Uncontrolled Airspace Blog

Congress: Indeed, time for you to act...

2011-01-17T15:47:00.002-05:00

Over the weekend one of the lesser stars in the media firmament of our Nation's Capital, The Washington Examiner, took to task in an editorial what it views as "chronic problems" at our Federal Aviation Administration. Without remotely suggesting that there aren't issues worthy of the Examiner's suggestion -- that Congress dive seriously into its oversight role -- it's misplaced and, simply, dumb to suggest that one particular member of Congress "demand that (FAA Administrator Randy) Babbitt produce significant, measurable improvements in each of" six specific areas during the coming year -- "or resign and let somebody else take over the controls."

The Examiner's posing an interesting idea...if, that is, you consider it smart to have people who've failed to do their jobs for several years suddenly get over their neglect by demanding that the new guy, in under a year, "produce significant, measurable improvements" -- or quit.

While The Washington Examiner may believe in its idea, they clearly aimed it in the wrong direction.

From my perspective, Congress should first succeed at providing the budgets and the tools agencies like the FAA require to best serve the public -- or resign and go on to that K Street lobbying job they'll have waiting on them.

If, however, Congress indeed succeeds on doing its authorization job, then it can get heavy into oversight -- not before.

Congress needs to conduct oversight over federal agencies and this writer won't be one who suggests that the FAA couldn't benefit from something better than it gets from Congress today, which seems to veer between benign neglect and superfluous micromanagement.

Last time Congress did more than vote another extension of FAA funding was last summer and Congress used the opportunity of temporarily funding the agency to load it up beyond its existing overload; Congress added a number of mandates involving complex changes to the FARs, changes that, by an act of Congress, must be made through the lengthy and time-consuming Administrative Procedures Act, or face congressional ire of another sort.

Congress largely ignored all of the Examiner's bullet points going back years, when the GOP controlled both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue and both sides of the Capital and, as these things go, Congress hasn't shown itself to do much better with the Democrats in the same position -- references the new mandates from last summer.

So how about this Congress:

First, pass a five-year budget authorization for the FAA...you know, one that provides for the changes and evolution already ongoing. Do that now, please, and let the agency get on with attempting to make progress by at least knowing what its budgets will be.

Second, apply your oversight role; if some of that oversight picks up on some of the Examiner's somewhat lame claims, well, that's the price of democracy. Administrator Babbitt's a big boy -- he can handle himself, for example, on airline pilots training for collision avoidance as part of their recurrent, or the Examiner's hysteria over what it calls "lighter-than-air gliders," a mistake that calls into question the depth of knowledge by the paper's editorial writers; sounds, at points, like they actually know or understands less then they think about aviation, overall.

But Congress should resist applying its oversight authority as an exercise in applying even more conditions to allowing the FAA to have a five-year authorization and with it a semblance of funding predictability. Matter of fact, let's up the ante to you finishing your work for all agencies of the Executive Branch -- it is in your job description; getting re-elected isn't.

And if you can't do that by year's end, Congress, resign and make room for a lawmaker interested more in public service than in private campaign funds -- that thing you know you spend more time on than actual lawmaking.

'Nuff said.

-- Dave

Onward into the second decade of the 21st Century...

2010-12-31T17:48:00.002-05:00

For 2011, here are a few pet wishes from the remarks section of life's log book:

...that we find a practical, affordable solution to the 100LL challenge...

...that electric power advances in airplanes to a level comparable to autos...

...for any and all TSA mandates to at last make sense and cents...

...for an all-around viable LSA that cost no more than the average Suburban Unnecessary Vehicle...

...for a last-and-final rebuke to the tiresome issue of user fees...

...to reach this point in 365 more days knowing that more people are flying and fewer are dying or dropping out...

...and finally, for the happiness, health and safety we all need and deserve.

Thanks for another year of UCAP madness, listeners...let's to it again next year.

-- Dave

FAA BS: TTFs DO NOT threaten airports expansion...

