Pilot Proficiency

It was once believed that all swans were white. No one considered the possibility of black swans until a Dutch explorer discovered them in Australia in 1697. That is the nature of a Black Swan event: Its rare, has an extreme impact and is predictable in retrospect.

Instrument approaches are designed such that several divergent paths and procedures funnel into one of a few common designs. Almost every approach you fly will either be a cone of narrowing vertical and lateral guidance; or a staircase of stepdowns to a minimum altitude.

Recently our flying club toured the new tower at Palm Beach International in southeastern Florida. About 60 pilots signed up to see this multimillion-dollar facility. This is what we saw.

The standard ILS approach is kind of a seen-one-seen-em-all situation. Sure, the numbers vary from one to the other, but the technique is rather straightforward and theyre all mostly the same. All you have to do is get established on the localizer, usually with a few turns from your friendly controller, wait for the glideslope needle to come in and then just follow them both to the runway. And, thats just about all there is to it. Until theres more…

Chances are youve looked at that table of precipitation types in aviation meteorology books and been fascinated by all the different possibilities. We see all these different types of codes in METAR and TAF reports every day, so why do ground schools just give us the decoding tables and not much else? Each kind of code tells its own little story about what the air mass is doing, whats going on at that airfield, and how the weather will affect flight operations.

While traveling into Valdez, Alaska for the annual fly-in and STOL competition, a couple of planes were trying to hurry in before the airspace closed for aerobatic practice. A couple minutes after tower gave best forward speed instructions to a Lake amphibian (not known for great forward speed), the following exchange was heard:

In its most basic form, a yaw damper inhibits movement of an aircraft around its vertical axis, performing like an automated set of feet on the rudder pedals. A yaw damper pulls aircraft movement information from a series of accelerometers or rate sensors in the rudder and translates it into the proper amount of calming […]

With a quick handshake and a soft thank you, Lyle and Kurt pulled up the airstair and started up my airplane. I watched in the rain as the props came up out of feather and the nav lights blinked on. Stricken, I retreated to the observation platform at the FBO and watched as Lyle taxied […]

The C35 Bonanza, N5946C, was cruising at 6,500 feet when there was a sudden loud bang from the engine compartment, followed by a smell of oil.

Most ILS approaches are constructed pretty much the same way. The environment in which a pilot might fly them can vary widely, however, and is important to consider. At an airport like New York’s La Guardia, which sees 375,000 annual takeoffs and landings, the ILS Runway 13 at the airport is used often. These traffic […]