Features

Two years ago, my fiancee and I were chaperoning my 94‑year‑old grandparents on a Delta Air Lines flight to a vacation destination. Grandma walks just fine, but my World War II Marine veteran grandpa had to use a wheelchair around the terminal and an aisle chair (skinny little wheelchair that fits in the aisle between […]

FAA Approves Seatless Airliners For Freight Reminds me of the QC 727’s of the early 70’s. Slide out the seats and slide in containers. It’s gonna be a while before these airplanes will have paying passengers on board. Instead, keep them flying with paying boxes instead of paying passengers. It could lead to a new […]

One would think that a fairly simple recurrent training requirement established by the FAA over 40 years ago would be a ho-hum thing by now. One would be wrong. The FAR Part 61.56 requirement to fly with an instructor biennially (every two years) and receive an endorsement of a pilot’s basic fitness for flight is […]

This story originally appeared in KITPLANES. By Scott M. Spangler America’s car culture has inculcated consumers of almost every conceivable product to expect, desire, and demand a new model every year. “Do we really need to do that?” asked John McBean, president of Kitfox Aircraft. “Ford comes out with a new F-150 pickup every year, […]

On a nice fall afternoon, I was returning to my home airport after a Missouri Pilots Association board meeting. Another member was about 10 minutes ahead of me, and we were both on flight following with Kansas City Center. I heard Center give my friend a traffic advisory as we were nearing Kansas City. Center: […]

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 […]

Are You Open To The Public? A good point was made of which I think most pilots/public are not aware. That is… the FAA neither approves or disapproves any building of radio towers and such. As an FAAer for years, I took an Obstruction Evaluation course about 25 years ago. So between my memory and […]

Mother Nature is infinitely complex as is the weather that comes with it. After 40 years of flying and some good meteorology training (courtesy of the Swedish Air Force) I’m still occasionally baffled on how things play out. Here are a few examples where the unsuspecting pilot can get surprised. Temperature Changes You’re planning a […]

This story originally ran in KITPLANES. By Dave Prizio Randy Schlitter, owner of RANS Designs, Inc., has been working on an all-metal utility airplane kit for going on three years now. Subscribers to his newsletters have tracked the progress of this plane since August 2016, and orders have been pouring in for several months now. […]

Approaching Wilkes‑Barre/Scranton Airport, the traffic advisories from Approach were scant until after a bit, Approach said, “Archer 44939, traffic at your 11 o’clock, slow‑moving, type and altitude unknown. I’m not talking to him.” Me: “939 looking.” Approach: “You spot him yet?” Me: “Negative.” Approach: “Might be a train on the mountain.” Sure enough, there it […]