Flight Safety

I have to admit to a fondness for the colors of autumn. I find that I look for excuses to go flying when the trees put on their all-too-brief displays before the iron of winter clamps down. I find that I’m not alone in my compulsion, as the virtual airport has been busy the last […]

Charles Perriguey, Jr. was born inGlendale, Calif. and grew up in nearby San Gabriel. He had only flown once on anairliner when he enlisted in the Marines after high school. He trained at NASPensacola in fixed-wing aircraft, then the Marines offered him the chance to flyhelicopters and he took it. In Vietnam he flew Sea […]

One of the frequently asked questions that instructors and flight school administrators hear quite often from the primary student is: “Once I acquire the Private Pilot Certificate, what then? What can I do with it?” Most often, this student is training to become a pilot just “because” – he or she doesn’t have a specific […]

Frankly, I never dreamed this series would last for five or six columns! It has been an incredible effort, and an interesting journey for me. Now that I’ve gotten you up to altitude (see “Pelican’s Perch #34“) – and left you there for a month – it’s time to set up for cruise. Mar 12, […]

It was one of those good evenings at AirVenture Oshkosh, the kind that reminds you why you return each year. The Pilot’s Lounge had moved bodily to a spot under the wing of Jay Apt’s Twin Beech. We had survived Doc Blue’s birthday party, including the part where he had surrounded the area where the […]

John Richard Rossi was born April19, 1915, in Placerville, Calif. He grew up in San Francisco and split hiscollege years between the University of California at Berkeley and the merchantmarine. He entered the Navy for flight training in the fall of 1939. Uponreceiving his wings and commission in 1940, he was assigned as Flight Instructorat […]

Not long ago, I was in the office of the Chief Flight Instructor at an FAA Part 141 approved flight school when a young man came in fresh from passing his Private Pilot certification check ride. Amid all the congratulations, one of the things the chief instructor told him was that he should start his […]

I cut my teeth as a pilot in the Midwest — the Chicago area to be exact — and I learned lots about weather during those days. Among the things I learned is that 97 percent of weather is safely navigable (by a qualified and current pilot in a properly-equipped airplane, but that’s another subject […]

We’ve now beaten the technical issues to death, let’s go fly! If you haven’t read any of the prior material on this, please don’t fail to see “Those Fire-Breathing Turbos (Part 3).” This column is highly specific to the “turbonormalizer” systems as installed on Teledyne Continental Motors (TCM) “big bore” engines like the IO-520 and […]

It’s a bit disconcerting when it happens. Every once in a great while someone says something that causes your jaw to drop in utter amazement. You stare at the person who just made the statement because you can’t comprehend its magnitude. Meanwhile, your tonsils are attracting flies. It happened to me recently, here in the […]