and to the northeast. About the time we got over the mountains near LA, alt. probably 13,000, the plane took a dramatic and quick dip to the left. I was sitting in the last row left window seat and I was looking straight down at the snow covered peaks below. The wing just fell about 60 degrees and it seemed like we hovered there for a split second until the plane rolled quickly back to the right past level to maybe 45 degrees to the right and then came back to level. This all happened in about 1.5 to 3 seconds. It was crazy in the cabin stuff started to come out of the overhead bins and people were flyin around. If you were out of seatbelt you'd be hovering or out of your seat for a split second. The steward in the back was getting ready to serve drinks and he got knocked over by the kart as it levatated then flew from the left to right side of the plane. He got pinned against the right side wall and was hurt fairly bad with cuts to his legs thru his uniform. Lucky for him the lady at the end of my row was a RN and she attended to him till the bleeding in his legs stopped. It was dead quiet for like 5 minutes until the flight deck came on and stated "we got cought up in the wake turbulence of a heavy about 11 miles ahead." My first thought was that we lost some kind of control and I seriously for the first time ever thought this may be it. I knew the mountains were not far down, and it felt like the plane was going to flip over. I knew if we did that would be all she wrote. It was like slow motion and I remember saying a short prayer in my head.
If that wasn't crazy enough as we go to Michican the weather went to crap. We were on decent to DTW and the weather was bad typical Michigan winter weather blowing and driving snow, winds over 40mph and from looking out the window almost whiteout conditions. The flight crew warned us that the landing would be rough well in advance. On final approach we were getting blasted fairly hard from what I felt was crosswinds and the plane was dipping and rolling and pitching forward to aft as he was trying to guide her in. You could tell he was really fighting to get her on the ground. I wonder how hard that was for him or if it just seemed rough for us in the back. I think some passengers were mad at him for the flight but I just shook his hand and told him that it was a sweet ride!
