My Fear of Flying on an Airplane

This is a story about my fear of flying on an airplane.


I know at this era, fear of flying on airplane sounds so ridiculous. Y’all probably be like

“Dude.. Nowadays planes are damn safe. Why are you so paranoid about this? Drink some tea. Calm your tits. Chillax”

And yet, no matter how hard I tried to calm my tits, my guts and the chemical in my brain always says otherwise.

In this article I’m trying to dig deep; or maybe just to explain; as to why this fear exists in the first place, despite the fact that there’s never really any terrible experience occurred on an airplane during my lifetime (and honestly speaking? Hopefully never).

1. The lack of knowledge about airplanes, how it works, and what to do

On every trip of airplane you are only been taught of how to evacuate; as in, where to head for emergency exit, how to put on safety vest, and then that’s it!

Okay first of all, this is like, a big question mark, exclamation mark, even, that only an over-thinker like me would notice.

Why would you teach the passengers how to evacuate, even before the plane takes off? 

Aren’t airplanes supposed to be safe nowadays, just like how it is claimed, so why is all that for?

The act of teaching how to evacuate and put on safety vest every single time before the take off marks as a signal for me to always ALWAYS be standing by during the trip, just in case something went terribly wrong, just like, you know, how teaching you to evacuate and put on safety vest is for ‘just in case’ purpose (so despite staying up all night just so I can be knocked off during the plane trip CLEARLY didn’t work for me, and instead of being knocked off during the trip, I slept after arriving instead; which sucks because you slept your holiday hours away L)

Second of all, if airplanes are so safe nowadays, why don’t you educate us on why the airplane claims to be that safe instead? For example, like how this type of BOEING that we are riding are highly manufactured and implemented with a really advanced technology in such a way that even flying through lightnings and thunder won’t even give this airplane a single shake; if we are able to be educated and reassured during our trip, wouldn’t there be less and less people  like me questioning on how it works?

Also things like what is turbulence, facts and figures, how we handle it, when we should and shouldn’t be worried; you know, all in all, it’s the lack of knowledge about airplanes that makes the experience of riding this transportation scary.

And let’s pretend that this is my own fault because I am able to look it all up but I don’t, which brings me to my next point.

2. Fear of Heights

This maybe the main reason as to why the fear exists in the first place. I am scared of heights, way before this thing fear about airplanes surfaced and escalated. I hate riding escalators/elevators to high floors, I despise rollercoasters and whatever hell they installed in amusement parks just to rise up your adrenaline, ugh nope, thanks. Even when I managed to get myself on, let’s say, 25^th floors, I choose not to look below. It’s like there’s a demon inside of me that says “jump. Jump and see how it feels!! Really. You will never know if you try.”

I don’t know about you, but that scares me. I don’t want that demon to ever appear in my brain and tells me stuff I don’t want to hear. Sometimes my logic is not strong enough; like how sometimes when I’m at the escalator and the whispers come and my logic struggles, I tend to fight back and I lose my balance a little bit.

Whew that went dark real fast. Moving on.

3. The inability to escape/run from the situation

I actually read this point in Quora (good app, you, an intellectual, should try some time) which somebody tries to explain why people have aerophobia. The logical reason behind it is that by right, when someone encounters a situation which would harm them, their brain will activate a certain chemical which I clearly did not remember and activates their muscle to quickly escape/run from the situation. This is your brain trying to protect you from self-called harm, that your brain recognizes. Because flying on an airplane is considered as a threat, your brain is telling you to quickly do this act and wants you to escape/run from the situation as soon as possible, but in reality, you just can’t run to the emergency exit and jump yourself into 30,000ft of height, can you? (and yes, my fear or flying on an airplane made me properly listen to whatever the fuck the pilot or the flying attendant announce on the speakers for example just how much height exactly you are at during the trip because you know, just in case they would say something like “THERE’S A FIRE IN THE BACK OF THE PLANE BUT EVERYBODY STAY CALM AND TAKE THE BREATHING MASK ABOVE YOU THAT JUST EJECTED” and if I missed the announcement I be like “why is this thing dangling above my head” TO WHICH LEADS ME STRAIGHT TO DEATH so yeah.) So with the inability to escape/run from the situation, comes the inexplicable fear which you can do nothing about it but cry or using a meditation app on your smart watch to help you breathe which CLEARLY wasn’t me.

I think that’s about it. I’m still trying to face the fear and move on like any other normal humans would do by reading about how people love flying on an airplane instead of focusing on how terribly wrong it could get.

I would say this fear actually comes occasionally but it got worse after that one day, I was at Bali and I’m going to take a plane home at 4PM when I heard there’s an airplane accident that happened on 8AM, AT THE SAME DAY. AND THE SAME AIRLINE. (R.I.P October Li** A** plane crash L). I literally froze after hearing that accident, and so far as I can remember, my fear of flying became increasingly significant.