Flight Safety

For pure fun in aviation, not much beats flying seaplanes. The pilots I know who have found room in their aeronautical budget to get a seaplane rating have been uniform in telling me that they had a ball doing so and were glad they did it. As winter weather starts to retreat from the northern […]

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have proposed a possible fix to relieve the increasing noise complaints from neighbors of Boston’s busy Logan Airport — if airplanes on departure just slowed down by about 30 knots, it would significantly reduce the noise at the surface. Logan is one of many airports nationwide where the […]

In a preliminary report released on Monday, the NTSB summarized its investigation so far into the helicopter accident in New York that killed five passengers on a sightseeing flight on March 11. The board says the pilot told them he provided a safety briefing before the flight, and told the passengers where to find the […]

While traveling into Valdez, Alaska for the annual fly-in and STOL competition, a couple of planes were trying to hurry in before the airspace closed for aerobatic practice. A couple minutes after tower gave “best forward speed” instructions to a Lake amphibian (not known for great forward speed), the following exchange was heard: Tower: “Lake […]

We’ll admit our bias up front: We like flight simulators. A lot. Being cheap, we came to like them originally because we could use them to keep our instrument skills up for a fraction of the cost of getting in an airplane and putting on the hood—whether we could log the time or not. As […]

The Aviation Electronics Association Convention powers up Monday, March 26 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. The annual event offers a way for manufacturers, distributors, technicians and business leaders to connect and learn about regulatory issues impacting their business, according to the association. AEA says their exhibit hall will have more than 135 companies […]

The text message was familiar: “Have to cancel today’s lesson.” The accompanying sad-face emoji didn’t mitigate the fact that too many flying lessons never get off the ground, stalled by self-imposed realities of alleged real-world issues. Over a quarter-century of instructing, I estimate about half of all appointments cancel and not simply because the student […]

Airshow pilot Andrew Hill, 53, whose 1955 Hawker Hunter crashed in August 2015, killing 11 men, has been charged with “manslaughter by gross negligence” in a British court. He will appear before a judge on April 19. The 11 who died were either in vehicles on the road or standing on the roadside, outside the […]

The FAA on Thursday published an emergency order that prohibits the use of supplemental passenger-restraint systems in doors-off flight operations that can’t be released quickly in an emergency. “This order formalizes the FAA’s prior communications on these operations,” the agency said. The FAA had already told operators last week to stop the “doors-off” tours. The […]