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.
Yellowstone spring

Smoke on the water: a long, summer cross country

Flying is fun, right? Yes, under the right circumstances. It can also be a challenge, as this story illustrates. Long cross-country trips in a small airplane can be a breeze, but only if that breeze is a healthy tailwind and the sky is clear. We had about twenty knots of headwind both going out and coming back.
Sunset from Cessna

The dream that is personal aviation

About a year after my girlfriend first bought me an introductory lesson, I recall hoping that such passion for flight would never subside. Still the novice, I had enough journeys in mind to fill at least my first logbook’s worth of entries. On a spring day in Morristown, New Jersey, I endeavored to strike one off the list with a flight down the coast.
Air Canada 727

15 minutes to disaster – and I never knew it

Feeling good about our decision, we continued with the number three engine just above idle keeping all the a/c systems running normally. We had no trouble maintaining FL330 with only a slight reduction of airspeed. For weeks, I wore a smug smile on my face as I told my colleagues what a wonderful job I had done. Then one day I opened my company mailbox to find an envelope containing a curt note from the manager of the company Pratt & Whitney overhaul department.
SR-71 on runway

An SR-71 Blackbird goes AOG – now what?

The Blackbird moved on to the active, lined up, stroked the burners on those two Pratt & Whitney J-58s and started a slow, but steady acceleration down runway center. But, now the "Aw, Sh*t!" The Blackbird veered sharply and quickly to the right side of the runway. Everyone in the tower sat up straight, and then the bird departed the runway and came to an abrupt, ugly stop.
Airplane out side window

Keep your eyes outside

When I began my flight training several years ago, my first instructor told me something that I thought was common sense and that he didn’t need to tell me: Keep your eyes outside. I remember asking myself where else I would keep my eyes if not outside and wondering why he thought it necessary to give me that little piece of advice.
Thunderstorms

I was a “weather coward,” and I made the right decision

"Hey jerk face!" my conscience screamed. "What about PILOT IN COMMAND don't you understand? Who makes the decisions around here? The line boy? Is this a good idea or not? If it's not, grow a pair and do what you know to do!”
Crew in Alaska

North to Alaska

A friend and I discussed flying to Alaska as he knew a fellow who had expressed a desire to see the northern state. I called a pilot friend who became the other front seat. He was not yet multiengine-rated although he was a competent instrument-rated pilot. I reserved the Twin Comanche for mid-July 1982 for our flight.
DC-3 with engine cowl off

Drop everything to fly a DC-3? Absolutely

My phone dinged as the text message came through. "Can you spend the day in Griffin tomorrow?" I had a lesson first thing in the morning, but was otherwise free. I asked Dan what was going on. "DC-3 flying. Emerg." I didn't need any other details and I made arrangements to change what would have been a lazy Saturday into one that would doubtlessly not be boring.
New York at night

It was more than adventure

While I have written about the adventures or misadventures of flying during my career, I don’t wish to leave the impression that I was in constant danger or that my career could be characterized as hazardous; it wasn’t. There were times when I witnessed unbelievable beauty—sights that I wished my loved ones could have shared.
Luscombe parked on grass

Out of control – flying a vintage airplane in Ireland

“Don’t you have to get permission from ATC or someone?” That’s the most common question I get when people discover I launch myself into the sky from a field. Confusion then turns to disbelief when I tell them “nope.” I usually let that little pot of incredulity simmer for a while; sometimes I’ll stir things with a “why would I need permission?”
PC-6 takeoff

Ferrying the “Pokey Porter” 13,000 miles

This account concerns the delivery of one Fairchild Heli-Porter PC-6 from the factory in Maryland to Yosu, South Korea. As a pilot for World Aviation Services, Inc., I have been assigned the delivery and will train a Korean crew upon arrival. The Heli-Porter is a single engine, turboprop, short takeoff and landing aircraft capable of carrying eight persons 420 miles at an optimum speed of 115 knots, hence my private nomer of "Pokey Porter."
Panama river

My introduction to bush flying in Panama

What am I doing here? I’m flying at 3,500 feet over water, heading into the unknown in a single-engine Cessna, and it’s dark! This is what I asked myself as I flew 10 miles out over the Bay of Panama before dawn.
PA-11 on grass

Growing up near a grass strip

My uncle and his friend opened up a flight training school after the war on our family's Northern Indiana dairy farm with a 3000-foot grass strip and farm-engineered hangar. Many former military pilots and a lot of local people took lessons and rented planes. I was enchanted with all the activity.
Glider wing walker

Just like a fly on the windshield

I advanced the throttle to full power; confirmed that both aircraft and all the associated equipment were going in the same direction at the same time and stole a glance in my rearview mirror. I noticed what looked like a big cloud of smoke off to the right side of the glider (George’s position). Curious.
Bill David by airplane

Learning to fly before I can drive

It might be hard for you to understand how lucky I am, but I am certain of it at this very moment. I’m on my way to take one of my flying lessons. I am 16 years old and I started a few weeks ago at Colts Neck Airport near Freehold, New Jersey.
Mulhearn by floatplane

What I did on my summer vacation (hint: seaplanes)

How many times have you been hangar flying with fellow pilots and the subject of a seaplane rating comes up? Have you ever heard a pilot say, “I don’t want a seaplane rating?” Probably not. A seaplane rating is like a DC-3 type rating: you either have it or you want it.
CYTZ ramp

My first flight to Canada – surprisingly easy and fun

I had done a few longer cross country flights in the past, but nothing that required being in a specific place at a specific time for a specific event. This doesn’t seem like a big deal, but it does mean that any mishaps along the way must be dealt with on the move and a solution found immediately so that the trip can still be completed.
Blizzard

A weekend on the beach – this time in a Super Cub during a blizzard

Visibility in the heavy snowfall was down to less than a half mile and getting worse. After having passed Tyonek, which was above me, and I couldn’t see it, I scooted by the Nikolai Creek strip, elevation 30 feet MSL, but it too had disappeared in the low cloud cover. And that cloud cover was now pressing me ever lower.
Pilot sleeping

Dozing for dollars at 39,000 feet

It’s quite funny to watch someone fall asleep sitting up, a condition described by researchers as head bobbing. The victims’ heads loll onto their chests then some wicked synaptic brain fart wakes them, their heads snap up like the cracking of a whip only to repeat the sequence moments later. The sleep experts and their theories notwithstanding, when you are tired no matter what you do, your brain will eventually just shut you down into a virtual coma.