After running this blog for three years or so I can honestly say I’ve seen and heard quite a few really interesting stories about the aviation industry. I’m headed to AOPA Summit in Tampa next week because I want to hear a few more. The other day I got a note with a video link [...]

Ag flying has always interested me because it is one of the last bastions of professional stick and rudder flying. Sure, technology has infiltrated the cockpit, but here it replaces the flagman (human or otherwise) who helps the pilot apply even coverage—not the pilot. Coordinating hand and eye and concentration still counts for something over [...]

Just like Alice falling down the rabbit hole, unraveling the real story behind the Northwest/Delta Airlines crew who forgot to land at MSP just keeps getting curiouser and curiouser. Brings to mind the gap in the Nixon Watergate tapes. If that doesn’t ring a bell, just assume it has to do with people trying to [...]

So, you wanna be a professional pilot, huh? Despite the economy, there will be a good number of vacant cockpit seats in the next decade or so as the last of the baby boomer bulge reaches 65, the airline pilot retirement age. If you are a Wall Street bonus baby, go for it. If not, [...]

Most of you probably know that a few months back I was abducted at propeller point and forced to assume co-host duties at the Airplane Geeks. About that same time, I met Dan Webb, my other co-host, a truly brilliant young man who continues to impress me with his knowledge of the financial side of [...]

In the grand scheme of American aviation, at least as the FAA sees it, amateur-built aircraft aren’t even on the radar sweeping through regulated skies. Created in home workshops and comparatively unfettered by the bureaucracy, these flying machines have been the nucleus of aviation’s success for more than half a century.  And with the FAA’s [...]

My pal Rod Rakic – better  known as Mr. My Transponder – and I were chatting today about his upcoming vacation to Florida, not too far from the Kennedy Space Center and almost in time for the next Shuttle launch. I would do almost anything to be in that visitor’s stand since there aren’t going [...]

When I learned to fly back in the mid 1970s, the airspace over the LA Basin was pretty crowded. Because of the smog that then reduced the visibility to some degree every day, most aviators were usually quite serious about seeing and avoiding each other.  Then, one spring Saturday morning, I awoke to a rare [...]