Flight Training

My wife and I departed Deer Valley Airport in Phoenix in our Cessna 177RG. Before departing we received a complicated taxi clearance to what looked like a parking lot at the end the active runway. Deer Valley calls itself “the busiest general aviation airport in the country” with lots of flight training. The “parking lot” […]

It was a Wisconsin-warm, winter-to-spring day. Roads and runways were plowed, but the heavy rains from the previous night did little to diminish several feet of snow on lawns and fields. My friend (let’s call him Bill) and I drove to the airport at 12:30 p.m. to practice some aerobatics in a rentable Super Decathlon. […]

I’ve been flying for more than a few years and during that time I have observed some piloting that could use some correction. So, here in brief are a few of the activities that I would like to change… if I were king. Straighten Up And Fly Right Many pilots don’t sit right for IFR […]

Who’s Afraid Of A Dead ASI? I could hear the pending screams as I was reading the article. I’m confident the self-appointed expert safety nazis are whipping themselves into a frenzy…I anticipate the storm is already bursting on the phone and email receptionists. (Well, maybe not on the phone. It’s easier to express offense and […]

If you’re among the aviation illuminati, you will know about the Swiss cheese theory of accident incidence. That’s where the holes in multiple slices of cheese line up to allow the determined accident to sail straight through to the bottom of that smoking hole where you find yourself picking shards of your iPad out of […]

Advancing age has its benefits when it comes to flying—wisdom and experience are two, and perhaps greater financial security to allow us to indulge our aviation passion. But despite increasing longevity, much as we fancy achieving the ripe age of 969 years as Methuselah, we’re a long way from that (50 is the new 70). […]

Old-School Navigation Technology is fine but has turned a lot of people into morons. I have fond memories of working out the solution to finding one’s position at sea using the stars and a sextant as you described. This was one of the 100 great elementary problems in Heinrich Dorrie’s great book. Also, it was […]

I was approaching Gainesville, Florida the week after the Florida Gators were destroyed by the Nebraska Cornhuskers in a bowl game and I listened to the ATIS. The code was Gator. When I called the tower I thought I would be cute so I said I had Cornhusker. The tower controller got me real good […]

Southeastern University and International Aero Academy, both based in Lakeland, Florida, announced last week the launch of an aviation program that will provide a fast track to a professional pilot career. The partnership will pair four-year and two-year bachelor’s and associate’s degrees from SEU with IAA’s accelerated FAA Part 141 pilot training programs, based at […]

The FAA has proposed some changes to its standards for obtaining an Airline Transport Pilot (ATP) certificate in the airplane category or for obtaining an airplane type rating, and if you have any opinions about the proposal, the FAA wants to hear from you. The proposed rule change is posted online, and comments will be […]