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Photo: Robert Goyer

"Tower, 224TX. No emergency, but a door popped open and I need to come back in and get it closed."

It was yesterday morning and I was in the SR22 going up north to fly with my buddy Scott from Aspen Avionics in his Cirrus. I had just rotated, 300 feet agl and climbing and I could feel the cold seeping in and hear the air slipping in through the cracked passenger-side door. I briefly, for about a tenth of a second, thought about continuing my two-hour flight up to Oklahoma City with the wind whistling in, but abandoned that idea before it was even fully formed.

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Photo: Robert Goyer

I’m a big believer in mission statements. I’ve always said that you can’t be committed to doing something if you don’t know what that thing is you’re supposed to be doing. Doctors, bakers and candlestick makers all can benefit from putting into words exactly what it is they’re trying to do. This is not to say that a good mission statement necessarily results in following through on that statement. Clearly, it often doesn’t. But it’s a great start.

So all that said, I’m deeply concerned by what that mission statement might be for the new Federal Aviation Administration.

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A couple of weeks ago controllers at Denver International made what the FAA is calling a mistake (and it sure sounds that way to us) when they gave a Republic Airways regional jet arriving at DIA a heading that required it to turn back through the flight path of a SkyWest RJ that was also on approach. The resultant turn brought the two RJs into very close proximity, and the jets were forced to take evasive action when their TCAS systems commanded it. The good news: the collision was avoided and I'm writing about a near miss and not a tragedy.

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Photo: Photography Courtesy of Cessna

There was one word I didn’t use in my blog last week. That word was “China.” One commenter brought this to my attention in no uncertain terms. “Well, interesting story Robert, but like so many have said - CHINA, CHINA, CHINA !!”

In my piece that wasn’t about the SkyCatcher being built in China (click here if you haven’t seen it) I was simply explaining why airplanes cost as much as they do and in the process used the SkyCatcher, Cessna’s two-seat LSA trainer, as the example to make my point.

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