Pilot Proficiency

Bumpy air isn’t pleasant. For passengers, it can feel even worse, sometimes to the point where it becomes necessary to offload lunch. Airmanship guru Wolfgang Langewiesche addressed the problem in his 1944 classic, Stick and Rudder: “It is in rough air that straight flight becomes an art — and the interesting thing about it is […]

This engine failure did not occur in my airplane, and I wasn’t the pilot. Nevertheless, I was personally and embarrassingly involved in the process that led to the incident. It all started when I, as an aviation journalist, embarked on a series titled “Careers in Aviation” and arranged to write about a day in the […]

We always hear, “Plan the flight — Fly the Plan.” And this is great advice — until the plan no longer makes sense. Unfortunately, too many pilots plan the flight and then hang on to that plan when it no longer makes sense because they really don’t have a backup plan. Quite often, we spend […]

It is unlikely that inhabitants of any part of the country other than the Northeast really identify with the term “nor’easter.” For those familiar, the word sends shivers. The wind whips out of the northeast in New England when a low parks itself off the coast and blows back cold, wet weather from over the […]

When any pilot considers cold-weather flying, in-flight airframe icing is first and foremost on the list of worries. Icing is an important safety risk to all types of airplanes, and a great deal of cost and effort is spent to avoid icing or to safely remove it or prevent it from accumulating. But the cold […]

In the spring of 1944, Col. Don Blakeslee wanted P-51 Mustangs for his Fourth Fighter Group in England. But it would take weeks to transition the pilots from their huge radial-engine P-47 Thunderbolts into the sleek V-12-powered Mustangs. Blakeslee promised to have his pilots in combat within 24 hours of receiving the Mustangs – and […]

There are a lot of definitions out there for maneuvering speed (Va), including the textbook one that students deliver by rote, when asked. Unfortunately, most of the popular definitions don’t relate to the true meaning of this “life saving” speed. The best definition, albeit the shortest, is — “turbulence penetration speed” — the speed you […]

**BLOGBOOK ENTRY 6 ** I had my third flight lesson on Saturday, six weeks after my last. I had made the decision about a month ago to finish the FlightSafety ground school course and take the written before continuing with the flight lessons. Remember, when I started flying “oh so many years ago,” I learned […]

One of my short local flights last week reminded me that the time of year has a lot to do with what I can expect from wind conditions. It’s winter in the Northeast, and the season brings some pretty reliable presumptions. It’ll be colder, and the days are shorter. In clouds, icing assumes center stage […]

I have noticed a number of letters to the editor over the years that lament the fact that most of the training and safety articles seem to be about accidents. A few people have even indicated they were scared away from flying by the many accident stories. There is a very important reason many articles […]