Training & Sims

Situational awareness is critical when youre on the gauges, right? Few of us will argue that with a good EFIS its childs play to maintain that situational awareness, regardless of the quality of your scan. So far, so good.

While some readers probably welcome a refresher on turbulence, shear, and thunderstorm dangers, others might see it as beating a dead horse. But Wx Smarts is that intersection between my 30 years of forecasting and your thousands of hours of instrument time. Within these articles I guarantee theres always something that wasnt fully covered in flight school or the FAA circulars. Whether its more detail or just an unusual situation, the goal is to keep you interested, thinking outside the box, and having more insight into aviation meteorology than the average pilot.

You are flying the VOR-A approach into Salem Memorial (K33) in your Cessna 182. The airport has no tower, with Class E airspace starting at 700 feet AGL. The winds favor Runway 17. You dive n drive after the DME stepdown and break out at 680 feet AGL with the runway in sight two miles ahead. Do you (a) cross midfield and make left downwind to 17, or (b) turn right to the upwind leg for Runway 17 and make left traffic from there, or (c) turn left before reaching the airport and make right traffic for 17.

Which came first: the chicken or the Federal Egg Administration? Impossible to say. Physics teaches us that when Bernoulli found lift, his nemesis, Newton, said there must be an opposing reaction. So, when the Wright brothers flew, government pondered how to keep them from impacting all those other aeronauts. Little happened because of Newtons Law of Administrative Inertia: An agency at rest remains at rest until acted upon by an un-ignorable force. …

If you live west of the Mississippi, out where most of the military airspace and where most of the testing is done, youre well familiar with those pesky NOTAMs announcing interference testing of GPS or outright loss of the GPS signals. Most of us ignore them.

The Paris Air Show opened in June with the usual displays of military hardware and the latest passenger jets, but new and emerging technologies also attracted a lot of attention. Volocopter, a German company that has been developing a two-seat electric VTOL, announced it will work with the government of Dubai to test fly semi-autonomous air taxis by the end of this year. Boom unveiled the final design for a subscale prototype of its supersonic airliner, and said it will fly next year, with three GE engines. Airbus said its working on a new helicopter with a box-wing design that will cruise at 215 knots while maximizing efficiency. The Racer demonstrator will fly in 2020, Airbus said.

In April Killer Quiz, The Prof and the Pilot, I dont think that the answer to the last question is correct. With tailwind, one should reduce the airspeed below best glide speed, which in turn reduces the sink rate. Gliders pilots are very familiar with these concepts.Unfortunately, Cessna doesnt publish sink rates at various speeds to compute that accurately, so we are left to back-of-the-envelope calculations. We know that at best-glide speed (65 knots.

There are three levels of WINGS: the Basic, Advanced, and Master phases. Each level has multiple phases. Unlike the previous program, multiple phases can be earned each year. To complete a phase, pilots must get three flight and three ground credits which can be chosen from a wide range of activities.

The FAAs BasicMed rule took effect on May 1, creating a new option for pilots who want to fly without an FAA medical certificate. Under the BasicMed rule, pilots can fly under certain circumstances without a medical certificate, but they must pass an online course about aviation medical issues, complete a medical exam and checklist, and meet certain other criteria. The FAAs Advisory Circular (AC 68-1) on Alternative Medical Qualifications describes in detail how pilots can comply with the new policy.

I just got around to trying Jeff Van Wests IFR Sim Challenge from the Feb. 2017 issue. Its great! Many of us use desktop simulators like Prepar3d to practice instrument procedures. This makes it really challenging in a useful way. Please keep up this feature. Im sure it will only get better as you work on it.