Preflight planning

Long range learning: what do we bring from the flight school?

In my time as a student pilot, much slower and lower than I usually fly nowadays, I always wondered how much of that knowledge I was being trained and evaluated on would be applicable to the rest of my career. It turns out that, at least when it comes to the operational part of it, we can directly relate many of the student pilot concepts to the airline environment: a good surprise, for sure.
Airphibian

From the archives: The Airphibian

This article first appeared in the January 1947 edition of Air Facts. As amazing as it might seem today, Leighton Collins believed back then that flying cars had arrived. He wrote in the headline to this article, "Put it down for keeps that a successful car-airplane is now an accomplished fact." Seventy five years later, flying cars are still in the headlines but not in any garages or hangars. Still, the description of the Airphibian offers a fascinating look at the post-war general aviation boom.
TWA 707

Around the world in the “seven oh seven”

One of the first large, long range, intercontinental jet airliners to come on the scene in the late 1950s and early 60s was the Boeing 707. For TWA’s most senior pilots, moving from pistons to jets was the biggest transition since the change from visual to instrument flying in the 1930s. Several of our older captains opted to bypass the jets and finish their careers flying the Connie. The younger fellows, on the other hand, could hardly wait to jump into a jet!

Is Top Gun: Maverick based on the Bob Hoover story?

Like many of us, the summer of 2022 was spent seeing Top Gun: Maverick. The movie has become immensely popular both inside and outside of aviation circles. The reviews have been glowing, but one critique I have seen is that the ending was a little too cheesy, unbelievable, or “Hollywood.” But what if the most unbelievable part of the movie was actually based on a true story?
Stearman

Friday Photo: a Stearman patiently waits

This was the end of day 7 of a 9-day journey flying cross country to get the plane to its new home in May of 2020. We had been battling high winds and turbulence for seven hours by the time we landed at Winslow, AZ (INS).  We pushed the big biplane out of the wind and into the hangar that the airport FBO made available to us. After closing up the doors and unloading, I took a minute to take in the view.
F-100D

Herding cattle with a century-series fighter

Yanking the plane around for alignment, I dropped down to 200 feet (or somewhere in that vicinity) and pushed up the power for a passage over the field at 400+ knots while engaging the afterburner for added effect. As the ground streaked by in a blur, I abruptly pulled up into the vertical at the far end of the fence line and initiated a barrel roll. Tilting my head back over my left shoulder, I glanced back to where I had just been.
Smoke from OV-10

Every pilot a tiger

I quickly surmised that, as Shakespeare put it, "the game was afoot!" This fellow FAC was going to try and get on my tail and I had to do whatever was necessary to keep that from happening. I shoved my control levers into takeoff and land, putting my twin turboprop engines at max RPM while my throttles would control the pitch of the blades. I turned into him and we were quickly in what is called a "furball."
Hole in 150

A 12-minute flight and a serious in-flight fire

At approximately 1000 feet AGL, I entered a left crosswind to begin the pattern for an uphill landing on runway 36. During the crosswind leg, I noticed an odor in the aircraft cockpit that smelled like hot plastic. During entry into the left downwind leg for runway 36, the plastic odor became much stronger. I turned off all aircraft-powered electrical equipment, including the radio and transponder. I abbreviated my pattern slightly and turned left base early.
Super Cub

Special VFR—sometimes it’s the best option

When I went to Alaska, I had 500 hours in my logbook and a list in my head of things that I’d never do in an airplane, all things that the wise old owls had warned me about. By the time I left four years later, I’d made the transition from inexperienced greenhorn to cocky amateur and finally to competent operator. And I’d checked several of those “I’ll never” items off my list.
IAD

When things went wrong in a good way

Leesburg Airport was still under instrument conditions, so the final landing was also going to be a real VOR approach and a fine ending to the day. Everything went fine until about halfway through the approach when the VOR receiver lost track and the little red flag appeared. Carl had nothing to do with it. I called our approach controller with a missed approach and started the missed procedure.
Buffalo

Friday Photo: Buffalo at night

Two pilots, one airplane, and a mission to fly for dinner—that's the start of a fun flight. Add in a calm night and the twinkling lights of Buffalo, New York, off the wing and you have the perfect flight. That's the view Mark Bellis and Marc Volpe share in this Friday Photo.
B-17

You’ll get in trouble sonny

There were two older ladies eating at a nearby table. As Hugh walked down the stairs and through the gate to the airplane, one of the ladies stood up and called out to Hugh, “Don’t go out there, sonny. You’ll get in trouble.” She had mistaken him for a teenager without authority to be in that area, so was totally startled when he swung up into the belly hatch of the B-17 and briefly appeared in the cockpit.
XB-70 takeoff

A close call for the XB-70 at Edwards AFB

The North American Aviation XB-70 Valkyrie was a Mach 3, high-altitude strategic bomber designed in the late 1950s, with the maiden flight on September 21, 1964. Meanwhile, the Russians had developed their high-altitude surface-to-air missiles (SAMs), which made the XB-70 vulnerable. NASA and the Air Force used the two prototype XB-70s for high-speed flight tests and research into sonic booms.
Radar overview

Go or no go: desert storms

Living in Arizona, you make it a habit to land by noon in the summertime—after that, the heat of the desert often leads to turbulence or thunderstorms. That's not an option today, since it's already 12:30 local time, but it's close. Ideally you'd like to fly from Scottsdale, Arizona (SDL), to Las Vegas, Nevada (VGT) before things get too sporty. The flight in your well-equipped Turbo Cessna 310 should take just under 1 hour and 30 minutes en route.
Cessna 182

Weight and balance “get-there-itis” traps

It was a beautiful spring day for an airplane ride, which I was asked to give to a very important and even famous client (and his two friends). As an instrument pilot having flown for years, I knew the importance of getting the exact weight of my client and his two adult friends, so I got the numbers over the phone. I never realized that a hidden trap was awaiting me until I first saw all three of them at the airport.
AS365

A tail rotor failure at night in Saudi Arabia

We started a slight descent to 2500 ft. AGL, completed the pre-landing checklist, and turned to a 5-mile final to the LZ. As I added pedal to adjust for the change in our power setting, I realized very quickly that we had no tail rotor authority. I quickly checked to verify the condition, found that I had a full range of left and right pedal, but with no result.
Sunset with airplane

Friday Photo: sunset departure

"Few things in life can beat the view of a beautiful fall sunset framed in the wings of your favorite biplane," says Todd James. It's hard to disagree after seeing his photo, which shows a Marquart Charger MA-5 lifting into the skies with a glowing yellow sun on the horizon.
Constellation cockpit

Where have all the pilots gone?

I have noticed the aviation industry is once again experiencing another pilot shortage. So, let’s take a little trip back in time and see how we keep getting in to these so called “shortages.” A long time ago—when dinosaurs ruled the earth, beer was only a nickel, and I had no gray hair—the airlines were regulated and all was well upon the land. For a captain flying at night on an international flight, the salary was as much as God.
Stearman

California to Oshkosh in a 1941 Stearman

I have been attending the annual Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) convention in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, for years. Many have been attending it since its start in 1954, and have never missed a year. In 1994 I was fortunate to fly to Oshkosh with my friend Royce Clifford, and in her 1941 Stearman. The trip took four days from Gillespie Field in San Diego, California.
Garmin traffic

What a difference ADS-B In makes—or does it?

I recently moved a friend’s airplane from the Nashville area to Minnesota. Not just a normal, been-around-the-block-a-few-years airplane, but a brand new airplane with all the latest Garmin glass cockpit electronics and technology. But I determined that the aircraft—ordered, bought and paid for with ADS-B Out and In—only had the Out configuration.