Hone your pilot skills with the articles and advice below. Our sport-pilot articles cover topics of interest to novice and advanced general aviation pilots. Trust our ongoing training articles to improve your piloting skills.
I was tired. No, beyond tired. I was fairly well-whipped. There are no legal limits imposed on flight hours associated with ferry flying, and stupidly.
It’s ironic that most general aviation pilots consider a possible engine failure as their greatest fear.
I listened carefully to the clearance on the first go-around, shook my head in exasperation, and wondered if the controller had been a trumpet player in a previous life.
It barely matters what you fly these days— avgas is starting to comprise a greater percentage of an airplane’s total operating cost.
From two miles up, big water looks pretty much the same all over the world.
What makes some runways more challenging than others? The length? The wind? What you had for breakfast that morning? What?
It seems we all have a story, some event in our lives that brought us into the aviation trade.
What are the best conditions for landing uphill/downwind or downhill/upwind? It may seem dangerous to land into the wind but downslope on a snowy runway; yet landing upslope with a tailwind seems equally precarious.
Bill Stewart, until recently a lapsed pilot, sounds like something between a fighter jock and a kid in a candy store as he recounts his latest aerial exploits on the ramp at Chicago’s Aurora Municipal Airport (ARR).
The sheer enormity of the subject is a little intimidating. You probably could name several thousand characteristics of a “good pilot.”
It was 1984, and I was ferrying one of the last of the Cessna 207s to South America. It was a midsummer afternoon in South Texas, and the mushroom cumuli were climbing high into the stratosphere all along the border and south toward the Gulf of Mexico.
VFR corridors have served an important function in U.S. airspace since the creation of the old TCAs (Terminal Control Areas) and TRSAs (Terminal Radar Service Areas), now less telegraphically renamed Class B and Class C airspace, respectively.
Formation flying is a dangerous and, for me, compellingly beautiful and engaging experience.
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I spent over a year making the transition from piloting a TBM 700 turboprop to becoming a jet pilot; a process that has taken me through an ATP rating, two type ratings, a lot of simulator time, a jet trip to Paris, a bit of mentoring, one or two scary moments, some frustration and piles of cash
When I was a student pilot and my instructor would send me on solo flights to practice maneuvers, stalls were always last on my list.
All of us have spent considerable time observing our fellow aviators’ takeoffs, landings, radio communications, preflight inspections and general behavior at (and away from) the airport.
 I’ve seen few things in my lifetime as beautiful as looking down on other planes in flight while on the top of a wingover. Multiple airplanes acting as one require a significant amount of discipline, dedication and practice. Even after more than 3,000 hours of flying within 20 feet of other airplanes, I know that this is an extremely risky activity that should never be attempted without considerable ground and flight training. |
 The benefits of transitioning from pilotage to dead reckoning, four course ranges, ADF, VORs, Loran and then to GPS have been nothing short of spectacular. |