2010-09-22T15:36:00.004-04:00

Well, one of my friendly aviation associates sent me links to testimony the FAA delivered today; the agency staffers testified before House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

First up for your consideration, Catherine Lang, the FAA's associate administrator for airports. She told the hearing, according to press accounts, "The fundamental distinctions between public use airports ... and private airports have begun to blur."

Our friends over at the National Air Transportation Association sent me a press release declaring their concurrence. NATA's president James Coyne, generally a sharp guy and an active GA pilot, told the members this: “NATA agrees with the FAA that the primary issue for not allowing new RTTF agreements is to ensure the future utility of federally funded airports. Investments in airports, made through the Airport Improvement Program or through federal surplus property grants, are intended to enhance the flexibility of airports to meet the future needs, in both capacity and type of operations, of the National Airspace System. Due to the intrinsic nature of residential properties, as compared to commercial properties, RTTF agreements limit the flexibility of airport sponsors to expand according to the needs of the community. NATA believes that the FAA has made an overwhelming case for prohibiting new RTTF agreements and supports its proposal.”

Well...is that it? This stuff isn't going to be the last word. While I haven't heard what EAA or AOPA testified, lacking their perspectives, let me share a bit of my own take: "Bunk!"

Sorry, Jim; Sorry Ms. Lang; your assertions are patently "Bunk!" -- which sounds so much more polite than my first instinct. Bovine effluent.

No one, not the FAA, not NATA, offers any compelling evidence to support the contention that "RTTF agreements limit the flexibility of airport sponsors to expand according to the needs of the community."

To ask politely, what are you people smoking? A residential neighborhood of aviation fans and airport supporters is "intrinsically"more difficult to dislodge than, say, a higher-density residential area with no fans of aviation. Or an industrial park? Or small shop with a deep-pocket owner?

Really...On what planet?

And just so Jim knows I'm not solely picking on his comments, Ms. Lang failed to explain in any meaningful way how well-reasoned, balanced residential TTF neighborhoods "blur the lines between public use...and private airports" more so or even differently than the thousands of TTF agreements publicly owner airports have with business neighbors?

Are you saying public-private lines aren't blurred when it's a business selling whatever -- but are when it's Joe Pilot coming home from the office? OK...How? Take your time -- we know how long it takes an agency to think up answers to fit the policy...

At the end of the day, a publicly owned airport faces the same obstacles and obstructions whether the neighbors are private businesses or private residences.

Let's go a little further here. How can airport with a RTTF and a vibrant residential neighbor and ally somehow going to find it more difficult to deal with the neighbors when discussing airport expansion than one filled with people -- many of whom believe their move into the area justifies asking the airport to shut down altogether?

Sorry, Ms. Lang, sorry Mr. Administrator Babbitt, sorry Mr. Coyne. Nothing heard in that hearing approaches justification for preventing case-by-case consideration of new RTTF agreements with public, federally funded airports.

You all know damned well that not every publicly owned airport is a candidate for the kind of growth you think an RTFF would handicap; the majority won't. You also well know -- or should -- how difficult survival is for even financially viable publicly owned airports, and how much closer pressures exist for many airports.

Yet somehow you think providing business with privileges you'd withhold from individual citizens is somehow a path to airport utopia?

On what planet?

And we're bound to hear back about the "national security" issue somewhere in this; yes, individuals at some airports have had some issues -- some of them at RTTF sites, some of them at BTTF locales (as in "Business Through The Fence"). So what? Either we have a public airports system or we don't.

Security issues should be resolved at the site of the offense; not by stopping through-the-fence.

So a couple of suggestions:

First, come up with at least a mythological scenario where all the power of imminent domain and taxing authority of a community would fail a RTFF airport should it want to expand -- and how that would have been different had it been businesses instead of residences. We no longer tolerate claims lacking any backing; this is one of those.

Second, explain to the rest of us how private business is inherently a more-desirable TTF neighbor than an individual with a home -- right now, you've got nothing on this front but a baseless contention; for instructions on resolving that problem, see the next paragraph up.

