All Aboard Exposure Airlines

Were you able to fix it?" someone asks. My head snaps to the right. A man in a fur hat and red ski parka pauses before answering. That's it, I think. There's some mechanical problem with the plane. My mind races ahead, spinning out of control. I hate 737s. They have bad rudders, right? Maybe there's another flight home. Or even better, I could take the train...

Fur hat finally answers, "Yup. Just the wheel," as he points to his carry-on suitcase.

Classic. My mind had leaped in the space of a nanosecond from a waiting room in Logan Airport to a death spiral over the Atlantic. Dr. Curtis Hsia of Boston University's Center for Anxiety and Related Disorders calls this automatic thinking. It was even worse a few hours earlier when, as part of my treatment for a debilitating case of aviophobia (fear of flying), Dr. Hsia had booked me on Exposure Airlines. It's the newest thing in phobic therapy: a virtual airplane of hardware, software and fancy head-mounted display screens that feels like the real thing.

I hate window seats, I remember thinking just before my virtual flight took off. You can see how far you'd fall if...Oops. Don't go there. I want to speak to the crew for reassurance, but there is no one. Instead I'm squeezed into a row of four seats, alone.

I take a hurried glance out the window to check the weather. Just a few stratus clouds. That's O.K. The sound of jet engines drowns me as my virtual airplane heads down the runway. My legs are stiff, and I arch my back in anticipation. No g-force in this simulation. A small break for me. We level off. Sky is still good. I begin to relax. Look around. Not so bad.

A humongous noise sparks my body upward. Another glance out the window. Not good. We're in the middle of a thunderstorm. The seats ahead of me are shaking. I can feel the thunder in my bones. I know this isn't real, but I can't seem to control my fear. Through the din, I hear Dr. Hsia ask me how I'm feeling on an anxiety scale of 1 to 10: total relaxation to panic. I'm pushing 9. The storm thunders on. I am hating this.

"Why isn't the pilot saying anything?" I ask Dr. Hsia. I crave reassurance. The pilot must be fighting to stay aloft, I think. Maybe he's drunk.

"What about the co-pilot?" Dr. Hsia asks.

He's probably drunk too. Otherwise someone would be saying something to reassure me.

"What's the likelihood that both pilots would be out of it?" he asks.

Probably nil, I answer reluctantly. All right. They got bad weather information. I start looking around the cabin, searching the seams of the fuselage for any signs of strain. Don't know what I'm expecting. A loosened panel. Dripping water. A broken bolt. Still no word from the crew. I'm getting ticked. They should be talking to me. My head is pounding. I'm fingering my necklace. My legs ache.

It's over. The sky is clear again. I get my breath back. My back is just sinking into the seat when--Gotcha! We're in another storm. Just as bad. Panic level back up to 9. Still no pilot. Damn him! Does this plane have a lightning rod? My head is bursting now.

"What do you think would happen if lightning did hit the plane?" Dr. Hsia asks. I don't know. It would break apart. "Has that happened before?" Not that I know of. "If the pilots are flying through this, it's because they know the plane can take it," he says calmly.