A chartered pilot and a fisherman left a cooler and bait in the plane. A bear smelled the food and destroyed the plane getting to it. So the pilot radioed for three cases of duct tape and some sheet plastic, and they went to work on some DIY plane repair:
They were able to fly the plane home. A few commenters don’t seem surprised. Elambend says that his dad once used duct tape to patch a (much smaller) gash on the tip of his wing:
He referred to it as “500 mile per hour” tape. Supposedly, this was the maximum speed to which duct tape would adhere. He may have been pulling my leg on that bit.
M. Brueschke links to an article about how duct tape is used on commercial aircraft all the time:
Heck, it’s been used on the moon. [...] That plane isn’t going to fly much faster or higher than canvas aircraft did in the First World War and I’ll trust aviation tape and plastic sheeting over 1915 era doped canvas.
Thomas adds that this is exactly what duct tape was created for:
It was invented by the US Army Air Corps in the WWII era as a way to field-patch damaged aircraft.
Personally, I’ll fly in virtually any aircraft, no matter how questionable. I’m a trained skydiver and I can get down on my own.