Pilot Proficiency

The law provides $3.35 billion for airport planning and development and noise compatibility planning and programs. Appropriations for facilities and equipment from the Airport and Airway Trust Fund will run for the same term, increasing annually from $3.33 to $3.707 billion in 2023. These monies will be used in part to upgrade ASOS/AWOS systems, fund remote (unattended) towers, eliminate the deferred maintenance backlog of air navigation facilities (many of which are over 40 years old) and improve cybersecurity within ATC as well as in the National Airspace System.

Another day, same drill, but the controller is talking to another airplane on another frequency, so you might hear say again more than once. ATC is often tasked to use multiple frequencies at once. Its not the easiest thing to do with people talking on both, but we adapt and prioritize. One way we adapt to prioritizing is by the airplanes speed. The faster they are going, the more likely it is that I need to get to them first before they enter another controllers airspace without coordination.

It’s the final Gold race for the Sport Class at the Stihl National Championship Air Races outside Reno, Nevada. I’m in an Aero Vodochody L-39 Albatros, making circles at 8,500 feet above the Reno-Stead Airport, watching as a group of eight Lancair Legacies, Super Glasairs and Thunder Mustangs battles it out at high speeds around […]

It’s a warm, sticky August morning in Florida, and even the stiff breeze swirling in through the Cub’s open door fails to refresh. I wipe my brow and adjust my ball cap, then peer intently at the lake we’re approaching. It’s not just the climate making me sweat; I’ve been working hard, and things just […]

An instrument landing system (ILS) uses two separate ground-based radio transmitters to provide both lateral and vertical guidance to pilots during an instrument approach procedure that normally includes the lowest landing minimums. A Category I ILS approach, for example, typically offers a 200-foot decision height above the ground. ILS approach visibility minimums are measured either […]

Around here, we call it the “trip of a lifetime,” though that hardly does it justice. You might remember last month’s column that left off at an improbably tasty restaurant in Kangerlussuaq, Greenland, after just the first day of a 23-day private jet tour of Europe. Air Journey organized the trip, and it featured three […]

I totaled my airplane on May 27, 2018, at 10:30 in the morning. I was departing Telluride Airport in Colorado. It was a Sunday. She was a V-tail. I loved her. She was fast and strong and easily the most exotic thing I have ever owned. And I killed her. They say it’s better to […]

In 2018, a Junkers Ju 52 crashed in the Swiss Alps while attempting to cross a 10,000-foot saddle from south to north amid gusting winds.

Milwaukee ILS/Loc Rwy 1L is a complicated simple procedure. Scroll over the interactive image below for details.

I recently learned of a facility Id not previously known. Aircraft Simulator Training in Santa Rosa, CA, advertises in my type-club magazine and I decided to give them a try. Due to some date confusion on my part, I thought I was beginning this process with a couple months of flexibility. In reality, I had a couple weeks. In e-mail discussions I was impressed with the approach that Aircraft Simulator Training took, but we just couldnt get the schedule to work. So, I looked elsewhere.