The Trouble with a Flying Porta-Potti

[Guest beachbob]

Years ago, I was a civil servant in a U.S. southern state. The Department of Aviation flew the state's aircraft which then included several very early King Airs and an Aero Commander. I knew the half dozen or so pilots really well and was thus the benificiary of any "skuttle-butt" concerning the big shots-mostly the Governor and his family-who they flew hither and yon. One Governor and his wife particularly irked them because of their haughtiness and generally unpleasant behavior toward the "hired help." One really hot and humid summer day they flew the Governor's wife to a town where she was to deliver a luncheon speech to some group or the other. They closed up the King Air and went to wait in the FBO while the state police drove her to her meeting. She was gone several hours. The state police were supposed to call the pilots at the FBO when the state's first lady was on the way back so they could prepare the airplane. They failed to get the call so she arrived back unannounced and she and the two pilots walked out to the plane together. One of them opened the airstair door and a horrible odor drove them back four or five feet. She had used the porta-potti on the flight up, they had not noticed, and she had not given them a heads up. They spent an embarrassing half-hour waiting for the plane to air out after disposing of the evidence. That story quickly made the rounds of state government! If that Governor and his wife had not treated people so badly "what happened on the state plane would have stayed on the state plane" just like Las Vegas.