In the wake of a “cluster” of recent GA accidents, AOPA’s Air Safety Institute is urging pilots to take a pre-holiday “safety pause” to consider the risks of upcoming travel between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day.
Noting that the pressure of completing holiday travel plans can increase the risk of a given flight, AOPA is urging pilot’s to use its online flight risk evaluator tool and apply and use personal minimums.
With the weather turning colder and nastier across much of the country, it’s also a good idea to perform extra planning for your upcoming holiday flights, and leave yourself with a Plan B in case conditions turn out to be worse than forecast. AOPA recommends getting some extra flight instruction with a CFI who is familiar with the airplane you’ll be flying.
As always, it’s better to be on the ground wishing you were up there than in the air wishing you were on the ground. If you can’t make it to grandma’s house for turkey this year, there will always be another opportunity to make the trip.
