Search Results for: vfr

The runway lights were just coming on when I met Kary and Karver in the pilot’s lounge at the virtual airport. Kary is a longtime CFI and volunteer pilot with the Civil Air Patrol and I admire her judgment on safety matters. Karver is a young man who recently completed his instrument and commercial ratings […]

To the owner of an Experimental Amateur-Built (E/A-B) aircraft, any accident is a tragedy. However, the FAA monitors the homebuilt accident rate based on fatal accidents only. It’s understandable, in some ways. Unlike owners of production aircraft, builders of homebuilt aircraft are usually very familiar with disassembling and transporting a bent bird. A minor enough […]

Pilots are aware of the rules and regulations defined in the Federal Aviation Regulations and the Aeronautical Information Manual. If you have devoted much time reading them you understand that for every reg demanding what to do, there may be another citing the opposite. This is a story of a pilot who followed the FARs, […]

It is nearly impossible to mention the AIM in a discussion of proper procedures without hearing “the AIM is not regulatory!” as a retort. Often, implicit in the response is, “so we don’t really have to follow it.” But is that true? What is the difference between “regulatory” and “non‑regulatory”? Does “non‑regulatory” mean we are […]

uAvionix made a name for itself with the innovative skyBeacon and tailBeacon ADS-B Out solutions‭. ‬These 978‭ ‬MHz UAT devices‭, ‬intended to replace a wingtip strobe and taillight‭, ‬respectively‭, ‬proved popular for owners wanting a cost-effective way to get ADS-B compliance without having to‭ ‬invest in a new transponder or install other equipment inside the […]

AVweb’s General Aviation Accident Bulletin is taken from the pages of our sister publication, Aviation Safety magazine. All the reports listed here are preliminary and include only initial factual findings about crashes. You can learn more about the final probable cause on the NTSB’s website at www.ntsb.gov. Final reports appear about a year after the […]

A seamless transition from tablet to cockpit is the theme of Garmin’s updates to the Pilot app announced today. In particular, the new features in Version 10 allow pilots to load instrument procedures—approaches, arrival and departure procedures—directly into the Pilot app and then connect with a range of connected panel-mount navigators. The app’s new features […]

In a detailed preliminary report Friday, the NTSB said it found no evidence of mechanical failure in the S-76B helicopter crash that killed basketball star Kobe Bryant and eight others last month. The aircraft went down in poor weather at Calabasas, California, while on a VFR flight from Santa Ana to Camarillo on Jan. 26. […]

Common Sense vs. E-Everything My impression is that nearly all discussions of electric propulsion omit the fundamental problems of physics that limit the whole enterprise: the energy density of batteries. Of the three obstacles standing in the way of electric propulsion (energy storage, efficient electric motors, motor controllers) two have been solved. Small, lightweight, three-phase […]

Thunderstorms are the nemesis of general aviation. We can’t penetrate them nor fly over them. Fortunately, we have several sophisticated tools at our disposal to help in the preflight planning to make that all important go/no go decision before we head into the murk. Their sophistication is remarkable, and we need to choose those that […]