Flight Safety

On Aug 22nd, 2017 while flying near Myrtle Beach, to Triple Tree Aerodrome, SC to watch the total solar eclipse, there was the following exchange. Experimental: Florence Approach, Experimental NXXXX Request. Florence Approach: NXXXX go ahead. Experimental: N7XXXX requests vectors to where the sun doesn’t shine. Florence Approach: Now that’s funny. Martin Heller

Thanks to a big kick from the jet stream, Norwegian Airlines is laying claim to the fastest non-Concorde airline flight between New York and London (Gatwick). The Boeing 787-9 hit a top groundspeed of 674 knots and made it to the airport just south of London in five hours and 13 minutes on Monday, almost […]

Searchers will return to a remote area of the Rocky Mountains near Revelstoke, British Columbia, after relatives of two people missing in a suspected plane crash found a fuzzy drone photo in which the words “help” or “here” appear to be written in the snow. The photo was taken by a commercial drone whose use […]

The FAA says it’s satisfied by measures undertaken by Transport Canada and Air Canada to address a couple of serious errors by Air Canada crews at San Francisco International Airport in 2017. In July, an Airbus A320 came close to landing on a taxiway occupied by four widebody airliners waiting to take off and in […]

While the National Airspace System remains open and accessible to all aircraft, the government shutdown, which began Saturday morning, could affect thousands of owners, operators and pilots if it persists. Air traffic control and all the associated operations are designated as essential services but most of the FAA’s ground-bound services will be shuttered during the […]

In the world of economics, there’s a concept called tragedy of the commons or sometimes freedom of the commons. The underlying principle is that in an economy of shared resources, individual members act against the good of all by consuming more than their share or acting to spoil the resource. The classic example is a […]

AVweb’s General Aviation Accident Bulletin is taken from the pages of our sister publication, Aviation Safety magazine and is published twice a month. All the reports listed here are preliminary and include only initial factual findings about crashes. You can learn more about the final probable cause in the NTSB’s web site at www.ntsb.gov. Final […]

Former Major League pitcher Roy Halladay had three drugs in his system when his Icon A5 crashed off the coast of Florida in November. The retired ballplayer had trace amounts of morphine and amphetamine along with an intoxicating level of the sedative zolpidem, commonly known as Ambien, in his bloodstream according to an autopsy report […]

Not to get all metaphysical, but the heart is at the very center of who we are and what we do. It feeds the brain with nutrients and life-giving oxygen, and fuels the cells out to the extremities. Any abnormalities of the heart, especially at the controls of an airplane, can lead to stress if […]

Students of all ages who are working toward a career in aviation can find scholarships available from a wide range of sources. GAMA said last week it is now accepting applications from high school students for its Edward W. Stimpson “Aviation Excellence” Award, named for the organization’s founder. The $2,000 award will go to a […]