Many of us may have a story about duct tape coming to the rescue in a sticky situation. To that I am adding my recent one.
On Monday, May 20, we boarded the plane ready to return home after a week long vacation. The day started early. As the shuttle from the hotel to the airport that we were supposed to take were full, we were forced to take an earlier shuttle. That meant that we had to get up real early and had a long wait at the airport. We boarded on time and settled down for a four hour flight. I dozed off and on but soon realized that the plane was still stuck on the runway and departure time had already come and gone. Curious to know what was the cause of the delay, I started to look around for an answer. Soon I saw the pilot walking near where I was sitting and open an over head bin diagonally across where my seat was. It was a small bin with a small black suitcase. my mind raced through several theories. I overheard the pilot saying to one of the crew member that he can’t take a risk. Soon a ground crew with a yellow vest arrived on the scene and opened the bin. He took out a screw driver and tried to fix something. He gave up after some try, went to the back of the plane ( my seat was on the last row before the toilets) and started talking on the phone. Obviously there was some argument and I heard him saying that he can’t fix it as someone had replaced a screw with a non-standard screw. Sabotage? Soon another crew member took the black carry on out of the bin and moved to the front of the plane and out the door. Another ground crew member arrived soon and things started falling in place. The door of the overhead bin had come loose and the pilot did not want to fly as he was apprehensive that the bin door may open during flight and be a safety hazard. The first ground crew could not fix the door as someone before had replaced the original screw with a larger screw and now the standard screw won’t fit. The second ground crew had a roll of duct tape ( red color for good measure) that both of them applied liberally to ensure that the overhead bin door stay shut during the flight.
You can see the end result on the featured image. No harm done. A small screw delayed our departure by forty five minutes but the flight itself after that was uneventful. I shudder to think of the delay that could have been if we were forced to change plane. Duct tape did save the day.