Third, if you actually can come up with some fiction to support that second point, bring along an explanation of why business warrants or deserves any preferential access over a private individual seeking access in any public-private encounter . And telling us "they create jobs" won't cut it; those home create jobs, too. They pay taxes -- they are the citizens the Founders had in mind when they drafted our Constitution; don't remember seeing anything mentioning corporations, businesses, etc.

Time to punt, folks.

The FAA's conclusion here is unfathomable, unjustifiable and unneeded. It's chasing a problem that exists only in their minds. And it's wholly incompatible with part of the agency's mission.

As my friend there put it, "So much for FAA promoting aviation...again."

Respectfully,

Dave

Beyond irresponsible...

2010-09-15T15:15:00.002-04:00

Well, just heard the fourth trustworthy assessment of chances that Congress will finish work on the bill "reauthorizing" the Federal Aviation Administration. The assessments are in alignment: it ain't happening this year with this Congress -- specifically, with this Senate.

Congrats, lawmakers!! That's two straight Congresses that the FAA has gone without full reauthorization.

That failure means Congress essentially starts all over on the issue come January so a third Congress can get a crack at micromanaging, earmarking and otherwise abusing the process to gain an advantage on some well-funded constituents' wants.

Unconscionable; just unconscionable that a body required by the Constitution to be of adult age seems to lack a majority of adult personalities or adult responsibility. Members of both chambers on both sides of the aisle tried; between working to protect narrow business interests on both sides of the aisle and a general, brainlessly disciplined "Just Say No to Everything!" mentality among the minority party, it's probably a miracle that even the gazillion continuing resolutions got past with the stop-gap money that kept open the doors, towers and centers functioning, and rulemaking continuing at its typical plodding pace.

Guess this is as good an example there is of how "grown-up" doesn't always mean "adult" -- with particular credit to those good folks in the Senate working to protect their contributors' vested interests...gosh knows, they found a way to insinuate their own proclivities about safety and training into the FAA's rulemaking plans.

What a pity they couldn't accomplish as much to make the entire agency more functional and efficient.

But it's still unconscionable that the adults let the children drive the process off the runway end where, in the end, the agency's hopes of a workable, road-map-able authorization might come from two bodies with 535 grown-ups working -- particularly when it takes only one brat among the "upper" chamber known as the Senate to screw it up for the millions who fly or work in aviation.

-- Dave

Hello....DoT....anybody home...?...anyone...?

2010-07-02T15:35:00.003-04:00

Dear Secretary LaHood...

Did General Aviation do something to tick off DoT? Did somebody stop up the lavs at the Southeast Federal Center? Did one of us buzz New Jersey Ave. SE?

The question arises because once again, Mr. Secretary, DoT is demonstrating a disturbing tendency to treat commercial aviation as the only aviation -- that exists, that plays a role in America's economy, its well being and the movement of people and goods. Does an airplane have to be on a FAR 121 or 135 certificate to matter to DoT? Or is it that DoT staff can't read numbers below 100 -- as in FAR 91?

Sure looks like this is true. You've given us cause to carp before.

The last time you heard from me my complaint -- validated by the response of others -- came in mid-May in the form of a post to this blog observing how General Aviation was shortchanged (again) in representation on your Future of Aviation Advisory Committee. Knowing how much dumb stuff you have to read, you can refresh your memory about my comments here: http://ucap-podcast.blogspot.com/2010/05/shortchanged-again.html...we'll wait...OK...

Got it, Mr. Secretary? DoT short-sheeted GA in representation on this committee -- whose efforts we're just sure will be profound and far reaching, resulting in a new stack of paper to dust after shelving -- by appointing the head of a General Aviation manufacturer as the sole GA body, after naming multiple members from the airlines, airline unions, airline consulting and academia. No pilot group representation, no aircraft-owner or private-operator -- just one guy from a planemaker who just automatically will think in the same terms the rest of us support...right....

But, this is a new day and a new post about an old problem: Today, it's your department's five-year plan draft and DoT's seemingly willful refusal to acknowledge General Aviation as a transportation power and economic influence worthy of policy planning. Sucks, Mr. Secretary, just sucks how DoT again and again seems to act to ignore General Aviation...if you're getting any points, it should be only for consistency.

