briefs

INSURANCE Professional “Contract” Pilots — Are You Protected?Professional pilots are always covered by an aircraft owner’s insurance, right? Well, if not, it’s enough to be qualified under the open-pilot clause, right? Short answer: Nope. Read this article by the V.P. of an aviation insurance agency and then check the fine print on the insurance policy. […]

Well, at least he had his seatbelt on. Powered parachute pilot Don Beatty, of Great Falls, Mt., dangled upside down from the seat of his machine for almost three hours on Saturday after the chute got tangled in a 230,000-volt power line near Great Falls. He was finally rescued by a crane after emergency crews […]

Homebuilders rejoice — your mistakes probably aren’t that bad. British officials are wondering how the pilot and passengers (including two aircraft mechanics) on board a Cessna 210 could fly the plane for two hours without realizing — or expressing particular care — that a five-foot section of one wing was missing. The unnamed pilot, from […]

Pilots in the Houston area are beginning to wonder what it will be like to share the airspace with a fleet of unmanned aerial vehicles slated for deployment at Ellington Field. The Air Force has announced that 12 Predators will be based at Ellington as it prepares to take away the F-16s currently attached to […]

If they can make a shortstop see the ball better off the hitter’s bat, could Nike MAXSIGHT colored contact lenses help a pilot pick out potentially conflicting traffic or see the runway better on an ILS approach? The sports megalith, in conjunction with Bausch and Lomb, has developed contact lenses in both prescription and non-prescription […]

If your airplane has some of the latest electronic gear, your flight-planning nomenclature is changing. Effective Sept. 1, 2005, the FAA is adopting several new suffixes to be used in identifying the navigation gear on board. The new designations apply specifically to RNAV and RVSM capabilities. There are also some significant changes to the definitions […]

EAA is asking the FAA for some flexibility to smooth the transition of ultralight aircraft and pilots into the new Sport Pilot/Light Sport Aircraft regime. As it stands, pilots who try to follow the rules could find themselves grounded for months because the system hasn’t quite caught up to the demands that need to be […]

Possibly one of the most prominent examples of an urban airport system of reliever airports is under intense scrutiny, in no small part because the big airport’s biggest customer is on the financial ropes. According to The Associated Press, Minneapolis’s Metropolitan Airport Commission (MAC) is lifting every rock trying to find ways to cut expenses […]

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