Weather

PEGASAS, is not just another aviation-weather acronym—it stands for the Partnership to Enhance General Aviation Safety, Accessibility, and Sustainability, an FAA Center of Excellence for General Aviation. Amongst the long list of efforts produced by PEGASAS has been Project 4, Wx Technology in the Cockpit (WTIC), which concluded in August 2018. Project 4 collected information […]

I live in the Deep South, and I emerge from summer begging for a massive cold front to clear the Florida/Georgia state line and bring some ­much-needed relief from the blistering heat and stifling humidity. Come the end of September, I am aching for sight of high cirrus, introducing a phalanx of low cumulus, chased […]

Dark gray clouds scudded low overhead, pewter waves slapped Windbird’s hull as it heeled in a gust, and a fine, cold mist obscured the low black line on the horizon that defined our island destination, now 7 miles away. Given the sullen weather, you wouldn’t know it was July 5 if not for the steady stream […]

Garmin launched its new D2 Air GPS smartwatch for pilots, which includes multiple tools for planning and in-flight use. Serving to connect seamlessly between a pilot’s flying life and ground-based existence, the D2 Air features weather, direct-to navigation, airport info, flight logging, and a pulse oximeter. The watch displays in several time zones (including Zulu […]

Cedar Rapids, Iowa, stood in the gunsight of an awesome derecho storm that hit the state on Monday, August 10, in the early afternoon hours. A derecho, usually associated with rapidly-moving bow-echo or squall-line thunderstorms, packs immense straight-line winds, often in excess of 100 mph—and it remains far more difficult for meteorologists to predict than […]

The aviation support system in the US has grown steadily over the past 60 years, and it is the worldwide standard for its breadth of pilot services across the National Airspace System. Notably, these services are provided as a government-funded resource without additional fees as you may experience in other parts of the world. Change is afoot, […]

It happens to be my lot in life as a pilot to get to fly regularly a couple of routes that take me through the most active thunderstorm areas in the country. These routes, from central Texas to northern Kansas and, again, from central Texas to Florida, not only point me in the direction of […]

In the early hours of August 19, 2019, a tropical wave appeared off the west coast of Africa. A few days later, it began showing signs of organization and cyclonic movement inside a small low-pressure area. By August 24, the system had grown large enough to qualify as an official tropical depression centered about 700 […]

Twenty-five years ago, a Seattle-area pilot tried to do his mother a favor. He would take her to visit a friend on the other side of the Cascades. Their route would go through the Snoqualmie Pass, which, on the day of the trip, was unfortunately beset by fog and low-lying clouds. The pilot was instrument-rated, […]

December is the cruelest month in the Culebra Range of southern Colorado. This chain of lofty mountains is rugged terrain, where the raging winds of winter have caught several airplanes in downdrafts. in my Navion, I have sniffed out the range’s updrafts and downflows, trying to identify weather conditions leading to airplane disasters and to […]