Now AOPA isn't exactly at the top of my fav's list these days, but in reviewing the salient materials the association's observation rings honest and accurate: "In its current form the (DoT) plan places more emphasis on travel by bicycle than on general aviation," AOPA President Craig Fuller wrote of the draft in a communication to you. You can catch up on this here:

http://www.aopa.org/advocacy/articles/2010/100701dot.html?WT.mc_id=ebrief

Five-thousand airports and not even 10 percent of them get airline service; half of those get Spartan, minimal, barely subsistence-level commercial service. Does anyone in your agency know or understand how the other 4,500-plus airports and their communities connect to the aviating outside world?

General Aviation, pure and simple.

General Aviation pilots flying General Aviation aircraft in and out of General Aviation airports...and connecting those communities to the rest of the world directly, hub-free and TSA compliant. Or is this the problem? The airlines haven't yet succeeded in suppressing General Aviation out of existence -- and out of competition -- so the DoT is helping my willfully ignoring it?

Without belaboring the nitty gritty details of how General Aviation would have to be invented -- if it hadn't come first, that is -- let me close with two questions:

First, regarding the Future of Aviation Advisory Committee, will DoT ever step up and correct the short-changed representations to something proportional to General Aviation's impact and influence? 'Cause right now, sir, it looks like you decided to just ignore the shortcoming and plow forward as if it will be meaningful anyway. Prove me wrong.

Second, will DoT similarly update this inadequate blueprint to something that recognizes a uniquely American institution, American General Aviation? Or will DoT continue to have eyes only for the Common Carriers?

Happy Independence Day Weekend, Mr. Secretary. Now, how about showing some independence and doing the right things for General Aviation?

Sorry -- guess that was three questions. You got the big office and the big title; prove me wrong -- please.

Respectfully,

Dave

I don't care...

2010-06-30T21:06:00.002-04:00

Here's a conversations which could have actually taken place between Jack and Jeb. (Warning: contains language that you'd never hear on our podcast.)

Anybody else notice...

2010-06-29T17:18:00.002-04:00

...how much more expensive AOPA "benefits" have become since Phil Boyer left? Well, after today it struck me that it's getting expensive to maintain both a basic membership and to sustain the previously-much-vaulted "Member Benefits" -- bennies for decades included in that $39.95/year membership.

The first change to catch my attention came in the form of the AOPA Medical Services Desk; for years, the advice and assistance of that desk's staff was a member benefit, all inclusive...now what's free is a basic Q&A service, mostly Web based, it seems, with links that still help people find an AME, check drug eligibility and such; but the complex stuff for which we generally need expert help to retain or restore medical certificates is only available through one of two levels of fee-for-service programs. Humm....OK...

What irked me first was the announcement making it sound like AOPA was creating this bold new effort on behalf of members...YEAH! Maybe they're making it better...

Knowing full well that such a benefit had long existed, it floored me, upon reading further, that this wonderful "new" program required more money: either "just $37 a year" for the base Essential Medical Services Program or, if I wanted the full-up Comprehensive Program it "is offered for $99."

OK...free before, a hundred bucks now...

Today it happened again. It came in my e-mail box, an AOPA invitation to reserve my print copy of "AOPA Airports." That thick, phone-book like document has had a place in flight bags for decades -- courtesy of AOPA's Member Benefits program that boasted how much more value existed in those benefits than the cost of membership. Ordering before a certain date assures me of "free shipping" -- but requires a member to also pony up $19.95 -- $39.95 for non-members...

OK, I understand that printing is expensive -- even on cheap phone-book-like paper; I understand that the product is now available in electronic form...that form will be cold comfort sitting somewhere with no electricity, no internet and no hard copy to leaf through looking for a better airport...and must admit, I'm not really a devotee of activating an electronic device for every question or need -- particularly when I'm traveling...I liked having a choice of how to receive my "Member Benefit"...now I have a choice between what's cheapest for the association and what's preferable to me -- for $19.95, shipping free if...yaddayaddayadda...

