Search Results for: wright

Bipartisan legislation, supported by the aviation industry, has been put forth to establish a national aviation center, for the purpose of workforce development and overall promotion of the industry—and make sure that high schools around the country have access to aviation-based STEM curriculums. Senators James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) introduced the legislation, […]

No matter how successful we are in life, there’s always someone with a bigger house, a newer car and a better job to help keep us honest. That’s certainly true in aviation, where we’re often left to wonder how some pilots can get away with buying and flying more airplane than they can handle. You […]

Rereading Robert Wright’s article in the July 2019 issue (“North To Alaska”), in which he was following the British Columbia and Alaska coast, he writes that the latter part of the trip was “mostly on top” from Skagway to Cordova. For someone who is frequently advocating risk management, it is hard to understand his reasoning […]

For the pilots, crews and families that operate vintage biplanes for giving public rides, there are few—if any—days off when it comes to performing important annual maintenance and 100-hour inspections. Meeting the FAA safety criteria for holding out rides to the public when your airplane was built over 80 years ago requires a dedication to […]

The Pacific Northwest, for the purposes of this article, includes the states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and parts of Montana and Wyoming. Thats a huge hunk of territory and comprises more than 250,000 square miles for Washington, Oregon and Idaho alone. The region includes two major mountain ranges-the Cascades and the Northern Rockies-and many smaller ones, as well as several major river basins. There are major cities in the region, such as Seattle, Portland and Boise, but also thousands of square miles of largely empty land and wilderness.

Wings Over the Rockies Air & Space Museum (WOTR) and the Jeppesen Aviation Foundation announced on December 17, “Wright Brothers Day,” that they have joined forces to create the Wings Over the Rockies Captain Jeppesen Foundation, a new 501(c)(3) organization. The foundation’s mission is to support Wings Over the Rockies Air & Space Museum in […]

On a hot August day 50 years ago, I was deposited in front of the Trans World Airlines terminal at Kennedy Airport in a rented Cadillac. The Caddy needed some timing work done on the engine, and the ambient temperature had outpaced the vehicle’s air conditioning, but I didn’t care. I was flying to London […]

Because I’m both an airplane nut and history buff, many of my European work layovers involve either seeking out aerial adventures or investigating some bit of the 2,000 years of tumultuous history that seem to lurk around the continent’s every corner. Often, I am able to combine these interests—for a great deal of aviation history […]

Like it or not, winter weather is upon us here in North America. After a few brief weeks of not as much thunderstorm activity, were headed squarely into a a couple of months featuring widespread near-freezing temperatures and precipitation. From storing our airplane, to preflighting it, picking a route and ensuring our destination doesnt have any slippery surprises, winter weather will have an impact on our operations, likely even if we stay in the pattern at a Southern California airport.

Its an aviation clich that your single engine goes into automatic rough when crossing any significant body of water. To be sure, any engine problem while beyond gliding distance from land is a critical problem, even if you have more than one. When flying a single, its everything. Another clich is that most of us dont bother to analyze the real risks of overwater flying. Any water crossing of any significance-and wed put the Great Lakes, Hawaii and Bahamas in that basket-should be carefully planned to ensure risks are mitigated to acceptable levels. The thing is, both clichs are true more often than not.