leadnews

Opinions aside, fewer than half the number of student pilots are today bumping their way through touch and goes and spinning whiz wheels when compared to recent boom times, and the old guard is mobilizing to increase those ranks. One of these initiatives is among the most ambitious recycling projects we’ve come across. Build A […]

General aviation shipments are coming off a record high half-year, but that surge apparently isn’t being fueled by new pilots. The Washington Post was at EAA AirVenture this year and, while it may not be a revelation to readers of this publication, informed its audience of the next crisis facing aviation: most pilots are old […]

Kaler is adamant that student pilots pay absolutely nothing for flight lessons and everything possible is done to mitigate other costs, like living expenses. The training takes place near Sayville, N.Y., on Long Island, and students have to cover their own transportation costs. Cessna has recently become a major corporate sponsor and there are about […]

The right arm of a disabled pilot has lots to do. Rudder and brakes are controlled with a rod that clamps to the pedals, enabling the full range of movement and combinations for air and ground handling. The device is STC’d and, with some practice, does everything your feet can. The pilot’s right arm fits […]

When he lost the use of his legs in a surfing accident, as with anyone in that position, Jim Kaler’s life changed dramatically. He was no longer the pilot of Gulfstreams and Falcon 50s for a good-sized corporate flight department but that didn’t mean he wanted to be restricted to piloting a wheelchair for the […]

Shortly after noon as this year’s AirVenture was nearing its close, a passenger in an RV-6 homebuilt was killed when a Grumman TBM Avenger ran into it from behind while taxiing at the Oshkosh airport. Both the Avenger (a very large WWII taildragger with limited forward visibility) and the RV were in line for departure […]

Officials at EAA started early on to tell the media not to expect attendance this year to match 2005, when the spectacular show featured SpaceShipOne, Global Flyer, and lots more, and on Tuesday they confirmed that prediction. Estimated attendance was 625,000, a decrease of about 10 percent from last year. Nonetheless, said EAA President Tom […]

While the big-name airplanes in Aeroshell Square grabbed a lot of attention in Oshkosh last week — Cessna’s proposed LSA, Eclipse’s newly certified VLJ (appearing in DayJet livery by the end of the week), and the soon-to-be-marketed HondaJet, to name a few — plenty of interesting projects were on display around the fringes of the […]

Socata‘s TBM 850 is not a VLJ, but the company says its performance is pretty darn close, and given the lower acquisition and operating costs, the difference is negligible. “No need for a VLJ,” says the company’s brochure. “Fly smarter with a VFT!” as in, Very Fast Turboprop. The 850 will climb to 26,000 feet […]

The folks from Excel Jet in Colorado planned to fly their Sport-Jet at Oshkosh for the first time this week, but instead they were telling the story of how the prototype cartwheeled down the runway after apparently hitting wake turbulence on takeoff, proving the hardiness of the cabin. Test pilot James Stewart (who tells his […]