Tribute to the FedEx pilots

I always think pilots are amazing people. They manoeuvre massive equipment that make drivers of large cars seem like they are driving toy cars.

And more amazingly, pilots bring people and goods from point to point; their work helps to connect people around the world.

While I must admit that the shipping captains are equally noble, there is nothing like zooming at 1000 km/h at almost 10 km above terra firma.

In many air freight companies and iffy airlines, pilots are required to operate equipment that may or may not be worthy of flight. Still, they try their best to get things and people from point to point each time.

Each failure to do so seems magnified beyond reason. Just because a plane crashes and a few hundred people die, it seems like the end of the world. Looking at it in perspective, the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami claimed about half a million lives. Assuming each aircraft takes 500 passengers and crew, we need to crash 1 000 aircraft at the same time to achieve the same amount of deaths. In fact, more people die on the road each year than in air crashes.

The FedEx pilots had to operate a MD11, which is highly suspect in its ability to survive severe conditions. Nonetheless, the pilots tried. That's the one of the most important lessons one should learn in life - to try. To die while trying is nobler than not having tried at all.

I only hope that the air disaster does not end in vain. Something should be done, such as phasing all MD11s out of commercial and freight service, so that aviation becomes even safer. That would be a larger tribute to the two men who tried.