Pilot Proficiency

On a singular night in 1994, I learned that while there are many risks in flying, like in most other activities, succumbing to fear and panic is the worst possible way to deal with those risks. Flight training, while continuing to place the emphasis on risk avoidance, should highlight rationality in dealing with those risks, […]

Pop quiz. You’re in the pattern at a nontowered airport on a calm day, announcing your turn to base for Runway 35, which is right traffic. Just then, you hear two other pilots make their first calls on the common traffic advisory frequency—one of them announcing they’re 2 miles out on a straight-in downwind for […]

As a kid, I was lucky to go on a lot of family vacations. Colorado, California, Florida—wherever we went, I always angled for the window seat on airplanes, eager to watch the earth disappear under me during takeoff. I was that kid who was brought up into the cockpit to meet the pilot and copilot, […]

I bought N4875D in fall 2012. It’s the first and only airplane I’ve owned, a Mooney M20F. As with any vintage vehicle, it’s been an adventure tracking down the various nits, bugs and deferred maintenance items. We’d been through the hydraulics, engine, prop and fuel system. When I took it in for an annual this […]

Every summer for several years, I have been flying my Varga from my home base about 25 miles south of San Francisco—San Carlos, California—to Ashland, Oregon, to take in a play at the Shakespeare Festival and then proceed to Idaho for some camping. The Varga is a low-wing, two-place, tandem-seat airplane with a 150 hp […]

Some accidents arrive entirely without warning, and it is hard to know what or whom to blame.

There are a few days in a pilot’s life that you remember forever. I am not talking about your first solo or the day you got (or will get) your private certificate. These events are always well-preserved somewhere in your brain’s hippocampus. I’m talking about those days when you really learned something you didn’t know—something […]

He was a good friend. A ski-resort developer, a leader in his community, someone we highly admired. He took off in his Cessna Cardinal at night from his ski resort during a snowstorm on a short trip he flew almost every weekend. He was not instrument-rated. He knew the route well, but obviously not well […]

Often, the word “front” raises anxiety and apprehension in aviation meteorology. It carries the possibility of showers and thunderstorms, signals a change in the weather regime, and means the distinct possibility of a busted forecast. Thankfully there’s nothing to fear. Fronts are now well understood— computer models have become excellent at handling the underlying air masses […]

Back when I was a fledgling aviator with less than a thousand hours in my logbook, I ferried airplanes for various aircraft brokers throughout the United States to build time. My goal was to gain 1,200 hours of flight time so that I could hopefully become employed flying canceled checks with a Part 135 operation. […]