Pilot Proficiency

Newton’s third law states that for each action there is an equal and opposite reaction. This concept can be applied in the cockpit too. For each action there should be an appropriate reaction. There are many levers, knobs and buttons and it is quite easy to mistakenly grab or push the wrong one. To ensure […]

We pilots love engines and with good reason. We rely on their continued trouble-free operation to keep us flying safely. Perhaps more to the point, without engines, flight would never have gone far, and it can be argued that every noteworthy advance in aircraft performance was preceded by a noteworthy advance in power-plant design. There […]

If you’re a private pilot or an airline transport pilot, it doesn’t take long to discover that the “small world” axiom is very true within the aviation community. A relationship developed years earlier can resurface in the most unlikely places. Because of that, I was given advice to never burn a bridge in my climb […]

When climbing, you need some right rudder to keep the ball centered. If you perform a half roll and continue to climb upside-down, which rudder will you have to use to stay coordinated? Why do we need right rudder in a climb, anyway? Is it because of slipstream rotation? The propeller drags some air around […]

After a three-year hiatus during which organizers dealt with safety concerns, the Red Bull Air Race World Championship returns this weekend with the official start of the 2014 season in Abu Dhabi. The inaugural race of the new season pits 12 Red Bull race pilots against each other as they navigate a low-level course consisting […]

I’m going to Chino, California. I’m not sure when, but I’m going. Here’s why. Exactly 65 years ago to the minute, a Boeing B-50 Superfortress named Lucky Lady II was rumbling high over the Mediterranean on an epic four-day journey, its four massive Pratt & Whitney R-4360 Wasp Major radial engines supplying a combined 12,000 […]

The following article is from Flying’s May 2013 issue. My pilot certificate has some eclectic type ratings — a Lockheed 18 Lodestar, the Fairchild Swearingen SA-227 (Metroliner or San Antonio Stovepipe), the Douglas DC-3 and then there’s that commercial hot air balloon thing. But I gotta tell you, the most exotic flying machine, the one […]

Most lessons learned in this column arise from personal experiences in airplanes weighing less than 12,500 pounds. But every once in a while, pilots flying big airplanes weighing 870,000 pounds or more have embarrassing moments that are worth sharing too. My two first officers and I were flying a routine leg in a Boeing 747-400 […]

There’s usually not much time to react before a bird strike, as was vividly demonstrated in the dramatic video of a bird crashing the through the windshield of a Piper Saratoga last week. But the pilot in this incident reacted just as all pilots should, by maintaining control of the airplane, assessing the damage and […]

Like so many of us who love aviation, I was lucky enough to have someone in my life who introduced me to the thrill of flight at a young age — in my case, my father. As a fighter pilot in the Air Force for 21 years, first flying F-4s and then F-15s, and then […]