Shasta off wing

Bringing the Comanche home—Apple Valley to Auburn

In late 2019 I became the caretaker/owner of a 1960 Comanche 180, but one with a slight problem: I was living in Seattle, and the airplane was in Southern California. Due to Covid complications, it wasn’t until the summer of 2020 that I had a chance to get familiar with the plane and bring it home to the Pacific Northwest.
G1000 cockpit

Safety, philosophy, and the glass cockpit

Here’s the basic temptation of filing IFR with the Garmin G1000 glass cockpit: its improvement in your situational awareness is so great that it seems to allow you to lower your personal minimums and cut the FAR limitations, or commonsense ones your instructors taught you, a lot closer than you would with conventional instruments. Is this OK, or is it likely to create unsafe conditions?
Route

Go or no go: how much ice is too much?

Just because the calendar says spring doesn't mean in-flight icing is no longer a concern—especially around your home base in Chicago. So today's proposed flight home from Detroit (PTK) to Gary, Indiana (GYY), might be a challenge. You are instrument rated and current, and you're planning on an IFR flight. Your Cirrus SR22 has a TKS deice system but not a "known ice" system.
Pilatus PC-12

What’s wrong with Pilatus PC-12 pilots?

A key reason for the PC-12’s popularity has been its stellar safety record, one of the best in all of general aviation. So any effort to answer the question, “what’s wrong with Pilatus PC-12 pilots?” has to begin with: not much. But accidents do happen, including a recent one off the coast of North Carolina. That means it’s worth our time to examine the safety record of a specific airplane type, even if you don’t fly that model.
First solo

Fright or flight: a first solo with an unexpected passenger

I took a deep breath and stared at the runway numbers. It was the moment all my training had prepared me for. I made the final commitment to the flight and eased the throttle to full. My heart raced as I shot down the runway. The airspeed crept up, and I left the ground behind. I was ecstatic. The 150 really does climb like a rocket!

Understanding responsibility: my first flight with a passenger

This article was the winning entry in the fourth annual Richard Collins Writing Prize for Young Pilots. After reading over 70 entries, our distinguished panel of judges (including Richard’s son) selected Nadja Keist as the winner of the $5,000 award. We hope you’ll agree that this article is a fine tribute to a great writer and pilot.

Friday Photo: sunrise through a tilt-rotor

During September of 2018 Bell Helicopter was deep into flight test operations with their advanced military-oriented V-280 tilt-rotor testbed. The latter is a competitor in the US Army's Future Vertical Lift initiative which is on-going as these words are written. As the aircraft was being towed into position, I saw an opportunity to possibly catch the dawn sun through the open cabin doors as the aircraft moved slowly across the ramp. The result is what you see.
Khe Sanh takeoff

The siege of Khe Sanh

I felt sweat drip under my arms. I took a long, deep breath to settle my nerves without making it noticeable to my copilot and flight engineer. As we taxied toward number one position for takeoff, the sun was just starting to come up. It looked like a beautiful day was about to begin. We made our takeoff for Khe Sanh at 0730. On schedule.
Tower BW

From the archives: Richard Bach on the pilot brotherhood

This article, from the November 1960 issue of Air Facts, is a classic example of Richard Bach's mastery of both aviation and language. In telling the simple story of an hour in an air traffic control tower during the graveyard shift, he captures the beauty of airports and the common bond among pilots. "What if every pilot knew, I thought, that we are already brothers?"
G1000 display

Weight and performance—there is a tradeoff

Interestingly, upon reaching the cruising altitude of 10,000 feet, the cruise speed was 12 knots less than that calculated prior to flight. I tried various settings of manifold pressure, RPM, and fuel flow. Flying lean of peak, which the big bore Continentals are adept at, the speeds were consistently lower than advertised.
Thermometer at 100 degrees

Low, hot, and humid

The subsequent takeoff began normally enough—I didn’t necessarily notice if we became airborne a little farther down the runway than normal or not. But once airborne, I slowly became aware that things weren’t going as expected. After liftoff, the climb rate of the 172 was downright anemic to say the least. It was clawing the air trying to climb, but without much success.
GTN screens

What Nexrad can—and can’t—tell pilots

Having near real time Nexrad weather radar display in the cockpit has changed the way many of us fly more than any technology I can think of since the introduction of GPS. But that Nexrad image is not an absolute guide. There are no signs pointing “go here” but “don’t go there.” The Nexrad radar image demands interpretation by pilots.

Friday Photo: snowy mountain peaks

Clay Thomas captures the beauty and peace of a glider flight in this gorgeous Friday Photo. As he describes it: "Soaring down the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, 606 kilometers round trip, maximum altitude 17,915 feet, maximum rate of climb 1,200 FPM, maximum airspeed 165 knots. Fuel burn, zero."
Father and son

Kids in the cockpit: be sterile and not heard?

As a talkative toddler who grew up in an aviation family, I became very familiar with the term sterile cockpit. Sterile cockpit was a kind way for my father to tell me to “shut up.” As I got older, I understood its importance because my dad was a single pilot operator and had a lot to focus on. We even started using the term outside the cockpit when somebody was busy with another important task.
T-37

How I became friends with ATC

ATC give us two turns the whole way before the arrival procedure, and cleared us up to one altitude, 8,000 feet. It was the smoothest, most peaceful ride for the baby and his mother you can imagine. They knew. They all had seen the flight plan. They all had a hand in bringing in a baby for care. The care and safety of our airplane and our baby were foremost, for us and for ATC.
flight surgeon

Tales from the doc side

Susan Northrup is an Air Force vet and now works for the FAA at the national level. In a sidebar conversation I asked what her favorite experience was. She quickly replied, "my first fighter squadron, at Moody AFB, and going with the unit to Desert Storm." For some reason that triggered my memories of flight surgeons I’d been stationed with, and the variety of personalities and circumstances.
clouds at night with moon

What are the odds? An electrical failure at night

As I depressed the microphone button, the lighted LED frequency numbers on my comm radio immediately dimmed and started to scramble to different numbers off frequency. I reset the frequency and tried again. Same result. I was unable to communicate because I did not have enough electrical power.
CFI with student

Why you should think like a pilot

After many years working as a TV producer and network executive, I turned my hobby (flying small airplanes) into a second career as a flight instructor. While you might not be excited by the prospect of getting behind the controls of an aircraft, every day that I teach new pilots I realize the skills essential to safe flying apply just as well to making you better at whatever you do. From that, a few suggestions.

Friday Photo: a lonely airplane in the desert

I flew to the remote Alvord Desert to camp under the stars in a dark sky. It was dark, but storm clouds blocked the stars each night. The days were filled with the subtle beauty of desert mirages and absolute silence. A real dose of solitude.
STOL Drag

What STOL everybody’s attention?

If you keep tabs on current aviation news and social media, you’ve noticed this thing called “STOL” has become popular. Not a day goes by that you don’t see a reference to STOL, a reminder of an upcoming STOL event, or even an image or video of a STOL airplane approaching a gravel bar or a makeshift dirt strip. What is STOL, why is it growing like a wildfire, and how can you learn more about it?