This trend is distressing.

Sorry, old AOPA Friends, but the appeal of belonging to this admirable association is shrinking; it remains justifiable for supporting AOPA advocacy; but embracing "member benefits" is getting too expensive to justify and another association is looking like a better place for my bucks.

What do you all think? Is "Pilot" magazine juicy enough for you to pony up the money for it alone (presuming print copies remain a "Member Benefit")? Do you maintain membership out of a sense of allegiance to the General Aviation Cause -- even if you seldom crack the magazine?

Is the luster of AOPA membership tarnishing under the seemingly increasing need for green? Let me know...makes me sort of curious about whether it's just the curmudgeon in me...

But right now, a line the actor John Vernon uttered in the movie "The Outlaw Jody Wales" is playing in my head -- a line about, well, legs and rain...and right now here in The Air Capital, the sky is clear...

-- Dave

Number One!

2010-05-29T20:44:00.001-04:00

Do a Google search for "General Aviation Podcast" and what's the first result on the list?

Check it out!

Shortchanged again?

2010-05-13T12:47:00.003-04:00

Dear Transportation Secretary Ray La Hood:

You know, with your background and credentials, having a real pilot back at the head of the FAA, you really gave a body hope that this Administration's approach to aviation would be more multilateral, if you will, than we've seen in the past. Presidential and Congressional misstatements denigrating the use of aircraft for business notwithstanding, the Administration seemed to take seriously the proposition that all aviation should be treated equally.

And then, today, the news flashes came pouring into my In Box, the stories covering your announcement of the membership of DoT's Future of Aviation Advisory Committee. Mr. Secretary, you've gypped General Aviation -- just like the string of prior DoTs and Presidential administrations. You don't seem to get "it."

If this was an election I'd be demanding a recount.

I do want a recount. You've got a panel of nearly 20 people. Filling one slot with a single GA representative -- and one predominantly tilted toward turbine-aircraft manufacturing -- makes it look to me like GA doesn't count.

And only a few days ago, NATA President Jim Coyne was commenting on how right now the FAA and TSA seem to recognize that "aviation" means more than "airlines". I felt so, too.

But this panel's make up makes me question my prior judgment -- and yours.

As much as I admire and respect Jack Pelton and his accomplishments at Cessna, to me his appointment to your committee represents that head-smacking moment when you realize you didn't invite an important relative to a family event -- the one who brings a major share to the event. "Oh, man, amid getting those half-dozen airline execs, the big-airports people, the airline-union folks and the academics, we almost forgot the token spot for general aviation...Say, how about that guy from Cessna...he'll appreciate the smell like kerosene like all the others...wouldn't want to leave out GA...Don't want people thinking we don't see anything else as important as airlines, do we?"

Well, it sure looks like that's the philosophy -- all airlines, all the time.

It doesn't have to be that way, Mr. Secretary. You could still tap people who represent the several hundred thousand American pilots who don't fly for the airlines, who fly for their own businesses, who actually own aircraft and patronize those thousands of airports that don't get kissed by the wheels of airliners.

You could still snag a people with real insights about the world beyond the Human Mailing Tube -- people from AOPA, EAA, NATA, NBAA. Who are they? Well, I know you know -- but for the guy reading this who'll clip it to your dailies, those are only the organizations who represent the majority of pilots flying the majority of the airplanes serving the majority of the airports and the majority of the Fortune 500.

You could even tap a couple of state aviation directors -- whatta concept! -- or even the head of the National Association of State Aviation Officials itself.

Why not? Is it because to you nothing counts unless the aviation is related to a San Diego or Port Authority of the Big-assed Apple, or mass air-transit companies? Don't the rest of us count?

How about the tens of thousands of pilots who fly solely for their own personal needs, family travel to business or to save the environment? How about those who fly only for fun?

You could appoint someone from the General Aviation Manufacturers Association or even the Light Aircraft Manufacturers Association. But your manufacturing membership qualifications seem to require that representative come from a planemaker making products designed to carry hundreds at a time or have a fleet average speed up in high Mach territory.

