santa

A CFI recalls the time she had to provide an emergency flight review for the most famous of pilots in order to save Christmas.

There is not a pilot among us who has not wondered about the logistical challenge involved in the queen mother of all cross-country flights—Santa’s trip around the world on Christmas Eve. That consummate aviator, Kris Kringle, aka Santa Claus, graciously made time for FLYING to let us peek behind the curtain, as it were. Although […]

The command keeps tabs on St. Nick’s Christmas Eve movements by using a webbed network of satellites, heat-seeking sensors and, of course, fighter jets.

Santa came early this year for dozens of island communities in the South Pacific, powered not by nine reindeer, but instead four Rolls-Royce turboprop power plants, each generating 4,700 horsepower. Last week, U.S. Air Force crew members concluded an annual weeklong airdrop of food, tools, fishing equipment, and clothing out the back of C-130 Hercules […]