Snow on runway

A thirty year mystery solved—icy runways and crosswinds

I lined up with runway 18 as I had often done in the past, only to find that I had little to no control deflection remaining (full left aileron and full right rudder) with strong winds gusting out of 270 degrees. With a full cabin of customer-passengers in the other five seats coming for a two-day factory visit and tour, my macho, risk-tainted bravado at that time told me to press on with landing—which of course I did.
Islander

An Easter miracle in the Canadian Arctic

In 1981, I was living in Fort Simpson, Northwest Territories, which is north of the 60th parallel, working as a new bush pilot. I was flying south to a very small community on Trout Lake on Easter Sunday. The flight service lady informed me that they were still looking for a twin engine pilot who went missing on Good Friday. Being religious, she was convinced that he would be found today, on Easter Sunday, and that I needed to look for him.
DC-3 engine

Diagnosing an engine failure by sound

In the summer of 1987, I watched a DC-3 take off from a paved runway south of Atlanta, where I was working to add fuel and oil to airplanes. I heard an inrush of air as a “waa – waa” sound. This was recurring at a noticeable but slowing rate. I interpreted this slowing repetition as an engine inlet manifold splitting open behind a supercharger.
Cessna flare

Smooth operator: sometimes you can go too far

How smooth is too smooth? And how to achieve that? Before we start the never-ending discussion about super butter/greased touchdowns, an essential disclaimer right from Boeing’s Flight Crew Training Manual: “A smooth touchdown is not the criterion for a safe landing.”

Friday Photo: Texas sunset

Greg Pepper was returning to Houston from Dallas after introducing an aspiring pilot and brother to his Cirrus SR22 when he took this photo. "During a very quiet and uneventful trip home, I was awestruck by the beauty of this late fall Texas sunset." So are we.
Mountains

Breaking my own “rules to fly by”

My passenger-side wing was pointed straight down at the mountainous terrain below us and, seated behind me, my good friend and her six-month pregnant daughter gasped in sheer terror. Just a moment before, we had been cruising in CAVU conditions while meandering along the windward ridgeline of the Presidential Range in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. How did I find myself in this predicament?
T-33

Hang on young man: fighting an invisible enemy in a T-33

The cabin pressure was way above where it was supposed to be and I was starting to feel a bit dizzy so I turned my oxygen regulator to 100%. As I flew on the dizziness increased, my fingers were white, and my nails starting to turn blue—signs of anoxia—so I turned the oxygen regulator to emergency in which mode it actually forced oxygen into my lungs.
Rope

The day my glider checkride almost went bad

Based on past checkrides, it had become the expectation that the rope break would occur on the second flight. But as we turned crosswind on the last flight, he still hadn’t released the rope. I started thinking he must be going easy on me and maybe I started to relax a little—when WHAM he released the tow rope!
Checklist

Checklist vs. memory items

An old saw among pilots is that you use a checklist for actions you perform on every flight, such as lowering the landing gear, but for a very rare event, such as an engine fire, you’re required to perform the proper actions from memory. Does that make sense?

Friday Photo: storm over Tangier Island

Allen and Moira Epps flew their flying club's Cessna Skylane for an overnight to one of the most unique and isolated communities in America: Tangier Island, Virginia. As Allen says, it was all about "fresh made crab cakes and talking to natives whose distinct accent makes you realize their isolation."
Turbo on Cessna 206

Suddenly the engine went quiet

The new engine install resulted in no squawks and the aircraft returned to service. Shortly thereafter, I was cruising along on the second leg of a round robin flight with that new engine running smoothly when suddenly the engine went quiet. The pitch and RPM dropped as if the throttle had been pulled back completely, like a simulated engine failure.
F-4Ds

The hardest thing I’ve ever done in an aircraft

Contrary to the forecast of only scattered clouds, the visibility continued to drop to the point at which it was less than 20 ft. Now we were in very close formation, at night, in thick, lightly turbulent clouds, with light icing. I could see the wingtip light of the tanker but not the fuselage! Here is where things got dicey—not because of the weather, but because I really needed to pee!
Inverted

Beyond the $100 Hamburger: how aerobatics can expand your horizon

You mastered the basics of operating the machine, navigating from A to B, understanding how weather works, and the regulations. You took your friends up. You have flown out to all of the $100 hamburgers. But the reality is setting in that most of your flying is solo. You find yourself slowly flying less and less. You used to go up once a week. Then it became once a month. Where did the excitement go?
Turn on short final

Reducing loss of control accidents in five minutes

Let’s cut right to the chase: there is a strong case to be made that many base-to-final accidents may have as a significant factor the pilot’s fear of a runway overshoot, fearing that any runway overshoot can only be disastrous. However, if pilots have flown even one deliberate runway overshoot and seen that the real issue is instead fear of the unknown, then just one five minute traffic pattern with a deliberate runway overshoot has the potential to significantly reduce loss of control accidents.

Friday Photo: rise and shine

When the weather is nice, and it's before the time change, I take advantage of the nice weather. Here is a picture inviting everyone to aviation, a new morning, new opportunity to learn and experience aviation.
Ramp at SPA

An intro flight takes an unexpected turn

There I was, bouncing around in the backseat of a Cessna 172 as my friend tried to stabilize the aircraft while our pilot was simultaneously shutting the door. Yet no amount of slamming seemed to lock the door in place. It would merely rebel by jerking open yet again. We were in quite the dilemma at several hundred feet. This experience was certainly not what I would have expected from an introductory flight!
Bald spot

Who’s landing this airplane?

Collecting my things, I heard an alarmed expletive from the front of the plane. I looked out to see a combination of fear and disgust in Roger’s eyes and my heart sank. I quickly hopped out, walked around front and immediately saw the issue. The right main had a huge bald spot, void of any rubber, that was at least two layers into the threads.
Indian Harvard

Fire, fire, fire

I had qualified as a fighter pilot in the Indian Air Force in 1966, completed the flight instructor’s course a few months earlier, and just upgraded to QFI Cat B a few days ago. In other words, I could do no wrong. I was indestructible! I was carrying out an A&E check on a Harvard IV-D which had undergone a routine servicing. I was flying solo and the plan was to do the engine and trim checks followed by a stall and spin.

Easier than they say: flying a Cub from Idaho to Baja Mexico

Recently a friend and I had cause to celebrate a newly earned PPL, so in the midst of winter, we left snow-covered Idaho for a 4000-mile trip to the tip of Baja and back. A Super Cub is not the ideal plane for this mission. With only 46 gallons of usable fuel and 31-inch backcountry tires, our speed was limited to 100 miles per hour. This journey was going to be on Mexican time: low, slow and off the beaten path.

Friday Photo: a sunlit thunderstorm

It was May and a line of late afternoon thunderstorms was building. I requested a deviation to the left to avoid what looked like a line of clouds and through the co-pilot window caught this developing thunderhead through an opening in the clouds.