Features

What a week. Like many of you, I’ve been stranded by the grounding of general aviation since Tuesday, finally able to fly my Debonair out of Las Vegas, Nev., as of Friday evening. Like many of you, I have some barely suppressed anger at the federal government for its actions in grounding me – and […]

Not long ago I wrote a column about the discussions we had in the pilot’s lounge here at the virtual airport concerning training instrument students in actual instrument conditions. There was a lot of feedback from readers and, overall, it turned out that a fairly large majority of people was in favor of such training. […]

Rick L. Cremer was born November12, 1945, in South Bend, Ind. His stepfather was a civil engineer for the stateof Michigan, so Rick moved from Alpena to Traverse City to Detroit while hisstepfather surveyed for the then-new interstate highway system. He took flyinglessons in high school, but didn’t finish his private certificate until midwaythrough his […]

Not long ago, Rick Durden and I wrote companion columns on the subject of buying and selling airplanes. Now it is time to discuss airplane paperwork – the maintenance records which provide a complete history of everything that has been done to the airplane since it left the factory as well as a complete equipment […]

When AVweb approached me about writing this column, I really didn’t know what to think. I was flattered, of course. But I was apprehensive, too. First of all, I’m not a writer. Secondly, despite my title, I’m just a plain old everyday controller. I didn’t get any special training to be a Safety Representative for […]

Pretty neat image, huh? I actually got to fly missions in that thing. Yes, it’s a U-2 spyplane; we referred to it as the “Dragonlady.” The saying went, you had to learn to fight with the dragon before you could dance with the lady. It was a joy to fly, but more so than any […]

Largely as a result of these columns, I am privileged to get a lot of email about engines and the basic principles, and I monitor a number of forums and mailing lists where pilots and owners hang out online. GAMI gets even more mail and phone calls of course, with over 8,000 sets of GAMIjectors […]

Before Lindbergh even took off for Le Bourget in 1927, he complained bitterly about the sensationalistic media coverage surrounding his and other attempts to be the first to fly non-stop from New York to Paris. Between that feat and the tragedy of his son’s kidnapping and murder, the mass media forced his retreat from the […]

Editor’s Note: This column should be printed out and posted on airport bulletin boards everywhere now and again next July. After getting back from Oshkosh I unpacked the airplane, put it away and walked into the pilot’s lounge here at the virtual airport to see what had happened while I was gone. One of the […]

Polly Vacher was born January 13,1944, in Paignton, England, and spent her childhood in the rolling hills andsunny beaches of Devonshire. She trained as a physiotherapist, then as a musicteacher, married, and raised three sons. Her attraction to flying began in 1989when she skydived to raise money for a charity, and she subsequently logged 245jumps. […]