Boring is the new black

The more I fly, the less space for ego I see in flying. Yet, if there is one killer in this business, it is precisely that. We see it in the statistics, we see it on some colleagues, and we see it within ourselves.
ZUG on ramp

A flying gig in New Zealand

After flying for a major airline more than 28 years, I reached the mandatory retirement age. I loved every minute of it, and I had no desire to retire. So, I began to research options so that I could continue commercial flying. As I scanned the internet, I came across a flying opportunity in New Zealand. A small airline was looking for a chief pilot.
DC-3 Spooky

The day I really graduated to airline pilot

Many senior pilots at Eastern regarded new hires as a "kid who didn't have enough common sense to come in out of the rain." This condescending attitude was particularly true of some of the older WWII captains flying the DC-8 at the time. Their view of your engineer status and job was simply, "get the fuel on board, sit down, shut up, and keep your feet off the seat."
Jet engine fire

Mayday, mayday, mayday!

I am surprised at how reluctant some pilots are to declare an emergency with ATC, as if some stigma is attached to saying the “E” word, that follows you around for the rest of your flying life. What I find more intriguing is some folks who are the most hesitant to declare one have never had an actual “real world” emergency. Yet.
Sunset

Friday Photo: Sunset takeoff

Airports around sunset are beautiful places to just sit and watch the world go by. Alan Connor snapped this photo of just that moment, as a tailwheel airplane lifts off, rising above a setting sun. It almost looks as if the airplane has a spotlight on it.
180 on floats

Thirty years of floatplane flying in Canada

In the spring of 1970 my friend Bob purchased a 1953 Cessna 180 on floats. It also had skis for winter. He and his friend had been moose hunting in Canada by living out of a lean-to basic tent. They wanted to build a moose hunting and fishing shack on a remote lake up there. I knew how to build so he included me in the adventure. I jumped at the chance.
Queen Air

A Queen Air sheds a propeller

On the evening of November 8, 1968, a Pilgrim Airlines twin-engine Beechcraft took off from Bradley International Airport with only a pilot and co-pilot aboard. Shortly after take off, when the flight was about five miles southeast of the airport, the aircraft suddenly lost a three-blade propeller from one of the engines and was forced to return to the airport and make an emergency landing.
Cessna with trucks

If it can fail, it will (and anything can fail)

About midway through the clouds, my JPI engine monitor began alerting us to a rapidly dropping bus voltage. Shortly after, we watched our GTN 650 GPS turn into a screen of flashes and hieroglyphics. I immediately leveled the wings, stopped my climb and leveled off (Rule 1 – Fly the plane!).
Cirrus EIS

Fuel Reserve Requirements—the FARs Aren’t Much Help

You’re pointed away from the destination airport on some controller’s vector and you are sweating the near-empty fuel gauges. As a last resort you tell the controller you are minimum fuel and need priority to the runway. Did you violate FAR 91.167, the rule that sets the requirements for minimum fuel when flying under IFR?

Friday Photo: sunset from FL 380

A sunset between layers, flying southwest between two of the most well known tourist destinations in Brazil: Rio de Janeiro and Foz do Iguaçú, home of our share of the amazing Iguazu Falls, on the triple border with Argentina and Paraguay.
On the ground at Wales

Utqiagvik to Anchorage—Three Amazing Days in the Air

Bleak. Barren. Forbidding. Lonesome. Awesome. Beautiful. Cosmopolitan. No, this isn’t one of those "pick the word that doesn’t fit" quizzes. These words all describe a three-day flight across Alaska, from Utqiagvik (formerly known as Barrow) to Anchorage.
Runway

Two exciting landings in 21 years of flying

Everything was going perfectly until I turned base leg and heard my very first mayday call. It was a pilot of a Cessna 172, who had just taken off on runway 33. He was experiencing power loss, and called out that he didn't think he could fly the circuit because he had three passengers on board, so he was attempting to make a turn around and land on runway 15.
Air Force One

Read the NOTAM—my conflict with Air Force One

I tied down the plane and went up to the office to pay the fee. On departure (remember, the beer!), the friendly gentleman mentioned—just by the way—that the airspace over Warsaw was about to be closed from 10pm that day (Friday) until 10pm the following Monday. The reason? The US President was about to fly in to commemorate the outbreak of WWII.
Swift

I could never be so lucky again

Zach put his iPhone flashlight to use in the only shadow to be found in the brilliant blue aloft. “Dad! Oil is pooling at my feet.” Instinctively I began a 180-degree turn to the last airport we flew over—a life boat in the distance known as Silver Wings Airpark (TS36). I traded airspeed for altitude and resisted the urge to command more from my faithful Continental by pushing up the power, knowing now the race against time had begun.

Friday Photo: over the moon

Our local EAA chapter had a late afternoon picnic right at sunset at Ovid, NY (D82) – also known as “Ovid International.” Waldo was kind enough to take a number of members up in his beautiful Cub on an absolutely perfect autumn evening.
Jetwing on ramp

From jars to jets: the forgotten story of the Jetwing

Backyard gardens enjoyed a good growing season hear in the Midwest, leaving us with an abundance of produce. What hasn’t been used already is being saved by drying, freezing or canning. There’s even a shortage of canning supplies at the local hardware store. That got me thinking about glass jars and outer space. Stay with me and I’ll explain.
Wright memorial

Wish fulfilled: flying to Kitty Hawk

The Wright Flyer was my favorite topic for such study. How could two bicycle mechanics succeed in engineering an airplane, and so far away from what they called home? A plan emerged in my mind… why not fly my Cessna 172 to Kitty Hawk and land at the place where the aviation began? Seemed far-fetched initially, but when you put your mind to something, it will eventually manifest.
Landing on ice

Runways optional: Twin Otter tales from the Arctic

In the 1970s and early 90s, I was fortunate to fly with many different Twin Otters and operators on combinations of straight skis, wheel skis, mixed nose ski and wheels, high flotation tires, and floats. Using these aircraft to support our research took me all over the vast landscape of the Canadian Arctic, ranging from Tuktoyaktuk in the Beaufort Sea to the High Arctic Islands and east to the Canada/Greenland border in Baffin Bay.
Cirrus

Do we want flying to be hard or easy?

Earning a pilot certificate is one of the most difficult things you can do as a hobby. While technology has made many activities easier these days, pilots still have to learn about magnetos and Morse code, bank angle and Bernoulli. For some aviation boosters, that’s a problem; for others, it’s an opportunity.

Friday Photo: sunrise at Monument Valley

After four days of touring the canyons of the West, I was looking at nearly 10 hours of flying time to get home. I checked out of the hotel early and walked across the street to the airstrip, watching the horizon slowly brighten. At exactly sunrise, I took off and grabbed a couple of “secondary sunrises” of the big, red fireball cresting the mesa. Made it home just before sunset!