Pilot Proficiency

When taking off from your home airport, what’s your preferred departure technique? Do you choose to climb at Vx (best angle-of-climb airspeed), Vy (best rate-of-climb airspeed) or perhaps some other speed? In high-performance piston singles especially, max performance takeoffs at Vx or Vy may not be the smartest idea. Sure, you’ll gain extra altitude climbing […]

An emergency landing nearly ended in tragedy last week when an airplane was forced down on a ski slope in the French ski resort Avoriaz, the French news outlet Agence France-Presse reports. During the forced landing, the airplane managed to avoid most of the people on the busy ski hill but hit a Polish skier […]

We’ve seen cliff diving in airplanes, gliders and wingsuits, but how about in a snowmobile? In this epic video, a stunt team from Finland has modified a snowmobile and actually made it fly. Driving straight off a cliff, parachute attached, they glide down a mountain in Riksgränsen, Sweden, soaring at the same level as a […]

Dramatic video captured the collision of a pair of Indonesian military trainers as the pilots practiced their routine for an airshow in Malaysia on Sunday. The pilots of both airplanes safely ejected after clipping each other during a head-on pass that led to the fiery crashes of the KT-1B turboprops, single-engine training airplanes built by […]

During homecoming weekend at The Citadel, the past came alive for hundreds of Citadel grads from around the nation and, in a few cases, the globe. Old times, old tales, old pains and old pleasures — one way that time effects us all is that good times get better and bad times lose their sting. […]

It was a growing cumulus cloud, cauliflower-shaped with distinct edges. Our IFR route was taking us right through it. “You’re not going to fly through that, are you? That’s a thunderstorm,” said Martha, clearly alarmed. “Well, yeah. But that’s not a thunderstorm. It’s not tall enough. We’re only at 17,000 feet. Besides, it’s right in […]

One Friday morning, Brennan Parrish and his girlfriend, Ann Elizabeth, flew out of Savannah-Hardin County Airport in Savannah, Tennessee, in a 1967 Piper Cherokee Six. What looked like a quick loop in the pattern suddenly turned into a diversion to a nearby pasture. Painted in all caps were the words, “Marry me.” The 15-foot-high by […]

A UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter assigned to the Army National Guard in Hammond, Louisiana, crashed near Eglin Air Force Base, about 40 miles east of Pensacola, Florida, during a routine training mission on Tuesday evening. Seven marines and four crewmembers from the Marine Special Operations Regiment from Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, were on board the helicopter […]

In the increasingly sophisticated field of computer-generated imagery (CGI), even an aircraft in the earliest stages of development can take shape with a likeness that will be almost indis­tin­guishable from the first prototype that will eventually roll out of the production facility. So advanced are today’s digital images that, even for some with the most […]

Three French sports stars were among 10 people killed on Monday when two helicopters collided in northwest Argentina during filming for a reality TV show. The sports stars, all well-known in their home country, included Florence Arthaud, who in 1990 set a record for sailing across the Atlantic alone; champion swimmer Camille Muffat, who won […]