briefs

The FAA last week issued a proposed Airworthiness Directive that would affect certain Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) MU-2B series airplanes. The proposed AD aims to detect and correct improper rigging of the propeller feathering linkage. The improper rigging could result in an inability to feather the propeller, which could result in asymmetric drag and control […]

Use of the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) will be extended to allow operations within 200 feet above touchdown zone elevation, or height above touchdown (HAT), equivalent to the standard ILS Category I HAT, the FAA said Friday, a move that will provide more precision, all-weather approaches and will increase capacity at thousands of GA […]

An aviation mechanic in Fargo, N.D., whose certificate was revoked after a plane crash in February 2005, now has agreed to pay a $2,500 fine for another incident last July. The mechanic was taxiing a single-engine airplane in order to perform maintenance work when the plane’s propeller struck a pickup truck, causing substantial damage, The […]

A scramjet engine successfully completed a 10-minute test flight over south Australia on Saturday. “The rocket motors worked well and the nominal trajectory was executed as planned,” the HyShot consortium said in a news release. The 4.5-foot-long craft comprised a scramjet engine attached to a rocket. It flew about 195 miles into space, then with […]

The FAA last Thursday made final the proposed Airworthiness Directive it issued last December affecting almost 300 crankshafts in Lycoming engines. (This AD was proposed prior to the latest Lycoming Service Bulletin that “retires” some 5,100 crankshafts.) No comments were received, the FAA said, so it will adopt the AD as proposed. “Lycoming has said […]

Three bombs exploded and police detonated two others on Friday morning at the homes of five workers who staff the contract tower at Walker Field Airport in Grand Junction, Colo. Nobody was hurt in the blasts, and the apparently homemade devices did little damage. At our deadline, authorities were searching for an individual — a […]

BRAINTEASERS Quiz #105: Think ClearlyFlying instruments is not particularly difficult. It’s figuring out what Air Traffic Control expects that fogs the brain. Learning the hidden powers of IFR and VFR clearances launches any pilot on a direct route to success.

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Although the FAA’s recent efforts to minimize the use of “taxi into position and hold” procedures have been vociferously opposed by the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, two pilot groups this week said they are fine with the changes. “The FAA’s review [of TIPH] promises to build in necessary safeguards during departure and arrival operations […]