The Pilot’s Lounge

Things have been kind of busy, so my visits to the Pilot’s Lounge at the virtual airport have been carried out at low cruise. I was present long enough recently to hear a student describing to his instructor what he had learned after having some difficulty with crosswind landings. She listened patiently as his recital […]

It always fascinates me that general aviation airports somehow become ghost towns about 5:00 on Sunday afternoons, even if the weather is superb. This particular Sunday was no exception: The Pilot’s Lounge at the virtual airport was rapidly emptying. The students had headed home, and the only folks around were some of the flight school […]

We had our “Hey, Let’s Have a Barbeque” barbeque at the virtual airport recently. Of course it rained. I had retreated indoors to the Pilot’s Lounge, where pilots were blasting the TSA for its most recent screw-up. They were wondering how an organization that hired morons who climbed on TAT probes marked “No Step” while […]

It happened the second day I was at Oshkosh. I’d vacated the Pilot’s Lounge at the virtual airport to visit Oshkosh along with a few hundred thousand of my closest friends for our annual immersion in all that is aviation. I gaped at the latest in electronics for the instrument panel, marveled at some of […]

It was a weekday evening and I’d just finished flying with a relatively new instrument student who was proving to be competent, determined to learn, and overall a genuine pleasure from an instructor’s point of view. I’d stopped into the Pilot’s Lounge at the virtual airport out of habit and ran into Old Hack, Sandy […]

“You moron.”Visiting the Pilot’s Lounge at the virtual airport is usually one of the highlights of my day. That greeting, however, caused me to think that this wasn’t going to be one of those days. I’d stopped by to see who was around and found that the column I had written last month about post-war […]

No matter where pilots gather, it’s only a matter of time before someone starts a debate over which are the best and worst airplanes. It is no exception in the Pilot’s Lounge at the virtual airport, and the battle was raging one afternoon when I happened to wander in. Old Hack was adamant that the […]

I‘ve always found it amazing when, in midst of the noisy confusion of a crowded room, someone can say something that triggers such a powerful recollection of an event that suddenly I am isolated from the hubbub, aware only of the intensity of my thoughts. It recently happened to me in the Pilot’s Lounge at […]

I don’t know if it set a record, but it snowed here every day save one in February, so most of the action at the virtual airport was in the Pilot’s Lounge, where students and experienced pilots alike colorfully expressed their preference to be flying and their frustration with the elements.I confess to being among […]

It was late when I got into the Pilot’s Lounge at the virtual airport. I’d airlined into the big airport and driven about an hour here, as I wanted to drop off some things in my hangar and then see if I could locate a back issue of a magazine in the Lounge before going […]