Mile High Club

Forget the Quiet Birdmen, the Society of Experimental Test Pilots, the Order of Daedalians or even the Hump Pilots Association. Mile High Club Caught On Tape has perhaps no affiliation in aviation brings a sly smile quite like a membership in the Mile-High Club. For the unfamiliar few, joining this decidedly loose group simply requires achieving intimacy while airborne.

What's the club's appeal of mile high club caught on tape? Apart from the obvious, maybe it's the organization's egalitarian spirit: Unlike the exclusionary policies of other prestigious aviation clubs, anyone can join?you don't even have to be a pilot. Tales of qualifying conduct in the first-class cabin of airliners are almost as old as the sandwiches that they serve in coach. But a pilot's certificate greatly increases membership potential. With an airplane and a pilot's license, well, you're already halfway there.

The origins of the Mile-High Club aren't difficult to trace. The founding, er, member is already well-known to aviation history: pioneering aviator and bon vivant Lawrence Sperry, whose inventions include the turn and bank indicator and retractable landing gear. In November 1916, Sperry began giving flying lessons to a New York socialite (for the record, a Mrs. Waldo Polk), and later that month, the Curtiss flying boat that he used while instructing her crashed over Long Island. The duck hunters who came to their rescue found the couple naked. The Mile-High Club is said to have been born on that day. Perhaps the incident inspired Sperry's next invention, which just happened to be the autopilot.

But despite any number of precautions, how safe is it to join or continue club membership when you're also pilot in command? Do these airborne romances really occur, or is this just more hangar talk?

"Of course, it's going on," said an official at a major aviation safety organization, before waxing fondly about "wonderful home movies" made by American pilots stationed in Europe during World War II. However, major accident databases contain no evidence that aerial liaisons represent unsafe sex for PICs and their partners.

"If [sexual activity] became the cause, then that's not a mechanical issue. Therefore, it would be turned over to other authorities," explains Keith Holloway, an NTSB spokesman. "There's a privacy act that we deal with, and if it falls under that, the information is not made public." But it's clear that the FAA isn't getting truckloads of Mile-High Club-related accidents or incidents that are referred to them for investigation by the NTSB.

"To the best of my recollection, no cause of an accident is attributable to what you're suggesting," says James Peters, an FAA spokesman, when the subject of safety and the Mile-High Club was tossed on the table. "I don't recall any such accidents in our database that we've ever read. I would have to say that the incidence is extremely rare."

Although private pilots are doing a good job toward safety, a number of charter companies offer an even safer opportunity to join the club. Precision Operations, Inc., a Los Angeles-based Part 135 operation, is one of a number of operators scattered across the country that offers "Mile-High Club" flights, giving couples the chance to earn their club wings. Most of these "love flights" are conducted under Part 119 rules, which cover aerial tours. Flights must stay within 25 miles of the airport of origin and land at the same facility. Precision operates its "love birds"?Piper Senecas, Aero Commanders and a Piper Cheyenne I?from several airports in the L.A. area. (The company also operates in Las Vegas and Phoenix.) The hour-long flights start at about $250 in a Seneca and $500 in the Cheyenne. Precision's Anthony Stevens reports that most of the bookings are made by women, often as a birthday or anniversary gift, and the peak flight season is around Valentine's Day.

Seats are removed and replaced with a futon or mattress for the flights. No paperwork for the alterations is needed. A bottle of private-label bubbly with the couple's names on it helps put them in an "aerotic" mood. Flowers, strawberries or other romantic flourishes can be supplied. New York Aviation, a company that offers similar flights on the East Coast in a Piper Aztec, includes monogrammed Mile-High Club sheets with package deals like "The Quickie" and "Romeo and Juliet" at prices starting around $600.

Despite the club's name, there's no requirement that intimacy should occur at 5280 feet MSL or above to qualify for membership. But inductees are apt to be sticklers.

"Some people will ask us to flash the lights when we reach a mile high," grins Stevens. After that, he says, "There's no such thing as trimming the airplane and leaving it alone. You've got a lot of CG shift going on." Most of the company's flights are conducted at 5500 feet, but the congested Los Angeles Class B airspace can restrict the available "aerogenous" zone.

"There are limitations because of the large airports," Stevens says. "There are places we can't go and places we might be able to go, and everything else is planned in advance." Airspace constraints are explained during the preflight briefing. The company also tries to find out about any client preferences beforehand?not their sexual peccadilloes, but things that might add more spice to the experience.

"A guy was a huge baseball nut, so we picked a night when the Dodgers and the Angels were both in town, and flew over Dodger Stadium and Ranger Stadium," Stevens smiles. "One guy was a roller-coaster fanatic. We took him over Disneyland and Knott's Berry Farm."

The majority of customers, however, don't care about the scenery. "Most of the time, they're not looking out the windows," Stevens says of his love-flight passengers. "Nobody's in a hurry to go anywhere."

Sadly, these flights aren't big money-makers. But more important than the modest income from the 30 to 40 "Mile-High missions" that Precision flies each year is the opportunity for training that it provides for its pilots.

"Getting pilot time is one of the biggest things," Stevens explains. "They're working to get a job in the airlines, and hours are important. If we can do something [to help them build hours], we do it." The company operates the flights with crews of two, and pilots use the time for hood work, maintaining currency and looking for traffic.

"Most of the flights are at a relatively low altitude," Stevens says. "We're in the [Cessna] 172, 182 flight altitudes. It's busy. There are a lot of airplanes. We like having more heads in the cockpit.

"One of the things that has struck me is that the people we deal with are genuinely nice. Most of the people are fun, and they're with someone they care very much about," Stevens says. "We shy away from anything that sounds flaky or seedy." At the conclusion of the flight, customers receive "official" Mile-High Club membership certificates.

Like all clubs, membership in the Mile-High Club isn't for everyone. But unlike most clubs, there don't appear to be any unhappy members.