Flight Safety

Last Friday, we departed Detroit City VFR northbound in my SR22 for some sightseeing and requested traffic advisories from Selfridge Approach. Shortly thereafter, we heard this exchange: Selfridge Approach:“Cessna XXX, traffic at one o’clock and two miles. A whacko.” Then a brief pause. Selfridge:“Correction: That’s a ‘Waco.’” Cessna XXX:“Maybe he’s both!” Brian Litch

Logbooks as a means of preserving precious memories of flight are way overrated because most of us just jot down the basics, rarely making note of how scared, excited or inspired we were by a particular flight or lesson. So even if I could find my first logbook, it would be of no use in […]

Sure, we know what maneuvering speed is, we learned it in private pilot ground school. You know, Va-Design Maneuvering Speed. “This is the maximum speed at which the limit load can be imposed (either by gusts or full deflection of the control surfaces) without causing structural damage.” That’s the definition straight out of the old […]

Fighter aircraft followed a Cirrus SR22 with an unconscious pilot aboard until it ran out of fuel and crashed in the Atlantic off Virginia on Saturday. The fighters were dispatched after the aircraft, on a flight plan to Manassas from Waukesha, Wisconsin, flew past its destination through restricted airspace around Washington, D.C., which attracted NORAD’s […]

For the second time in one week, a contretemps over reclining an airline seat led to a flight diverting and landing short of its destination. An American Airlines flight bound from Miami to Paris landed in Boston Wednesday night after Parisian Edmund Alexandre, variously reported as 60 and 61, became upset when the passenger in […]

The Recreational Aviation Foundation is making great progress in its effort to amend laws in all 50 states to make it easier for pilots to gain access to privately owned airstrips. AVweb’s Mary Grady spoke with John McNade, an RAF volunteer, about how the RAF is getting it done and why it’s important. Duration: 7:44 […]

AVweb’s weekly review of developments in aviation revealed news that Cessna delivered its 10,000th single-engine airplane from its Independence, Kansas, facility, Bell Helicopter broke ground on a new manufacturing facility, Cutter Aviation received a safety award, and the FAA authorized transition training in Bearhawk amateur-built aircraft. Textron Aviation Inc. announced that Cessna Aircraft Company delivered […]

Sometimes I feel as if Lockheed-Martin Flight Services is the Rodney Dangerfield of aviation-no matter how sophisticated, cool and user-friendly its weather briefing and flight safety services become, pilots don’t seem to be paying attention. That being the case, I’ll say it up front: the free-that’s free-services Lockheed-Martin have for pilots are cutting edge, impressive […]

Here’s the way private GA flying is supposed to work… if you’re flying to Nantucket for lunch with your friends, and they want to pitch in for gas, that’s OK with the FAA. But does that mean it’s OK to walk into a public place full of strangers, say “Hey, does anyone want to go […]

Malaysian Airlines has been losing cabin crew at a higher than normal rate recently and the leader of its biggest union says there’s no mystery there. Abu Malek Ariff told AFP some employees “are now afraid to fly.” Since the missile attack on one of its aircraft in Ukraine, which followed the March disappearance of […]