Flying Staff

Picture this. I’m sitting in the right seat of Richard Collins’ Cessna 210 about to give him his flight review (née Biennial Flight Review, BFR). I’ll admit I’m a bit intimidated. I’d really like to be able to make the review have some value for Richard, but I know that the idea I can actually […]

In 1988, three years before Eastern Airlines ceased operations, one of its pilots began a small charter business on the side. Tom Cooper’s small company offered flights around South Florida, the Bahamas and Cuba in Cessna 402s. In short order, however, the charter company expanded, and by the mid-1990s, Gulfstream International Airlines was operating Part […]

Jabiru 250 (Photo: EAA / Jim Koepnick) Each month, Flying answers questions about the new sport pilot/light sport aircraft rule with assistance from the Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA), the authority on the opportunities available within the category commonly known as “sport pilot”: Q: My medical examination is next month. If I “fail,” I know I […]

My monthly check is similar to the process of writing. Initially, the schedule resembles more of a rough draft than a publishable piece of literature. Editing is part of the process. Some months involve more editing than others. In that regard, when I retrieved a voice mail message to call our lead flight standards coordinator, […]

You may remember last month we left off in a brand-new TBM 850 halfway between Scotland and Iceland at Flight Level 280 with both a master caution and a master warning light flashing and a horn blaring. That we were a long way from any land much less any runway required no emphasis. A fuel […]

W.W. (Bill) Boisture Jr., who has made the rounds of top management of several leading business aviation companies, was appointed chairman and CEO of Hawker Beechcraft in late March. Boisture replaces Jim Schuster who had announced his retirement last year. Boisture has held top positions at Gulfstream, NetJets, SimuFlight and Butler Aviation, the predecessor of […]

There is frost accumulating inside the windows of my cockpit. I reach a gloved hand up and scrape a clear opening in the ice. The long, graceful lines of the left wing extend almost 50 feet into the impossibly thin air surrounding us. Normally when I fly, I’m off the surface of the planet, but […]

When I was three years old, I wanted to be an astronaut. Mostly because my older sister Gail wanted to be one, I think. But, still. Never mind that girls weren’t allowed to be astronauts back then. Obstacles, even seemingly insurmountable ones, never stopped anyone from dreaming — especially at age three. My father, enlightened […]