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Cross-Country Flying Stories

Cross-country flying stories from Bill Cox offer fantastic insight into what pilots face on long distance flights. Dig into our X-Country Log today.

Renewal

A simple, four-hour round-trip helps remind me of the reliability of GA airplanes

In most recognizable respects, the trip was hardly unusual. It was just an easy 280 nm hop from Long Beach to Groveland, Calif., for a speaking engagement before the Pine Mountain Lake Aviation Association, a typical out-and-back, 1+50 hop in the LoPresti Mooney, precursor to at least a four-pack of 400 to 600 nm trips around the Southwest.

Ode To The Fast Lane

General aviation answers a question that wasn’t important until recently

I wouldn’t want to be riding out on the wing tonight. The wind is roaring down out of the north like a polar bear’s breath—a vicious torrent of air frozen by winter and twisted by the Rocky Mountains. Somewhere below, far down in a blanket of black sky four miles deep, the night snow of November blitzes New Mexico and Colorado into immobility.

Memories Of Africa, Part VI

Seven days to Cameroon

In response to what seems like a gigabyte of e-mails, here’s yet another chapter of ferry-flying experiences in Africa during the ’80s and ’90s.

Great Sandy Australia

See Down Under—on the coast

His name is Blair Howe, and if he were any more Australian, he’d hop or eat eucalyptus leaves. Though he’s only about five feet and 11 inches, he’s a giant of a man—probably 270 pounds—all muscle and attitude and fiercely proud of his country and accomplishments.

Secrets Of Johnston Island

An emergency landing on a top-secret base

Majuro in the Marshall Islands has to be one of the world’s more remote locations. It’s smack in the middle of the Pacific, 1,600 miles east of Guam and 2,000 miles southwest of Hawaii.

How To Blimp

Goodyear proves that low and slow can be fun

After a takeoff run of about one foot, the attitude pitches up to 10, then 20, then 30 degrees. I know we can’t maintain this pitch angle very long, but the pilot holds the nose up with no apparent concern for impending disaster.

Nauru—For The Birds

This island nation once operated the world’s hardest-working 737

I’d overflown Nauru perhaps a dozen times. It’s almost directly between Majuro, capital of the Marshall Islands, and the famous Henderson Field at Honiara, Solomon Islands. When I was regularly delivering airplanes to Australia in the ’80s and ’90s, I often looked down on the small, oval-shaped island, which is 26 miles south of the equator. Its interior looked moonscaped and jagged, like something out of a science-fiction movie. I wondered why on earth (or more accurately, water) anyone would want to live there.

Llamas & Condors

XC Log: Try South America

I was at a speaking engagement in Alaska awhile back, talking about the joy and pain of flying the oceans, when a member of the audience asked about my experiences in Central and South America.

Paws In The Sky

Dogs make wonderful copilots, even if they do sometimes complain about the landings

Yes, I’m guilty. The rumors are true. I am one of those silly, sentimental pet lovers who regard dogs as a couple of steps above most humans. I’ve owned and raised a succession of Siberian huskies, Alaskan malamutes, German shepherds and dobermans for the last 40 years, and as a group, they’re some of the most wondrous creatures on the planet. I’m ecstatic when they’re born, and I cry when they die.

Safety—A Tough Sell

Blame it on pilot error

Woody was one of those pilots we all thought would live forever. He was something of a legend in the ferry-flying community: an aviator who had been everywhere in pretty much everything, had never wrecked an airplane and seemed to live a charmed life. A former African missionary, he was a friend for 20 years who knew more about flying the world than anyone else I had ever met, and we all assumed he was invulnerable to the dangers of ferry flying.