Cessna takeoff

Solo in every sense of the word

The other day I was cleaning out the drawers in an old dresser and unfolded a green button-down shirt, ruined by having been defaced with a marker and having one tail cut off. Why did I save this thing? I made out some words on the garment that jogged my memory and started my mind to wandering…
Mount Robson

Rocky Mountain rescue

I decided to look down and see where I was geographically. When I looked down, I saw a red flare coming up at me. Well that’s a first. I looked again and a second red flare was shot upwards. I began a circling descent and noticed on this logging road, four individuals with their arms outstretched basically making a “T” sign.
Airplane by hay

The engine just plain quit – my hayfield landing

A few summers ago, I was climbing out of a little grass airstrip in my Zenith 701 about a mile east of Smithfield, North Carolina, just starting to take in a pretty view of the Neuse River basin below, mostly thick forest with a dark river winding slowly through it, when the engine sputtered a few times (something like sputter, sputter, sput, sput, sput) and then stopped. Just plain quit.

Friday Photo: Sunset over Puget Sound

High wing airplanes make for great picture frames. In this Friday Photo, the sun sets over the Olympic Mountains as Steve Phoenix cruises along in his Piper Pacer. The sun is framed between the struts, while the light bounces off the water of Puget Sound below. Peaceful, beautiful, and exactly what makes flying so rewarding.
Glider ride

How to upset a passenger without really trying

Think about the excited guest or family member about to have that first airplane and/or glider flight. Most of the people who visit our glider field can fall into a few different categories, and each category has different backgrounds and expectations.
PA-23

A bad way to learn about aerodynamics

Many decades ago, my flying career was just getting off the ground when it nearly ended. It was August 1976 to be more exact and I had the opportunity to ferry a PA-23 that a new owner was restoring that had the full Geronimo conversion from Albuquerque to Cincinnati for radio and autopilot work at my father’s shop.
Stearman Red Baron

Vipers at 12 o’clock

It has been said that the last fighter pilot has been born. While time will answer that projection, this story is about the human element in dogfighting: the desire that pilots with skill and confidence have to test themselves against others with the same. In this epic experience, two of the latest fighters of the day meet relics of a bygone era.

Friday Photo: overhead Amsterdam airport

Passing through the CTR of Schiphol, one of the busiest airports in Europe, is a granted privilege for private pilots who are familiair with the CTR of EHAM. Preparation is key - knowing which runways are in use, wind direction, etc. - so that controllers can give direct commands which are followed promptly.

Go or no go: Thanksgiving trip across Florida

It's two days before Thanksgiving, which means it's time for the annual pilgrimage from your home in Jacksonville, Florida, to the home of your 91-year old mother in Naples. It's a 6-hour drive or a 1:45 minute flight in your Cessna 182, so it's easy to guess which method you would prefer. Will the weather cooperate? Read the weather briefing below and then tell us if you would go or cancel.
Aeronca

The loss of an old friend

I just lost an old aviation friend. The news came in unusual fashion, as an email with graphic photographs of the body, but no note about what happened. The damaged nose, the broken limbs— one separated from the body— it was hard to take. She had been pretty, perky, always ready for a good time. But now it was over.

Friday Photo: Ayers Rock, Australia

Ayers Rock is a famous sandstone monolith in the remote Northern Territory of Australia. It's a popular tourist destination, but it's difficult to reach by car. In an airplane, however, it is a scenic and unforgettable flight, as Bob Main shows in this week's Friday Photo. He calls it, "the trip of a lifetime."
Lower Russian Lake

Making an air drop from a Champ on floats – only in Alaska

The weather couldn’t have been better, though it would be a bit breezy in the mountains. I’d be supplying our proposed sheep camp with an air drop from a float-equipped, 65-hp Aeronca Champ. My flight log at the time showed that I had less than a meager 82 hours as a pilot. Confident I was; experienced I certainly was not.
Smiles in cockpit

Flying with a young child – is it possible?

One of the things I used to dream about before getting my license was to fly my wife and two-year old daughter around, sharing the experience of flying together. I would daydream about flying off to a fun destination, grab lunch (and coffee) and then enjoy a nice flight back to the home field. I often questioned if having an enjoyable flight was doable with a two-year old.
Night flying

Spooked about night flying in singles?

There will be a debate about flying at night in single-engine airplanes for as long as there are single-engine airplanes and it gets dark every night. That is a given. Recently the son of an old friend emailed and asked me what I thought about flying singles at night. My stock answer to pilots who express concern about this is simple: If you are not comfortable with it, don’t do it.

Friday Photo: Manhattan over the nose

New York has one of the most famous skylines in the world, and there's no better way to see it than from the cockpit of an airplane. Jody Kochansky was lucky enough to get a view of Manhattan from his Cirrus SR-20 on a perfectly clear day, and he shares it in this week's Friday Photo.
172 landing

Don’t turn a practice emergency into a real emergency

I was out at my local airport one recent afternoon, watching planes beat up (or should I say pulverize), the traffic pattern, and I saw something that really made me wonder what folks were thinking. I observed one locally-based Cessna 172 try to execute a simulated engine-out emergency landing on our 5,000 ft-long runway.
Washington airspace

Death, taxes, and airspace

Pilots and aviation lobby groups are up in arms right now about the potential privatization of Air Traffic Control, and rightly so. Unfortunately, these same groups have been much quieter about another government-led aviation disaster, one that has happened right under our noses: the relentless expansion of restricted and controlled airspace.
Cirrus jet

Video tip: Instrument approaches

Single pilot IFR is hard, says well-known flight instructor Jason Miller, and the biggest challenge is to stay ahead of the airplane. In this practical video, he offers three tips for managing a flight, from airspeed control to autopilot usage. The goal is for your mind to arrive at the next waypoint before the airplane does.
Piper on runway

The runway behind you…

This is a story about two words - “unfortunately” and “fortunately” - and has been de-identified in order to protect the embarrassed. However much can be learnt from the following incident. The pilot knew the aircraft well, having operated in and out of some quite restricted spaces over quite a long period. No need to taxi back right to the end of the strip – half way up will do! Unfortunately, a bad decision in retrospect.

Friday Photo: Wichita sunset

It was a silky-smooth IFR flight from KIXD to 1K1 for Dianne White. She was treated to this beautiful sunset, a view those on the ground didn’t have the benefit of enjoying that winter evening. As she says, "We pilots get to enjoy so many breathtaking sights those on terra firma never get to see."