One guy directly involved in GA is insufficient, unacceptable and actually quite insulting.

It's short changing a huge spectrum of that which makes up America's best-ever invention -- aviation. Long before million-dollar CEOs started trying to squeeze a penny out of an olive on a revenue flight, there was General Aviation. When the airlines can't fly -- like across the Atlantic because of a volcano -- there's still a General Aviation world flying across that ocean.

Sorry to say, Mr. Secretary, but like so many of your predecessor, where the future of aviation is concerned you seem to see only air carriers or kerosene burners.

There's time to correct this insulting shortsightedness before your Advisory Committee meets for the first time later this month. How about adding a few to your panel to represent the concerns and hopes of the rest of us in aviation?

Otherwise, Mr. Secretary, I'm sorry to tell you: you blew it. And I'll not look at your tenure with as much optimism or confidence again.

Respectfully,

Dave Higdon
Wichita

Jack And Jeb's Excellent Adventure

2010-04-22T13:24:00.004-04:00

As regular listeners know, Jack has been at my house for a few days while attending Sun 'n Fun. (Dave Higdon was here for a while, too, and listener Luca Berta also is here while stranded because of the volcano.) Jack mentioned some time ago how he's never been in an Aeronca Champ. Since there happens to be one based here at my little residential airpark, I humbly asked its owner -- long-time pilot, instructor and examiner Dave Whitman -- to give him an intro ride. Dave responded with great enthusiasm and this morning did the deed.

Below are some images I took of the indoctrination, preflight, hand-propping and landing. Should be pretty self-explanatory...

That's Champ owner Dave Whitman on the right.

To my surprise, Dave offered me a ride, also. I've been in Champs before, but not this one.

Here's the landing, and the aftermath.

We both had a blast. Highly recommended as a way to blow out the cobwebs each morning after too many Leinies the night before.

Special thanks to Dave Whitman for making this happen, and to his daughter, Wendy (hotness = 11!) for running interference.

Jack and Jeb

An activist NTSB?

2010-04-19T21:47:00.004-04:00

A press release from the NTSB announces a three-day forum on "professionalism in aviation," beginning Tuesday, May 18, 2010.

"NTSB's investigations into the midair collision over the Hudson River last August, the crash of Colgan Air flight 3407 in February 2009, and the October 2009 Northwest pilots' overflight of their intended airport provided the impetus for this forum because all of them clearly demonstrated the hazards to aviation safety when pilots and air traffic controllers depart from standard operating procedures and established best practices," Hersman said. "During the forum, we will gather information on the screening, selection and training of pilots and controllers and methods to reinforce professionalism and excellence."

Do we really want a government agency -- especially one whose prime focus is safety at all costs -- suggesting to an an industry what is and is not professional?

Discuss.

Jeb

Aviation Journalism 101

2010-04-19T21:33:00.004-04:00

Comes now this piece on the Fox Business Channel's Web site, discussing the wisdom of and policy regarding carrying a large proportion of an organization's management on one flight. This is in the aftermath of the April 10 crash outside Smolensk, Russia, which killed many top leaders in the Polish government.

Conspicuously absent from the piece is any comment from the National Business Aviation Association (NBAA), the organization serving that industry segment.

The NBAA has many well-defined, suggested policies its member companies may adopt, one of which addresses carrying top management on a single airplane. Too bad FBC couldn't be bothered to to track down the industry experts for comment.

Jeb

For Sale: Great Airplane -- IFR!

2010-04-19T17:20:00.004-04:00

The advertisement continues thus:

"Low-time engine, great compressions, full IFR w/IFR Capable two-pound lead brick in panel..."

What? Lead Brick in Panel?? Any takers? Not even for the IFR-capable two-pound lead brick?

Shucks...thought so -- and not surprised. That lead-brick thought idea pops into my mind every time my eyeballs scan a used-plane ad mentioning its Loran-C navigator -- every time.

If you've no idea of the source of my irritation, take a moment now and scan this -- then come back...go ahead...we'll wait...

OK...you're back -- and you get it now, don't you...

For those who skipped their reading assignment, Loran C went away back in the first week of February, a victim of budget constraints, its own technological lethargy in the U.S. and the overwhelming predisposition toward GPS -- a navigation system with its own weaknesses and frailties...and now, no area-nav-type back-up.

So while we wait and hope for the folks at DHS, FAA, etc., to get behind advancing Loran into a suitable back-up system with an inherent resistance to frequency jamming, two things:

First, hope, pray, cross fingers that nothing takes out GPS -- which at this moment is suffering with problems with one of two WAAS satellites;

Second, stop telling me you've got a Loran-C in the panel -- please; it's as useless to our flying as a lead brick installed in the same slot -- and the brick at least takes less space and less power. Better still, pay someone to take it out and find a good reconditioned GPS for the panel -- at least it's got somebody talking to it with better hearing than a lead brick. The GPS should help you sell that plane better than a lead brick.

And if you can't do that, at least stop touting it in your ad...

amffn...

Dave

Under pressure

2010-04-15T14:20:00.001-04:00

I've refrained from posting on the April 10, 2010, crash of a Tupolev Tu-154 outside Smolensk, Russia, killing all aboard including Polish President Lech Kaczynski and his wife mainly because I've been busy with other stuff. Some thoughts:

1. The Russian investigation is continuing. The all-important data recorders have been formally turned over to Polish authorities.

2. Early word from, apparently, the cockpit voice recorder suggests there was no pressure from the passengers to get into the destination airport.

3. Air traffic control apparently warned the flightcrew about the weather.

4. The crash occurred on the flightcrew's fourth attempt to land. The Tu-154, a Soviet version of Boeing's venerable 727, contacted trees short of the runway and broke up.

This is a classic case of "getthereitis," a situation wherein there is pressure, real or imagined, to complete the flight to the preferred destination. While no one from the back of the plane may have told the cockpit to get into Smolensk, you can bet the crew felt some pressure to do so.

The airport at Smolensk reportedly does not have a precision instrument approach (ILS). Instead, the crew was flying an unspecified non-precision procedure, probably an NDB, given the location. Non-precision approaches are reliable when properly flown, but they're not designed nor intended to enable a landing when the airport is totally obscured by weather.

Lessons? None with which the aviation industry is not already familiar:

1. Don't succumb to pressure -- real or imagined -- to do something against your best judgment while in an airplane.

2. The time-honored practice of taking a look -- attempting an approach when the reported weather is below its minimum altitude, visibility or both -- is only a good choice if/when you have the discipline to fly the procedure and then evaluate the conditions you encountered and make an intelligent decision.

3. WRT to 2., no one knows at this time -- maybe the CVR/FDR readouts will shed light -- whether the crew saw enough of the airport environment to make additional attempts.

4. My rule of thumb: Taking a look is fine, as long as an honest evaluation of the results is made. If I screwed up the first approach and know what I did wrong and am positive I can fix it on the second attempt, I'll make a second attempt. If not, I'll go somewhere else. If I screw up the second attempt, I'll go somewhere else. Never are more than two bites at the apple appropriate.

There's simply no excuse for a professional flight crew -- which we have to assume this was, since it was flying seemingly the entire top echelon of the Polish government -- to make four attempts to land at this location.

A final thought: Never place all the important people on the same airplane at the same time.

Jeb

Great Southeast UCAP Meetup #2

2010-04-11T20:29:00.002-04:00

Uncontrolled Roadways

2010-04-11T20:26:00.000-04:00

After Saturday's Venice FL Meetup, the boys rolled out three of Jeb's motorcycles and went for a little ride.

Dave setup and took this pic. He calls it "Wild UCAP"

UCAP at Sun 'n Fun

2010-04-10T10:41:00.001-04:00

We'll be doing two regular episodes of the podcast while at Sun 'n Fun, and this year you'll be able to listen live as we record them.

Tuesday @ 6pm*
Sunday @ 10am*

You can listen to the podcast sessions, as well as ALL of Sun 'n Fun Radio's broadcast day, on the internet at http://liveatc.net/snf

* times are approximate, subject to things like the ending time of the daily airshow, and Jeb's ability to get up on Sunday morning.

