Pilot Proficiency

The FAA’s aircraft re-registration initiative has caught the attention of headline writers in the general media. “FAA loses track of 190,000 planes” was one. Naturally, the emphasis in the stories was on the potential threat to security. In fact, the larger concern is one of administrative housekeeping. Under the new rules, aircraft owners will have […]

I’ve carried several varieties of portable GPS navigators over the years, and of course none are approved as sole means of navigation for IFR operations. There are a number of reasons for this, including the fact that portable navigators don’t incorporate the necessary RAIM (receiver autonomous integrity monitoring) technology for IFR certification. RAIM raises a […]

I’m essentially a little airplane pilot, and only rarely have I “flown far out across the prairies of the sky to lands my fathers never knew and shores my kindred never trod,” but I think any pilot understands Gill Robb Wilson’s feelings about flying home for Christmas: I’ve blessed my wings a thousand times For […]

Research has shown that Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) is no joke. When the days get shorter and it’s colder outside, people are more prone to depression, anxiety and a variety of other symptoms we used to call simply, the “winter blues.” A lot of the recommended remedies involve maximizing our exposure to natural light and […]

There are jobs in which you’re required to punch a time clock, and there are jobs in which your value is not measured in how long you do something but rather in what it is you do. So what does this have to do with aviation? Congress, in its questionable wisdom, has passed a law […]

This past weekend I called upon a friend (who happens to be a private pilot working toward his instrument rating) and invited him to join me for a late afternoon leisure flight in the Remos G3. He would be my third passenger since certification. Admittedly, it’s more fun for me to have someone along so […]

The FAA website’s top story reflects the agency’s commitment to speeding the transformation to NextGen. It explains that Performance Based Navigation Instrument Flight Procedures (IFPs) are the key to the benefits of switching from ground-based radar to satellite-based GPS. And based on recommendations from a task force assembled by RTCA, the FAA has launched what […]

The late Bill Wagstaff, a former colleague of mine, was a very smart man who loved aviation. But though he’d taken some lessons, he never pursued the actual flying part very far. It just wasn’t a priority to work through (and pay for) all of what it took to operate an airplane safely and with […]

A new rule proposed by the FAA would require photo certificates for pilots. Currently, pilots carrying the “old new” tamper resistant plastic certificates must also carry a second government photo ID, such as a driver’s license. The new certificates would have to be updated every eight years with a new photo. If approved, the new […]

Over the course of the 18 years that I have been writing for Flying, I have received a couple of indignant letters from pilots who for some reason thought an article I had written was directed at them personally. They firmly stated that they would never make the kind of mistake I had written about. […]