Pilot Proficiency

I read a startling statistic recently. In 2013, there were more than 11,000 reported bird strike incidents among commercial, military and general aviation airplanes in the United States. That’s a lot of birds hitting a lot of aircraft. And now researchers think they know why bird strikes are so common in aviation. It turns out […]

As Honda Aircraft Company closes in on FAA certification for the much-anticipated HondaJet, the company has taken delivery of a simulator that will help train the operators of the light twinjet at the headquarters in Greensboro, North Carolina. The full motion, Level D simulator as well as a HondaJet-specific training program were developed by Honda […]

We’ve all seen B-roll video footage of robots busily building cars on an assembly line, spinning and whirling with impressive precision and nary a human in sight. But you’ve probably never seen anything like this. Researchers in Germany have connected a robotic arm to the cockpit section of an airplane to create perhaps the world’s […]

Maybe, someday, at the end of a flight I will be able to say, “My performance as a pilot was perfect on that flight. I didn’t make a single mistake.” So far I have never come close. My performance (and John’s) on a recent flight is a great example. It was time for us to […]

Looking for a spiritual lift, I entered Signature Flight Support in Boston with its soaring cathedral ceilings and even higher fuel prices. I had hoped to beat Capt. Courtney Crain to the FBO as she was airlining in from Palm Beach, Florida. We had not flown together in months. Alas, she was already hunched over […]

I am fortunate that the majority of my trips can be categorized as mundane, a characteristic that all airline pilots aspire to for the sake of our passengers. The law of averages indicated I was due a trip that fell out of that category. And on this particular flight, it almost seemed as if the […]

Galen Hanselman, who has published several guidebooks and charts for pilots interested in landing on something other than 5,000-foot paved runways, sent me his two-volume flier’s guide to Utah and the associated “Supplemental World Aeronautical Chart,” which resembles a WAC chart but includes a slew of backcountry airstrips not on the WAC. The quality of […]

While we may not be able to defy gravity as pilots, this group of fliers has found a fun way to play with Newton’s law while in the air. Check out this video submitted by Flying reader Alex Mazz and see how a simple science experiment in the air can bring a smile to just […]

You are likely aware of NASA’s Aviation Safety Reporting System (ASRS), which can give you a “get out of jail free”-card if you self report a mistake you’ve made during a flight. What you may not be aware of is that the ASRS publishes the submitted stories, anonymously of course, in a newsletter and in […]

It is uncommon for everyone to survive during a midair collision with major damage to the airplanes involved. But that is exactly what happened during a failed F-16 training mission that was conducted on October 20 last year. Unable to maintain visual contact with its lead airplane during a formation maneuver, one pilot collided with […]