Business Aircraft: A Brief Treatise on the Good, the Bad & the Ugly

2010-04-01T14:29:00.004-04:00

Consuming too much wire copy and short takes of news that come my way brings with it a near overload of information -- some of it actually useful and interesting for me, personally, professionally.

Such it was with a recent spate of stories with encouraging news about general aviation, both personal and business flying. Stabilizing prices for business-turbine aircraft, stronger sales of pre-owned, more people flying more hours, according to FAA's IFR numbers for business flying.

Love stuff like this, personally and professionally. Professionally, feels good to hear affirmation of what we can sense rumbling quietly in the firmament of flying. Hearing from more people interested, getting a sense that more are looking at buying their first airplane, something in the generic four-place piston-single range -- the biggest segment, numbers-wise.

Traveling with friends in a Citation Mustang recently reminded me of the wonders and convenience of all of general aviation, whether the personally piloted light-end jet, a corporate large-cabin bird or those simple, predominant piston singles.

AOPA and EAA extol the wonders and benefits of personal flying; NBAA accumulates a wealth of honest numbers about the time and, yes, cost efficiencies of putting company people on company company airplanes. And collectively the private aviation community can point out how the typical passengers on the typical business flight hails not from the boardroom but from the drawing board, technical-support warehouse or marketing bullpens.

Private airplanes even today help funnel supplies into disaster areas and rescue wounded from accident site; little airplane monitor our environment and help fight forest fires and catch crooks, and fly Mom, Dad and the kids to Gram and Gramps'.

Love seeing all this acknowledged and replayed with news that times are getting better.

After the hat-in-hand spectacle of The Big Three Detroit automakers before Congress in late 2008 helped transform a downturn into a drubbing, signs of reversal are choice.

These are the good things, the necessary things aircraft and their users should feel good about.

And then info on a different plane of business aviation comes onto the radar screen and the image that it planted in my brain is bad and the ugly -- rolled into one.

The story spoke of how recently a large bank declined to continue providing a top exec 120 hours of jet time per year, jet time apparently for personal use as opposed to business. Now giving aircraft access to key or otherwise qualified employees on their nickle doesn't strike me as a reputation spoiler when the involved staffer pays the freight -- in this case, that would have been just under $8,000 an hour. Cheap if you can afford it.

But the hours were a perk reportedly picked up by the company which, to add icing to this aeronautical slice of cake, also picked up the tax liability employees incur from such a perk. That's the bad.

This didn't play out in front of members of Congress; it didn't make the cable news stations -- yet those news outlets and many in business aviation know this sort of arrangement has been a routine aspect of compensation packages -- probably for as long as there have been business jets.

Even without the draw created by becoming front-page news, arrangements like this just plain make business aviation look suspect where it's otherwise legitimate.

Seems that some of these otherwise bright people, replete with degrees and accolades, would act smarter, make these arrangement unassailable for the company and the tool -- that business aircraft. But then comes the ugly -- the ramps full of company planes crowding airports in Louisville early next month and Indianapolis later in the month, as they did in Miami for Super Bowl and Daytona for, well, Daytona.

Too many users lack any hint of insight about the ugly with which they brush private aviation -- personal and business. That's not good.

Only we can overcome this degree of ugly, by remembering and reminding others of what's truly good about general aviation.

-- Dave

First...go back and read the first line of my last Blog posting...

2010-03-04T17:33:00.002-05:00

Yeah, yeah, yeah...we've heard. Some poor Controller at JFK brought the kids to the tower, coached them word-for-word and let them transmit hand-offs and departure instructions to departing flights...and yeah -- obviously, a couple of the planes flew for foreign carriers...yes, we know all that.

Now, Fox, MSNBC, ABC, everybody, hear this: This was a zero-threat act of a hard-working father trying to cope with a snow day or something...

It was not -- not, Not NOT! -- a threat to the nation's air-transportation system...the children were not managing or making traffic decisions, period. