Flight Training

Flight training providers across the country are reporting that they are having trouble getting their flight students scheduled for practical tests in a timely fashion, according to reports received by the Flight School Association of North America (FSANA). The organization says the decrease in the number of examiners in recent years and a lack of […]

The FAA published a rule that it says “relieves burdens on pilots seeking to obtain aeronautical experience, training, and certification by increasing the allowed use of aviation training devices” on Wednesday. The rule makes changes to a number of other areas as well, including further modifications to complex aircraft requirements for commercial applicants and credit […]

Too many IFR pilots don’t know their GPS as intimately as they should. Hitting “Direct To” and their destination is as much as many can muster out of their navigator. There is a serious lack of knowledge of what the GPS is trying to tell them. The most basic information a GPS provides to a […]

The idiot who first said, “You never forget your firsts,” would be the first person I’d keel-haul in my armada of firsts gone sour. Yeah, I remember my first love, a 1949 Cessna 195, parked saucily on the ramp at Teterboro Airport (TEB) in the late 1960s. Wouldn’t give me a nod with her nose […]

Future and Active Pilot Advisors (FAPA) is holding a free pilot job fair and future pilot forum on Saturday, June 23, in Chicago. Topics to be covered in the forum include financing flight training, pathways for professional pilots and the outlook of the global pilot job market. Although open to everyone, the company says the […]

Researchers at the University of Toronto have developed new simulations that they believe will help pilots to better recover when faced with an aerodynamic stall. “Part of the challenge is that pilots are often trained on simulations that take an aircraft right up to the point of aerodynamic stallbut not past it,” said Peter Grant, […]

I am not a big proponent of memorizing airspeeds. It can be a risky practice if you fly many different types of aircraft. Most of the important airspeeds can be determined from the airspeed indicator (ASI), though there are a few you probably should commit to memory, or at least keep on a placard. Eight […]

Aviation has never lacked for dumb ideas. It’s what drives innovation. “Hey, Orville, wanna jump off a sand dune strapped to these really cool wings I made in the bike shop?” What seemed stupid in 1903 is recognized as pioneering genius today. Likewise, countless other notions such as flying inside clouds without reference to the […]

The University of North Dakota (UND) has partnered with United Airlines to create a career pipeline program for its flight students. Through the Career Pathway Program (CPP), graduates of UND’s Professional Flight Program now have a direct path to United’s regional partners. Assuming they meet CPP requirements both during school and after graduating, students who […]

From 2005 to 2015, my small flight school offered training in the famously rare Comco Ikarus C42, which was (and still is) manufactured in Germany. I say “rare” because (to my knowledge), only 13 C42s were ever imported in the U.S., and at one point I had three of them in my hangar. It was […]