Browse Grassroots, a collection of flying-related articles by Budd Davisson. An accomplished aviation journalist, Budd shares his perspective on all kinds of flight-related subjects.
Our Christmas morning wasn’t what it should have been: we got a call early on that my ex-brother-in-law had just unexpectedly died. He was only two years older than I am and a health freak. The net effect on me was stronger than I would have expected. It was as if the concept of mortality more »
Almost regardless of our age, 20-something to gray dog, it’s impossible not to engage in those “Hey, do you remember when…?” moments, where we look back at experiences, people and times in our lives when something memorable happened. Then as we progress through life, we find ourselves hitting milestones that make it impossible not to more »
One of the advantages of visiting a friend in his home and/or office is that you get a sense of their environment.
With hundreds of people milling around me, I didn’t actually hear the engine, but I certainly felt it! It was a deliciously smooth snarl that I could actually feel in my chest.
After you’ve reached a certain age, when you get an email with a friend’s name in the title, you know that the news is never good.
The other day, as I was pushing my trusty mount out of the hangar, a pilot was having trouble getting a rental Cirrus back in the hangar next door, so I stopped and gave him a hand.
The voice had a very indignant tone to it. As if the tower should pay special attention to everything he said.
Okay, I know that airliners spend a lot of their time being tracked on someone’s radar scope and talking to ATC, so the assumption is that someone, somewhere knows exactly where they are at all times.
Today has been a hard one for those of us who follow history: First thing this morning, I learned that Alex Vraciu, America’s highest-scoring surviving ace, had died.
They live their retirement dreams before retiring.
I’ve known for a while my engine wasn’t totally happy.
If, at any given time, there are around 200,000 people on the grounds at the Oshkosh orgy of aviation, then there are probably the same number of reasons why they’re there.
It doesn’t seem that long ago that more than just the TV was black-and-white.
Courtesy of my laptop, it’s 0450 hours (that’s in the morning, in case you missed my whining), and I’m in another airport terminal.
As the student settled into the back pit and started to put his headset on, I stopped him and took his baseball hat off his head.
I first noticed it when one of our newer controllers, whose voice I didn’t recognize, told us we were cleared for takeoff on Runway Tree. Tree? Huh!
My student was from England. The first hop of the day was normal: from calling ATIS to flying the flight, nothing unusual.
Maybe it’s a personal thing, but to apply the term “hobby” or “pastime” to flying sounds somehow demeaning.