My sumptuous padlet by Grace Hicks https://padlet.com/ghicks12/3om7f5t3edxtxuqi en-us 2023-01-23 13:19:11 UTC 2023-01-23 20:04:07 UTC hello@padlet.com I had practice and it went really well and our whole team was feeling really good about the competition. The next morning I woke up at 4:45 in the morning. I packed a couple more things into my suitcase and made sure I have everything I need. I leave for the airport at 5:30 and am excited to fly to nationals with my team. ghicks12 https://padlet.com/ghicks12/3om7f5t3edxtxuqi/wish/2453206247 2023-01-23 13:24:05 UTC https://padlet.com/ghicks12/3om7f5t3edxtxuqi/wish/2453206247 I got to the airport and went through security. I got onto the plan with my team, and the coaches decided that they would assign who we would be sitting with on the plan. I got sat next to a girl on my team I didn't really like and she also hated flying and was really scared. Which was fine because I wasn't scared. We started to take off and it was super shaky and felt unsteady, but I thought nothing of it because I just thought it was a bad takeoff. But then we were in the air and it was very shaky and it felt like we were dropping in and out of the sky. ghicks12 https://padlet.com/ghicks12/3om7f5t3edxtxuqi/wish/2453219859 2023-01-23 13:34:18 UTC https://padlet.com/ghicks12/3om7f5t3edxtxuqi/wish/2453219859 The pilot had now come over the loud speaker and said that he is sorry for the turbulence and that the weather is bad at the moment. He said that it was very windy and we may have to land at a different airport. One that is closer by. The plane was so shaky and it felt like I was on a roller coaster. When I would look out the window you could see all the light in the city which was kind of cool and it looked really pretty. Then all of a sudden it kind of smelled like it was burning inside the plane so lots of people started to freak out including me. The pilot had come over the loud speaker again and said that it was normal and that when it got super windy it smelled burnt inside the plane. Which was odd, but I went along with it. I was sitting in my seat and I started to feel uncomfortable because the girl on my team was crying hysterically. And i'm not really good at comforting people so I didn't really know what to do. But I told her everything will be okay and that we will get there eventually. ghicks12 https://padlet.com/ghicks12/3om7f5t3edxtxuqi/wish/2453817440 2023-01-23 19:50:08 UTC https://padlet.com/ghicks12/3om7f5t3edxtxuqi/wish/2453817440 We were about 20 minutes away from the orlando airport. The turbulence was still really bad and it started raining. The rain sounded like a thousand bullets coming in through the windows because of how hard it was raining. Finally we made it to the runway and as the pilots were trying to land the plane, it made a huge noise that sounded like a bear growling. It was the weirdest thing. The wheels started to hit the runway and we started sliding. This felt so scary because I Thought we were going to go off the runway. The wheels ended up getting back on track and everything was fine. We pulled into the off loading spot and started to get off the plane. As we were walking off the flight attendants gave us oreos, pretzels, peanuts, american airline slippers, and an american airline sleeping eye mask. They said ¨Sorry for the inconvenience, we hope to see you again soon.¨ So I mean at least we got something out of the bad plane ride. But I still never want to get on an airplane again when there is bad weather. In conclusion turbulence may be super scary and you may feel like your going to die, but the pilots know what they are doing so try to not freak out to much. ghicks12 https://padlet.com/ghicks12/3om7f5t3edxtxuqi/wish/2453836773 2023-01-23 20:03:44 UTC https://padlet.com/ghicks12/3om7f5t3edxtxuqi/wish/2453836773