Lancair

Icing, the face of God and illusions

I entered the clouds at about 9,000 feet and immediately ice begin to build up on the wings.  I didn't see the wing ice at first because I was busy looking for ice on the the windscreen. But there was none. Finally when I looked left, then right I saw ice on my wings from wing tip to wing root. Yikes!  All white, the edges, and getting whiter.
commander en route

Flying to Sun ‘n Fun 2024

During the trip I put 18.1 hours into my logbook, met up with my buddies, made new friends, took a bunch of pictures, had great food and added new life experiences. Why not plan a flying adventure with your friends or flying club, enjoying all that the freedom to fly offers. Keep the blue side up!
cruise flight

Cruise Checklist, Complete?

Monitoring your engine gauges is sort of a systems-level skill which is part of every primary curriculum. But most of the focus is on takeoff; hopefully, you’ve been taught to stare at the gauges when you line up on the runway in case you must abort because one of them doesn’t look right. Yet just because your engine is acting normally on takeoff doesn’t guarantee it will in flight, right?
beech 18

Fate is STILL the hunter

Climbing through 1,000 feet on my assigned heading, without warning, the airplane pitched over violently into an uncommanded dive. The pitch over was so abrupt that my heart skipped a beat. Instinctively, I pulled back on the control wheel and wrestled the Beech 18 back into straight and level flight. With adrenalin fueling my heartbeat into a flutter, and my jaw agape, I steadied the pitch attitude and regained control.
seaplane on beach

Friday photo: If pigs could fly

Maule beached at a popular tourist atraction in the Bahamas along side some pigs—one of the many fun moments during an 11,000+hr commercial seaplane career!

IFR Insights with Spencer Suderman: Procedure Turn and RNAV Circling Approach

IFR Insights, hosted by Spencer Suderman, shares valuable experiences and tips for instrument flying. Spencer is a Florida-based airshow pilot and instrument flight instructor. In this episode, ride along with Spencer in a G1000-equipped Cessna 172 as he flies a full RNAV circle-to-land approach with a holding pattern course reversal into Cecil, FL.
Piper Warrior

Budget Buys and Early Bye-Bye’s

in this age of information we live in, there’s absolutely NO EXCUSE to ever depart an airport without checking weather including densitity altitude, NOTAM’s, and TFR’s.  It’s your Pilot in Command responsibility under 91.103.  Ask yourself, can I safely land or depart a particular airport given my weight and balance situation?  Can I safely land or depart given the density altitude and runway length?
new england coast

My first and last flying road trip

The plan was for a mid-October trip from Virginia up the coast to northern Maine with a first stopover in Newport, Rhode Island and then Nantucket, Massachusetts. We would complete the remainder of the planning the day by day. Getting to the adventure involved passing by Washington D.C., Baltimore, Maryland and the busy airspace around Newark, Kennedy, and La Guardia Airports.
CIRRUS OVER SOUTH AFRICA

Turbulence and Triumph: Lessons learned about flying (and about life)

Suddenly, the aircraft was jolted by a powerful updraft followed by a downdraft, as I knocked the top of my head on the aircraft and lost some altitude in a matter of seconds. My heart raced, but my training kicked in. I adjusted the throttle and worked to regain control, while staying calm and focused.
pa-32

Who needs pre-buy inspections?

Many findings were serious and could have had tragic consequences. Problems such as pieces of the four-year-old(!) crumbling air filter possibly being sucked into the engine; possible fuel leaks onto a hot engine causing fire; an accidental keyless engine start as a result of an ignored airworthiness directive (AD); an inoperable RadioShack stall horn unsecured and hanging only by wires behind the panel.

Friday Photo: forest fire off the wing

Jim Yares took this photo while flying his Cirrus from Buchanan Field in Concord, CA, to North Las Vegas, NV, via the famous “Trona Corridor”—a VFR path cut through the Edwards Air Force Base complex. This is a great way to get from Northern California to Las Vegas without going high over the hostile mountain terrain of the central Sierra Nevada.
New Cessna 172

So maybe there was a real purpose in flying that day

After I was current again and reasonably proficient, the 16-year-old son of some friends asked if he could go up with me.  I said he could, but only if his parents were very clear as to my experience, the record of the flying club, the kind of plane we’d be flying, Vx, Vy, everything.  They gave an enthusiastic thumbs up and we had a great flight.
Mechanic helping kid

Passing the torch

Pilots are life-long learners, and, per the Feynman Learning Technique, the best way to learn anything is to teach it to someone else. With that in mind, plus a desire to pass the torch to a new generation, some old pilots developed a week-long aviation camp for youth, ages 14-18. 
SGS 1-26

Soaring and the Aviation Safety Reporting System

The NASA ASRS system was created about 34 years ago, with the main purpose of identifying hazards to the overall approach to safety. In doing so, there had to be some caveats which insured its success. Perhaps the greatest one being that whatever information was disseminated through this process could not (BY LAW) be used in any type of enforcement against the reporting source.

Your passengers may not always enjoy flying

Turns out, it wasn't until turning base leg that we hit smoother air. With a 20+ knot headwind straight down the runway, my touchdown was slow and thankfully smooth. Had we made a fuel or bathroom stop, the guys may have ask directions to the nearest Greyhound station.
Windsock

Wind is More than a Number

Those little hills made for fiendish turbulence down low. The lower I got, the worse it became. I’m stubborn and I kept thinking it’s just 20 knots, and I’m a CFI (beating chest). Until I was porpoising down the runway like a first-time student. I went around the pattern a few times but finally got a clue and decided to go elsewhere.
cuban eight

Friday photo: half cuban eight

Half Cuban Eight with a 1 1/2 roll over Springdale, Arkansas.
V-tail Bonanza

Burning Man for Builders

Society will always tell us there’s no such thing as safe enough. We will add more and more sensors, cameras and lidar to things that drive themselves, while news headlines rage of man failing machine, machine failing man. We put in airbags and then a switch to deactivate them.

Challenges in Vietnam

,
Firebug told the flight mechanic to use a nozzle of the second fire extinguisher to open the fire door, and if he still saw flames, to discharge the whole fire extinguisher into the compartment. He then told the load master to get the fire extinguisher from the cockpit.
Airplane off runway

Survival gear after the crash…hmm

Or might it be the case that the pilot–you, for example—has mental and cognitive skills degraded by pain after the crash? And maybe all those survival tools and toys that were so appealing and easy to evaluate on a bright Saturday morning are in the moment hard to use, hard to get open from the packaging, or even forgotten?