Aviation Education Posts

I wonder if you remember what you were doing back in November 2006? Here’s a quick refresher of some of the top stories. Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes were getting hitched. The first hearings were taking place on The Hill to find a replacement for Se…

The 2026 Singapore AirshowAbout this time of the year, journalists from around the globe pack a couple of bags and head for Singapore to attend the annual international air show. I’ve actually never made it to Singapore and I won’t this…

When we record episodes of the Airplane Geeks the format is usually the same. We introduce our guest, when we have one, and then run through the four or five major aviation stories of the past week. Max and Micah and David and I offer up our opinio…

Listen to this showBetween a Rock and a Hard Spot: Demands on air traffic controllersI’ve lost track of how many government shutdowns I’ve experienced during my life. Some under Democrat presidents, others under Republicans. During a shutdown, a s…

NTSB Hearing RoomIt’s understandable that even the geekiest of airplane geeks didn’t have enough time in their week to listen to the more than 30 hours of testimony created when the NTSB began its recent public investigation of the even…

Pilots get rusty when they don’t fly often. No matter whether they hold a private pilot certificate or an ATP. Even a professional pilot with thousands of hours in their logbook can easily find themselves behind the power curve in an airplane. Stayi…

By Paula WilliamsIn the 1990s, when I studied journalism at the University of Utah, my heroes were Edward R. Murrow, David Brinkley, Walter Cronkite, Bob Woodward, and Carl Bernstein. I believed firmly in the importance of the Fourth Estate—journa…

Capt. BeattyA disinformation campaign falsely links “DEI” to airline accidents – let’s check the facts.By Capt. Jenny BeattyThere is no extant literature examining this question, so I accessed various sources to compile available data. I research…

Ed note: While this story is a bit dated, the winter-flying lessons are not.Inexperience, stupidity, get-home-itis — take your pick. Any of them applied to me one late November evening as I cruised Just east of Chicago’s Loop with an electric night…

The trip was going to be simple, I thought. My friend Steve would give me a ride from Pal-Waukee Airport PWK (now Chicago Executive) and drop me off at a short grass strip near Rockford (RFD), some 50 miles west, where I’d grab another Cessna …

In the BeginningIt was the afternoon of November 2, 1929, when a group of women pilots first gathered at Curtiss Field in Valley Stream, Long Island, New York. That meeting became the impetus for what became known as the Ninety-Nines, Inc., the Int…

Heaven knows journalists, me included, have spent an enormous amount of time pillorying Boeing and its CEOs over the past decade. It’s tough not to when this giant American corporation continuously offers so much ammunition.But I’m also…

In Episode #355 of Aviation News Talk, Max Trescott and I discussed pilot decision-making behind the wrong runway landing of an American Eagle Embraer 170 at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport (ORD) in late September. A few extenuat…

Have you or someone you know ever considered becoming an air traffic controller for the FAA? I spent nearly 10 years of my aviation career working for the agency, and I loved the work. Coincidentally, the FAA just announced its latest recruiting dri…

Bell 47Do you remember your first flight? I know I do. That image of a 12-year-old me climbing into the right seat of an old Bell 47 helicopter at Greater Rockford Airport in 1963 is indelibly etched into my brain. I even remember the pi…

Note: This story was corrected on August 10th at 10:23 am, thanks to the help of a sharp-eyed reader.Making an ATR-72 SpinI wasn’t in Brazil on Friday afternoon, but I saw the post on Twitter or X (or whatever you call it) showing a Brazil …

Continuing my curiosity quest inspired by Can GPS Spoofing Fool a Flight Navigator?, it seems that the US Air Force and Navy are the only reliable sources of air navigator training available today. But in either case, it is not a dedicated aviation …

It should go without saying that flying is a dynamic pursuit, so that means that learning and being able to proficiently perform the skills (and understand the knowledge that supports them) is not a one-and-done endeavor whose conclusion is the issu…

In the days before electronic flight bags, the duffels filled with the necessary performance, operational, and navigation paper were a weight and balance line item, especially with a full set of instrument approach plates. When formatted as electron…

A long voicemail from my nephew is not what I expected after I ignored a call from an unknown number. Recently married, he was on his honeymoon in Cartegena, Colombia, and from their hotel they could see the airport. This led to what he described as…

Given the state of the world, GPS spoofing has been in the news with unsettling frequency. Transmitting a counterfeit GPS signal to override the real deal serves the real purpose of guiding aerial, maritime, or terrestrial vehicles where someone oth…

It’s about trustI remember riding our crew bus with a bunch of other pilots, and flight attendants in the spring of 1991 not long after our employer Midway Airlines had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The old red and white school …

As a word merchant and an aviator, words are important. They are the foundation of communication, and in many instances they can be the difference between life and death. “Hold Short” is but one example. Equally important is our semantic…

By Rob MarkAn early scene in An Officer and a Gentleman, the 1982 movie about U.S. Navy recruits slogging their way through officer candidate school, has granite-tough Marine Gunnery Sgt. Foley (actor Lou Gossett Jr.) confronting candidate Zack May…