Food Safety

Below is an article I wrote for a corporate flight attendant website, but it is an article that can benefit everyone, so I thought I’d share it.  Although it is written for flight attendants it is important to use the basics at home, especially if you live with small children or elderly folks.  They are the most susceptible to getting foodborne illnesses and the most at risk of dying from them. 

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One of the most important things to understand about food safety is that YOU are part of the chain that will lead to either the health or the harm of your passengers, crewmembers and yourself.  You never want to be in a situation where your passenger is taken from his/her business or vacation because of food that you served while they were on the airplane.  Not only that, but foodborne illness is a serious issue; not only will it make your passengers, crew members and yourself very sick, but it can be fatal. 

Since you are directly involved in the safety of your passengers’ food there are several things you can do to help protect your passengers, your crew members and yourself from foodborne illnesses. 

#1.  Always wear gloves, even if your company or passengers don’t require it. 

#2.  Never use food that smells or looks funny, even if it’s from a reputable caterer.

#3.  Always make sure food is heated to its proper temperature.  (The temperature is determined by how much heat is required to kill the pathogens that grow on that specific food.)  Most airline caterers cook food to 70% and then send the food to us to complete the cooking process on the airplane so that the food is not over cooked.  That is why this rule is crucial to the safety of those on board your aircraft.  Since caterers don’t cook the food to the required temperature it is imperative that you do.

USDA Recommended Safe Minimum Internal Temperatures

• Cook all raw beef, pork, lamb and veal steaks, chops, and roasts to a minimum internal temperature of 145 °F as measured with a food thermometer before removing meat from the heat source. For safety and quality, allow meat to rest for at least three minutes before carving or consuming. For reasons of personal preference, consumers may choose to cook meat to higher temperatures.
• Cook all raw ground beef, pork, lamb, and veal to an internal temperature of 160 °F as measured with a food thermometer.
• Cook all poultry to a safe minimum internal temperature of 165 °F as measured with a food thermometer.

It’s important to remember that when you are heating/cooking food that has different types of meat in it you must heat all the meat to the highest temperature required.  Also, if you are heating vegetables or sauces that have come into contact with uncooked meat (or meat that has not cooked to the proper temperature) you must heat the vegetable or sauce to the temp required for the meat it touched.

It’s recommended that you use a good quality digital thermometer for your food.  This is because the cheap thermometers with a dial have to be recalibrated often and for this reason they often misread temperatures.  This article explains which thermometers to purchase and how to use them.  It also has an in-depth chart of all the meats and seafood and their necessary internal temps. 

#4.  When storing uncooked food always store the food by putting the highest required temperature foods at the bottom.  For example, if I have raw vegetables, chicken and steak I would put the vegetables highest, then the beef, and then the chicken so that if one of the dishes drips onto another dish that dish will reach the required minimum temperature to kill any pathogens.  If I were to stack the chicken on top of the beef and chicken juice got into the beef dish, I would be serving unsafe food if I only heated the beef to the required one hundred forty-five degrees because the chicken juice needs to be heated to one hundred sixty-five degrees.

#5.  All food has what is called a “safe zone”.  Once heated to its proper temperature to kill any pathogens hot food must remain above one hundred forty degrees.  In the same way, any food served cold must remain below forty degrees.  However, the foods are only safe at this temperature for up to four hours.  After four hours anything not refrigerated must be thrown out.  This is why on an aircraft the food is generally only safe for a little while unless you put it on ice or use dry ice to keep your refrigerator cold.  I order three 3x5 pieces of dry ice with every catering order that I keep at the bottom of my refrigerator so that the air stays cool enough to keep the food safe.  If your flight is longer than four hours I would recommend adopting this practice. Let’s say you have a 10 hour red-eye and you plan to serve breakfast when your passengers wake up; if you have stored yogurt, eggs, bacon, etc. in your refrigerator, which only blows cool air, your food will have been unsafe for 6 to 7 hours before you serve it, depending on when you loaded the airplane. 

#6.   Know where your food is coming from.  If you are in a foreign country, make sure that you use safety precautions when ordering your food.  A good rule of thumb is if you are nervous about the water then you should also be nervous about the food.  If you can’t drink the water don’t order any fresh water fish.  Also, don’t eat any skin off fruits and vegetables and don’t eat peeled fruits and vegetables unless they have thick skins that don’t absorb water.  If you are unsure about the safety of the food, one option is to have your caterer from home freeze food and store it with dry ice to use while you are in other countries.  Just remember it will take time to thaw, so plan ahead for that.  Brochettes freeze well, as do most Italian dishes.  Talk to your caterer about foods they recommend for freezing and reheating.  Another thing to do is ask the caterers in foreign countries where they get their foods.  I was in a third world country one time and found out that the caterer imported his vegetables from reputable countries because he served so many aircraft from those countries.  As long as he was being honest, my passengers were safe to eat a salad from him.  

You can find more information for the countries you visit listed below.

http://safefoodinternational.org/regions.html

http://www.cspinet.org/new/pdf/global.pdf  (This I just found, but I am printing it out so that I can refer to it from now on.)

#7.  Make sure your food is properly refrigerated while it is being delivered.  Find out each caterers method for keeping your food cool during the delivery process.  If they don’t have a method, ask them to fill zip-top bags with ice and put it in the bottom of the delivery boxes.  Also, make sure you instruct the caterer, hotel or restaurant to chill the food to below forty degrees before delivery. 

 

I want to summarize by encouraging you to educate yourself in the area of food safety, but to not let yourself become scared to order and serve food.  If you are ever in doubt of a country’s produce then just order all hot food and cook it to one hundred sixty-five degrees.  If a food item scares you then throw it out and serve the boxed soup and the packaged rice that you carry on board for this very reason.  You can also carry powdered milk as a stand-by for a really bad day.  Your passenger will thank you for looking out for their safety and well-being.

 

Safe flying and safe food handling,

Does Church Matter?

Lately, I have heard more times than not that people don’t go to church because their faith is private.  They say they know God and that is enough.  They don’t need the church.  Most people who hold this view have something against the church.  They think it’s full of hypocrites, something happened in the past that made them not trust or like church people, or they like keeping their Sundays free. 

I would like to start by saying that it is actually very hypocritical of me to write this blog post.  I myself do not attend church regularly.  There are two reasons: 

#1.  I work as a flight attendant.  It is rare that I am home on Sundays. 

#2.  We moved recently so we don’t have a church to call home.  We attend when I’m home, but we are church “shopping” right now, which makes it easy to skip a Sunday every now and then. 

So, why am I writing this blog post?  The reason is because I am learning how important it is to attend church, and not just to attend church, but to be an active member of a church.  The Bible calls church “The Body of Christ.”  If you really are a Christian (you have admitted that you are a sinner and that you cannot save yourself and you have asked Christ to save you and be the Lord of your life) then you are a body part, whether you attend or not. 

God designed Christians to fit together to form a body.  One Christian is the spinal cord, another is a rotator cuff, another is a pinky finger, another is a pinky toe.  One member is an eye, another is an ear, and one is the mouth.  The Bible says that Christ is the head.  All decisions are made by him and carried out through the members of the body.  If you are a Christian and you are not a member of a body, then you are depriving a body of one of its members.  If a human body is missing a limb that body has a handicap.  The same is true of a body of believers.  Have you ever thought about the fact that your absence in the church might be one of the reasons the people act in a way that you despise.  They are handicapped without you there. 

I am learning through my study of Experiencing God that pure selfishness is the only reason Christians don’t attend church.  If you have an excuse, that’s all it is.  We are designed to be a part of the body of Christ.  Unless we accept this as part of our faith we will never truly be in line with God’s will, which means we will never experience the full capacity of his joy and peace in our lives.  On the flip side, the church can never reach it’s potential without all of its members. 

If you are physically unable to attend church there are other ways to be involved.  You can find a church on the radio or internet.  You can call them and offer to pray for their needs or offer to send cards to people who are sick or haven’t attended in a while, or make phone calls, or offer to pray for the pastor while he’s preaching or for the youth as they meet on Wednesday nights.  You can also tithe to them.  There are countless things we can do if we cannot physically make it to the building on Sunday mornings.  You can make appointments with different pastors in your area and tell them your intensions.  Get to know different ones and see which one God leads you to.  If you can’t make it to them then I’m sure they will be willing to come to you, especially the one God wants you to support.  Doing this might even lead to a new kind of ministry for the church you join. 

As I commit to being part of the body of Christ some of the above will be my only options during weeks when I am traveling.  There is nothing wrong with this.  If you are a Christian then you are missing out by not committing to church.  At the same time, you are crippling the church God has been calling you to.  Pray that He will show you exactly which body needs you and pray that He will reveal to you and the church why you are there.  Trust Him to speak to you and people of the church before you start acting on why you think you are there.  He will show you both, and you will in turn reap incredible blessings as you watch Him at work through you. 

If you are a Christian there is no excuse for not being a member of a local church body.  I am guilty, but as I seek to correct this wrong in my life I pray you will seek to correct it in yours also. 

Lastly, if you are a member of church body I encourage you, and anyone else who is willing, to go through Experiencing God.  If you have already been through it then go through it again.  The last few weeks of the study focus on how the church body should function.  It’s eye opening.  I believe it will revolutionize your church and your ability to reach your community and ultimately the world.  

Church is not just important, it’s vital to our faith.

Leggings

I love wearing leggings.  My husband is not as fond of them as I, so last year when everyone was frolicking in their super cute legging outfits I was sitting on the bench.  Let me just insert here that I am often criticized for wearing what my husband likes instead of what I want to wear. I think these criticisms are kind of ridiculous. My husband is the only person in the entire world that I have any desire or need to impress (outside of work).  Why would I wear something that I know he hates?  That just doesn’t make any sense to me.  Just because I only wear what he likes does not mean that I don’t get to wear things that I do like.  I wear what I am comfortable in and what he likes looking at me in.  Knowing that my husband thinks I look good gives me more confidence than wearing any trend that I know he hates.  I practically live in comfy pants, flats and loose fitting tops because I would rather be comfortable than look good.  He thinks these outfits are cute on me, so we both win. 

Speaking of comfortable, this post is supposed to be about leggings.  I have been training under a flight attendant named Andrea.  She is an amazing flight attendant and I really enjoy getting to spend time with her.  She first trained me for domestic flights.  I’ve been doing those on my own for a while now.  More recently she has been training me on the international side.  As I have watched her both in the airplane and on layovers I have come to realize that she doesn’t wear jeans on our trips.  Unless she is dressed in slacks, a dress or a skirt, she is wearing leggings.  When I realized this it finally clicked in my head that jeans are the worst thing to pack (besides suites)!  If I wear legging outfits when I travel then I never have to deal with packing jeans.  This is brilliant!  It makes everything easier.  It saves a ton of space and makes your suitcase lighter.  So, after this discovery leading to the fact that leggings are now essential to my wardrobe, and the fact that leggings have been out long enough that Jason has adjusted to seeing them and now likes them, I have become a leggings wearing fool!   

I just read this article about how to wear leggings when you are over age 30, which I will be in one month, and I thought that other legging wearing fools might like to read it too.  Enjoy! 

A Hectic Time Just Got A Little More Hectic

If you read my post The Moment You’ve All Been Waiting For! and Change Is Good, Right? then you will know that I work as a contract flight attendant and that I’m currently transitioning into Executive Flight Attendant-ing, and that I took a job as a server at an Italian restaurant in Oklahoma City and a job with a catering company in Norman.  Well, they all merged over the last two weeks.  So, in a matter of moments I went from not having very much work to not sure when I’m going to get a day off.  This might sound like complaining, but it’s not.  These are statements of facts.  I am thrilled to have this much work.  My flight attendant job is part of our household income, and my catering and serving are going into an account that is strictly for vacation use.  This makes waiting tables so much more rewarding for me. 

