Flight Safety

Spring showed up last week, taking a lot of us by surprise. Everybody at the virtual airport adjusted pretty quickly except old Hack – he knows this first warm spell is just a teaser so he sat around in his heavy coat and muttered at the rest of us. As usual, the good weather brought […]

Michael Nolan was born October 24,1949, in Van Nuys, Calif. His first flight was in a PSA DC-4 out of Burbank,Calif., and he was hooked instantly. He learned to fly in late ’68 while he wasa student at L.A. Valley college, soloed on March 1, ’69, then earned a two-yeardegree from Fullerton College and studied […]

At the risk of stating the obvious, before you can use your airplane to explore the wild blue yonder you must first get off the ground. As simple as that may first appear, there are all sorts of questions to answer if you want to depart IFR. While many of you enjoy the approach control […]

The pilot lounge in Newark is larger than most but otherwise is the same as all of them. Lazy Boy recliner chairs are scattered about the brick-walled windowless room like the remnants of a close-out furniture sale. Some of them are broken down by hundreds of desperate toss-turned nights spent by harried (and cheap) commuters. […]

Several months ago I wrote a column entitled Some People (Just don’t Belong in the Air). At that time, because of lack of space I did not include what is perhaps the most blatant example of an individual who had no business even approaching within 50 feet of an airplane, let alone attempting to operate […]

Advancing your ratings makes you a better/saferpilot. We’ve probably all heard that statement more times than we can count, andmost pilots probably accept it as an empirical truth. However, others feel thattheir lack of advanced ratings does not make them any less safe or competent tofly the planes they do, the way they do. At […]

As I was rummaging around in my brain for some interesting stories to amuse pilots, I kept coming across the same thing again and again: Maiden. It dawned on me that much of my career has revolved around Maiden. From the day I walked in the door at Atlanta Center, to the present day, Maiden […]

I‘ve long promised myself I’d never get in this argument again. I have resisted manfully (is that sexist?) Every time I start to say something on this subject, I cover my ears and start the usual mantra, “Pink elephants, pink elephants…” trying to avoid even thinking about it. It’s a little like the time we […]

The pilot’s lounge relocated a bit to the south, while I spent some time doing volunteer flying in a Cessna 206 for LightHawk, the airborne conservation organization. LightHawk does most of its work in the U.S., but assists in efforts in Central America during the winter. My rotation was in the country of Belize. I’ve […]

It’s 12:40 on a lovely spring afternoon. My boys are in school; my chores and my errands are done. I grab my driver’s license, a blank check, my “Be A Pilot Certificate” and head out the door. I am determined that today I am going for a Discovery Flight. Flying in New England in the […]