CEO of the Cockpit

Spring brings new things to life. Little Canadian Geese hatch and grow into big geese so they can clog inlet guide vanes and fill big city rivers with Air Busses. Flowers bloom, little green turtles open their eyes to a brand new pond and our airline rolls-out a new passenger boarding system. The old method […]

The quiet home I expected to find when I returned from my last trip was not as serene as I might have hoped. My nephew Kermit was there and was going to stay for at least a few days while his parents vacationed in Vegas.The first indication I had that he was in the building […]

There is no cockpit seat in our airline more uncomfortable and embarrassing than the jumpseat on the MD-88.First, it isn’t really a seat so much as a giant, Chiclet-shaped, folded cushion that is hung in the cockpit by the most secure and opening-proof, metallic click-lock ever invented in this or any other universe. To release […]

It seems strange to feel cold while flying in the middle of summer but I was chilled to the bone. Long legs in high-altitude transports always result in a cold-soak, and the low temps work their way though the cockpit wall and over to your seat.On the Boeing 727, it was just something we had […]

It was Saturday afternoon at the local flight school and, as I tried to snooze in a lounge chair near the back of the room, I overheared a CFI begin his student’s Aviation as a Foreign Language training:”No,” he said, “it is pronounced ‘eh-luh-ron’ not ‘air-loin.’ “His student tried to repeat after him but still […]

Who knew that a nice afternoon movie during a Fort Lauderdale layover would lead me to pontificate yet again about aviation?The whole crew and I decided to take in an early after-lunch movie at the local cineplex. Since we had to take a vote on which movie to watch and since us two male pilots […]

A good copilot is a good copilot, no matter what the aircraft. I fancied myself a good copilot back when I was a first officer on various airliners. I considered myself better than the average bear when it came to flight engineering, as well. Being a good copilot is harder, in my estimation, than being […]

Pick-up times can come awful early when you are laying over in Manhattan and departing out of Newark. Our 6 a.m. departure for Los Angeles from EWR necessitated a 3:45 a.m. pick-up at the “Mildew Plaza” on 7th Avenue. Our normal pick-up times in Manhattan are an hour and a half before report time, but […]

A folded newspaper fell into my lap as I was sitting in the “king seat” awaiting pushback in Newark. It was a USA Today with the headline, “Two Biggest Airlines Set to Merge,” appearing above the fold. My co-pilot, Chet, had dropped it onto my dormant daddy parts and then flopped into his own lambs-wool […]

It was a tough approach to a landing and I was all by myself. No co-pilot to help me and no company dispatcher to ask for numbers or advice. I was fairly low on fuel — about two and a half gallons left — and the air pressure in my left main gear tire was […]