Just to recap the past two weeks, my first day at Papa Dios (the restaurant) was Tuesday, March 8.  I shadowed Tuesday Wednesday night.  I was supposed to shadow on Thursday night, but thankfully I proved myself competent enough that I started waiting tables on Thursday.  I also worked Friday and Saturday night.  The next day, which was Sunday, March 13, I drove to Bartlesville to work at one of my flight attendant jobs.  I worked Sunday-Thursday night.  I drove home Friday morning, didn’t work Friday night, but I worked a catering event on Saturday night.  I never knew how much physical labor is involved in catering.  It was me and 5 other ladies.  We unloaded, set-up and reloaded really heavy stuff. 

Sunday night I was not working at one of my jobs, but I did cook a four course meal and serve it to Jason and our friend Brandon in order to practice for an upcoming trip.  (We moved the dining room into the living room so that they could enjoy an in-flight movie.)  The first picture says it all.  The second picture is hard to see.  It’s hot towels.  The third picture is of all my irons in the fire.  The pics after that are what I served.  I started with an appetizer, which was stuffed peppers because Brandon likes them and fried yellow squash because Jason requested it.  I then served a soup course, which was tortilla soup.  Then onto the main course, which was a baked corn tortilla topped with cheese, chicken, mushrooms, and more cheese, with seasoned rice and refried beans.  For dessert I served Easy Peazy No-Bake Cheesecake.  The last picture is what my sink looked like when I was done.  The poor guys had to clean the kitchen because I didn’t finish serving them until 9:30 PM and I still had to pack before I could go to bed because I had a 6:30 AM flight the next morning, which meant I had to get up at 4 AM. 

  

So, that was a non-working day. 

I went to bed around 11:30 PM and then got up Monday morning at 4 AM, got dressed, gathered all my stuff and headed to the airport.  I’ve been working everyday this week.  I will get home Saturday afternoon just in time to say hello to my husband, change and head to Papa Dios for my Saturday evening shift.  YAY FOR WORK!  YAY FOR VACATION MONEY!!

Playing With Tigers

I’ve had two opportunities in my life to touch a tiger.  The first was at G.W’s Exotic Animal Park in Wynnewood, Oklahoma.  My brother Shane, my husband Jason and I decided to go after years of seeing the billboard on the highway.  It was more amazing than we could have dreamed.  I’ll do a post just about the park soon, but today is about Tigers. 

I have always loved BIG CATS. I think it is mostly because they are just like my beloved cats at home, just on a much larger scale.  At G.W.’s Exotic Animal Park, my dream of touching a tiger was more than realized because not only did I get to touch the tiger, I got to cuddle with him.

Then, a few months ago, my job took me to a place where liability isn’t nearly the concern it is here.  We had a guided tour through an animal park and the tour guide kept saying, “That one: no bite, no bite.”   “That one: bite.”  “That  one: no bite, no bite,” and he’s touching all the animals that “don’t bite”. 

Well, we get to the tigers, and he is explaining that the one we are looking at is about 6 months old.  He reaches his hand in the cage and says, “He no bite.”  I said, “What?!  He doesn’t bite?!  Can I pet him???!!!”  “Sure,” he says, “no bite, no bite.”  So, I throw my camera at one of the other crew members and rush over, elated at the possibility of getting to pet this big tiger.  I reach my hand in and scratch his ear.  Then, he leans in to rub his head against my hand, like cats do, and as his mouth is getting close to my hand, in an obvious gesture to rub his cheek against my fingers, the tour guide says, “Ah, might bite, might bite.”  Needless to say, my wonderful time of petting this amazing creature was abruptly cut short.  

 

  

I’ll leave you with a few more good tiger pics and one recommendation: If you ever have a chance to pet a tiger YOU MUST DO IT!  In fact, I encourage you to add it to your bucket list. 

 

 

 

The Biggest Bathtub I’ve Ever Seen

I’m house/dog sitting for a friend this week.  It feels more like house sitting because the dogs are so quiet and good that I keep forgetting they are here. 

When my friend was showing me around I noticed their GINORMOUS bathtub.  She said that they had never used it, but that I was welcome to.  I couldn’t wait!  So, tonight before bed I decided to go for a little swim.

This bad boy is 7.5 ft x 4.5 ft.  I could literally lay down and do snow angels if I wanted to. 

As you can see, I ran water for a bath.  The only problem was that I was so intent on getting pictures taken, gathering the right reading material, and making sure everything was perfect, that I didn’t realize until I stepped inside that ice cold water was pouring out of the faucet.  My perfect hot water was quickly becoming nasty luke warm water!  I rushed to turn off the faucets, but I wasn’t quick enough.  My wonderful bath had turned into a swimming pool of cool water.  DISASTER!  

So, I did the only thing I could.  I laid there in misery for a minute before getting out, drying off with hot air from a blow dryer (to try and warm back up, of course) and thought about how to get a HOT bath tomorrow night.  Here’s what I came up with: I’ll leave the water from tonight and take a shower in a different bathroom tomorrow.  Then, tomorrow night, I will just heat the water that’s already in the tub.  This way, I can have a hot bath that’s full of water instead of a hot bath with a little water, or a cool bath with lots of water.  Let’s hope it works. 

Click here tomorrow night to see if OPERATION HOT BATH is a success.

Change Is Good…Right?

This morning I looked at my blog and it made me feel restless.  So, I changed it.  Growth is more visible in kids, but humans never stop evolving and our lives never stop changing.  I created this blog just over a year ago, and when I created the blog it was a perfect representation of who I was.  (Just imagine the same picture and title as above.)

(Picture from btemplates.com)

But, now my life is changing.  Even though the changes are still up in air, I am calm and excited about our future.  So, this blog is a perfect window into how I feel, and who I am now. 

My amazing husband is about to finish his master’s degree and from there he will move on to law school.  He’s applied to places all over the country.  Our plan is to move to Houston, TX, but we await letters from schools in order to weigh all of our options.  Also, his 6 year military career will end next month.  He will go from working every day as an Air Force Staff Sergeant to working as a civilian.

                                    

My job is also changing.  I am transitioning from this to this.  However, since I am a “contract” flight attendant my job is based on the needs of the companies.  There is not a lot of need right now, so on Thursday I will start training as a server at Papa Dios Italian Restaurant even though I never thought I would wait tables again.  I guess I should have listened to Fievel, from An American Tale.

However, I must say that I am excited about my new job.  I’m good at waiting tables and it’s nice to do something that your good at.  I’ve been praying about what I could do to bring in extra income.  I started looking at fine dining restaurants in Oklahoma City.  I updated my resume and compiled a long list of all the fine dining restaurants I could think of, but I felt really unsettled about whether or not the restaurants would be flexible with my need to take off if a flight comes available.  I also worried about my life being run by a restaurant schedule.  I waited tables for a lot of years and they are open every day and busiest when everyone else is off work.  It’s not the greatest schedule for getting to spend time with people you love. 

A few days later I checked Craig’s List and there was a post stating that a fine dining restaurant in OKC needed a server.  I sent my resume and quickly got a response.  I called and set up an interview but almost cancelled because the restaurant is about 40 miles north of where I live.  Praise God I didn’t cancel.  I now know this was Him taking care of all my concerns.  I interviewed with two other restaurants and Papa Dios was the only restaurant who said that I can take off any time a flight come up.  This restaurant is also only open for dinner, they are closed on Sundays and the schedule I am taking over is just for Mondays and Tuesdays.  This could not be more perfect.  Thank you God for taking care of this for me. 

Another position I have accepted is to help serve at catered events for Legends, a catering company in Norman.  This is another “contract” type position.  So, I will just work when I’m available.  I’ve never worked with a catering company so I’m excited about what I can learn there.  

Stay posted as our lives continue to change:

              

Yes…Change Is Definitely Good.

The Moment You’ve All Been Waiting For!

“So, what is it that you do exactly?”

If you know me then you have probably asked this question, and you probably left our conversation more confused than you started.  It’s because it’s almost impossible for me to explain in an amount of time that I think people will stay interested, and because much of what I do is required to remain confidential.

I will start by explaining that even though we are all called flight attendants, there are different types of flight attendant jobs.  Right now I am in transition.  I am going from 3 years of pushing a cart down an aisle to preparing and serving food that is plated on china.  Flight attendants who do this type of work are called “Corporate Flight Attendants” or “Executive Flight Attendants”.  It is a very difficult and detail oriented job.  I am being trained by flight attendants who have been doing this for 15-20+ years.  It’s a very fast-paced job that requires extensive planning and the ability to think and adapt quickly to any obstacle thrown at you without your passengers ever being aware of any of it. 

I’ll explain the process of dinner as best as I can.  First, the flight attendant prepares as much as she can before the passenger’s arrival.  This includes putting doilies on plates, preparing the hot towels, putting butter that’s shaped like roses in individual dishes, cutting lemons and limes for glasses, folding napkins, preparing bread baskets, and anything else that can possibly done ahead of time. Then once she is airborne, the meal service begins.  The flight attendant offers the menu that has she has prepared, takes the passengers order and the begins preparing the meal.  She starts by putting everything that must be heated into the oven.  (I forgot to mention that she orders food from caterers who cook the food to 70% and then deliver it in oven tins.  The flight attendant finishes cooking the food.)  Once everything has been started she sets out the place setting:

(picture from gearpatrol.com)

She then heats wash clothes with hot water and offers a hot towel to the passenger.  She then begins dinner.  She fixes the bread basket and plates the appetizer.  While she is serving the bread and appetizer the  soup is heating.  She picks up the appetizer plate, fixes the soup and then serves it.  While the passenger is eating she fixes the salad.  She picks up the soup and then delivers the salad.  All this time the entre has been heating.  While the passenger is eating the salad the flight attendant is preheating the entre plates and making sure that all the food is ready to be plated.  Once the passenger has finished eating the salad the flight attendant picks up the salad plate and plates the entre.  The plates look something like this:

(picture from onemorebiteblog.blogspot.com)

The hardest part of the meal is making sure that the entre is still very hot when it is served to the passenger.  No one likes cold food.  Oh, and did I mention that through all of this the flight attendant is making sure that drinks stay full?  Once the passenger has finished the main course, the flight attendant picks up his plate and clears his place setting so that only the drinks remain.  She offers dessert and then fixes it accordingly.  She then picks up the dessert plate and finishes cleaning up everything on the table.  She then cleans the galley and fixes the pilots’ dinners.  

Now that you know a little bit about being an Executive Flight Attendant I will further explain my job.  I am called a “Contract Flight Attendant”.  This means that I don’t work for one specific company, I work for myself.  Companies who need a flight attendant can call, and if I am available on the days they need, then I will work the trip they need filled. 

The types of aircraft that require this type of flight attendant are luxury jets.  Here are some examples from Google Images.  These are not pictures I have taken and they do not belong to the companies for whom I fly:

(picture from le-aviation.com)

  Conference table from galley, which is in back of this aircraft

(picture above from connect.in.com)

Conference table and credenza from front of aircraft. You can see galley (kitchen) behind seats.

(picture above from globalair.com)

Galley

(picture above from avprojets.com)

Passenger seats – dining table folded out on left, sofa on right

(picture above from gulfstream.com)

As a flight attendant on these aircraft, you are a fire fighter, a medic, a chef and a server.  The trip starts with what is called a “trip sheet”.  The trip sheet tells you where you are going, what time you are departing, how long is the flight, what time you are landing, passenger names, crew members, etc.  It is every detail you need to know about your trip.  Once the flight attendant has her trip sheet she then decides, based on time of departure, which meal or type of snack she will serve.  She will make decisions about what to serve passed on passenger preference worksheets.  Here is an example:

Once the flight attendant gets the passenger profiles and decides what meals she will serve she then plans the menus and order the catering.  For example, if I had a day trip (there and back in one day) I would most likely serve breakfast on the way there and dinner on the way back.  Based on this passengers preferences I would come up with menus something like this:

 

Once I make the menus I write my catering orders.  This catering order is for 3 passengers for the breakfast flight out of the first city.

 

Dinner catering order for the return trip – 5 passengers:

The flight attendant will also have a grocery list.  She will go to the grocery store the day before the trip, and then to the aircraft to get it ready.  She will have to stock the aircraft with anything she thinks she will need that is not already on board.  For example, I use dish towels as pot holders, but I also need them to dry dishes after I wash them, so I make sure that there are plenty of dish towels on board. 

This is about everything that I can think to explain.  The only thing lacking is the unexpected that comes with most trips.  Sometimes schedules change while you are already on a trip and you have to put together new menus and contact new caters and cancel other orders all very quickly.  Sometimes passengers get held up and all of a sudden you have to make lunch out of what you had for breakfast. 

Executive flight attendants are creative and quick problem solvers.  They are very detail oriented and excellent planners who are not so type A that they can’t adapt quickly to anything you throw at them.  They are professional and well kept, and if they are exhausted from a 20 hour work day you will never know it.  They are amazing creatures.  I’m still learning, but I hope that someday the same things can be said of me.  

Fighting Fires, Literally…

I spent the end of last week in flight attendant training at Flight Safety in Savannah, GA.  It was AWESOME.  It’s the most real training I’ve ever experienced.  We spent Thursday in lecture, which was H-A-R-D.  I tried to remind our instructors that flight attendants are not people who sit for a living.  But then Friday came.  Friday was drill day.  For me, it started with fire.  (captions are above picture)

This was my group for the drills:

This was the fire simulator.  It is an actual aircraft that’s been gutted.  They light a class A (causes Ashes) fire in the lav:

 

During the drills we are not just putting out the fire.  We are also communicating with the pilots while sternly telling all the passengers to remain seated and remain calm.  This is my instructor and the window we have to exit through.  (These pics were taken before the real drills. He was showing us what we would be doing:

 

This is the guys getting ready to save us incase we stink at putting out fires.  Actually, they are in full gear because they stayed inside the aircraft for all of our drills:

This is me getting my Portable Breathing Equipment (smoke hood) filled with air so that I can breath normally while fighting the fire. (The smoke hoods on flying airplanes have O2 cylinders that have never been used):

 

Heading in to fight the fire:

Here I am escaping through the window:

Next, water drills.  They had their own pool equipped with a slide raft that you would have to slide down during a ground evacuation on a commercial flight.  We slid down the slide and then over to the raft where we had to flip it over as if it had landed in the ocean upside down.  We then went to the simulator where we had to escape through the window, go out onto the wing, inflate our life vests and then swim to the raft and climb inside.  They had machines that blew water to simulate a storm.  They also had a simulator that was a helicopter rescue.  We had to use all three ways that we might be pulled into a helicopter while all the water was blowing at us, which is how it would be if a helicopter was hovering over you:

 

The last part was the cabin simulator.  During these drills we are running through what we would do in the case of planned and unplanned water and land evacuations.  I wasn’t able to take very many pictures because we were all busy at the same time.  When one was the flight attendant the others were the passengers.  These simulators are really cool because they move up and down and back and forth depending on the type of emergency.  They also make noises and the lights flicker and everything.  This is a picture of the flight attendant throwing the raft out of the emergency exit window:

These are all the pics that I was able to take.  Hopefully you now know that when you fly you are in good hands.  Every flight attendant who is trained in the US is capable of everything you are seeing here.  We are all very well trained.  The best news of all is that very few flight attendants ever actually use what they learn in training. 

Happy Flying!