Flight Planning

Although all kinds of sport flying are for fun rather than transportation, all you “power pilots” don’t know what fun is until you try soaring; it’s so quiet the instructor can hear his students cry. Soaring in a glider or sailplane is just pure joy. With the sophisticated aircraft of today that most of us […]

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 […]

Editor’s Note: This is the second of two articles by AVweb columnists on FBOs. If you haven’t already, be sure to read Howard Fried’s companion column “Eye of Experience # 37: The Place of the FBO in the Scheme of Things.” Sometimes things here in the Pilot’s Lounge at the virtual airport get a bit […]

Ialways had enjoyed waking to find snow falling, although it had been a long time since I’d had the experience. Maybe this morning’s snow was prophetic, as a white blanket was never guaranteed in these parts this time of year. It made me feel particularly good in spite of the fact it would take while […]

The 747 was nearing the end of the trans-Pacific flight from Tokyo to Anchorage, Alaska, and had begun a descent from Flight Level 370 about 120nm from the runway. The triple Inertial Navigation Systems (INS) had functioned perfectly, and the autopilot in INS mode still held the big bird on a flawless and perfectly straight […]

As the snow piles up around the windows at the virtual airport and some of the resident airplanes grow funny appendages on their landing gear, I always ponder the fact that many pilots will spend a pile of money to put their feet into skis but few ever explore flying airplanes with skis attached. That’s […]