When the traffic reporter becomes the traffic news

[cgarison]

Westwood 1's traffic observing plane in the Philly area had to make an emergency land on the NJ Turnpike.

http://www.philly.com/philly/news/break ... _Hill.html

I would love to have a picture of this thing leaving the scene on the business end of a roll back.

[amayo]

I did that for five years here in Louisville and never actually had to land on a highway. I did have a few close calls though. We hit wake turbulence from a UPS Cargo jet one morning and it shot me through the plexiglass skylight in the roof of the plane. fortunately the heavy duty headset kept me from any injury. I have a chunk of that window as a memento! Also had several bird strikes. We ingested about 20 starlings taking off one morning and had to limp back to the airport. We had just enough altitude to make it to the grass between the runways. A rival traffic chopper had afew hairy episodes too. It can be a great gig, but never get comfortable!