Risk Management

My brother slipped me a piece of paper on which he’d jotted three numbers: 260, 240 and 180. If you haven’t guessed, they’re weights. Add me and the load is 860 pounds well-marbled (not 170-pound), above-average Americans. Add full tanks, 56 gallons of fuel and we would approach gross weight. I had yet to add […]

Every primary student who’s at least been ready to solo has experienced a few stalls and recoveries. If they’re lucky, they also are introduced to different kinds of stalls, and how the ways we enter them can help determine their characteristics. Along the way, we learn ways to recover from them. We learn these maneuvers […]

All Nippon Airways is modifying or replacing all 100 engines on its fleet of 50 Boeing 787 Dreamliners because the turbine blades are corroding and cracking. ANA, the launch customer for the 787, chose Rolls Royce engines and as the engines accumulate hours the blade problems have been getting worse. CNN reported the issue has […]

For at least the last 40 years, the precautionary, off-airport landing has rarely been taught. It’s certainly not required on a checkride and pilots who have a mechanical or weather problem are taught to go to the nearest airport and only attempt to land “out” (as glider pilots say) when the engine actually quits. Pilots […]

Marcus Paine, a longtime flight instructor and airshow performer, died Saturday at an Oregon airshow. Paine was reportedly pulling out of a loop just after takeoff in his Stearman when he crashed on the runway at the Airshow of the Cascades in Madras. He was 61. The aircraft caught fire on impact but airport firefighters […]

Tragedy marked the opening of a new general aviation airport in north central China. Michel Leusch, of South Africa, failed to recover from a dive during a performance at the first Silk Road International General Aviation Convention held at Danxia Airport on Saturday. The airport opened Friday and the convention was held to celebrate the […]

Partial panel is often viewed as a loss of vacuum instruments—the gyros. In reality you have a partial panel any time you lose one or more of the required instruments regardless of how they are powered or even their particular function. Losing any instrument deprives you of information that may have a crucial impact on […]

As the pilot population ages a significant portion of the graybeards (female and male) are now interrupting their muttering about the unfairness of a pilot shortage happening when they’re no longer in a position to take advantage of it with entering into conversations as to when it’s going to be time to pull the mixture […]

The FAA has issued its final rule on the controversial airworthiness directive that will require the replacement of cylinders on 6,200 high-displacement Continental engines. It takes effect on Sept. 15. The AD, which scraps thousands of aftermarket cylinders made by ECi, was initially proposed in 2013 for 520, 550 and some 470 model Continentals that […]

Airshow spectators in southern England likely saved the life of a performer whose open-cockpit aircraft crashed into the ocean at the Herne Bay Air Show Sunday. According to the Telegraph, the Turbulent D31, a tiny single-seat homebuilt, may have had mechanical issues before the unidentified pilot may have ditched it in shallow water of the […]