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But, if you are going VFR, deciding if you want flight following should definitely be on your list. If youre going to pass through Class Bravo airspace you might as well; its virtually a requirement. Otherwise, if the weather is clear and a million, youre not going through any airspace requiring you to talk to ATC, and youve decided to go VFR, should you consider flight following? Long story short, and after all factors are considered, the answer is Yes.

• When To Go Visual?
• Seperation Anxiety
• VFR Diversions
• Wildfire TFRs
• GA’s Rodney Dangerfield

The normal path for a fledgling airline pilot is to build his/her hours-traditionally as a CFI for pitifully low pay-and get a job with a regional carrier. That new first officer had an average starting pay in the mid-$20/hour range just a few years ago, before the hype of the pilot shortage. Second-year pay jumped nicely, sometimes as much as 50%, but then it stagnated at a few percent a year. A fifth-year first officer might have been making into $40-some/hour.

• Maneuvers
• Safety Policy
• IMC Emergencies
• Backcountry Culture
• High-Lift Devices

I had this exchange on a flight back to a rural Arkansas airport from Florida. I usually fly IFR even in VFR conditions. I was at 6000 feet, with a broken layer below me. I usually cancel about 20 miles in advance, as Memphis Center cannot see me on radar, or communicate with me once I descend below 3000 feet.

• Takeoff Performance
• Part 135 Transition
• Smarter Than Direct
• Ground Ops
• Paperwork

An approach to safety of dont have an accident and always effectively weight risks doesnt work because we dont take actions we think will cause accidents. Tom Turner recently presented a Wings seminar, Stop Teaching About Safety, covering this. Safetys an integral outcome, not a separate goal. Instead, he suggested approaching flying as its master and commander: The result will be safety. While being master and commander will work for all pilots, the instrument environment presents unique challenges to achieving that goal.

• Twenty Miles?
• Flight Review Options
• Inop Equipment
• Accident Stats
• Approach Gates

The Saratoga suddenly requested a climb. He was getting knocked around by turbulence in the cloud bases. Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do at that moment. Passing 1000 feet directly over him-my minimum vertical separation-were a string of climbing airliners. I couldnt bend the jets away from him, as I had another line of descending jets ten miles west of them. It would be an impromptu air show.

Getting weather info in flight has gotten cheaper due to FIS-B (ADS-B In). However, years before the FAAs eventual roll out of FIS-B and its array of free weather-information products, the dominant player in that industry was Baron Services though XM Radio. Sirius radio offered a competitive product from WSI. Eventually, Sirius and XM merged. The leading hardware was probably Garmins GDL 69 and 69A receivers getting XMs Baron offering.