'Plane View' Of Eclipse Leaves Some Philly-Bound Passengers Disappointed
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- If you assumed the closer you are to the sun, the better your view of Monday's solar eclipse, that's not necessarily true.
While some plane rides throughout the country may have offered a decent view, that wasn't the case for passengers on pilot Doug Jett's American Airlines flight from Atlanta to Philadelphia.
"I think they wanted a better view," he tells KYW Newsradio. "I think they definitely expected more. It's kind of unfortunate we didn't give them a good show."
He says passengers were disappointed, but shouldn't have been surprised.
"I did make the announcement beforehand that unfortunately we weren't going to be able to see it the way our flight was," Jett said, "and our flight path."
He says they were flying directly below the sun, which he feels may have been a blessing in disguise.
"I did not see many people carrying the glasses so I'll be very honest, I'm actually glad we were at the angle that we were just for fear people would look at it without the proper eye protection," Jett admits.
But for the passengers who did bring their eclipse glasses hoping they'd have the ideal view of this rare event....
"[They were] doing the 'hey, can't you just do the 'Top Gun' move and spin the plane over so we can see out the side of the window',"Jett says.
But the flight wasn't a total loss as far as the eclipse is concerned.
"One thing we did notice was definitely the shadow effect," adds Jett. "The darkness, just the haze and the way the sun outlook looked."
Most importantly, he says, everyone aboard the flight got home safe:
"It was actually relatively seamless."
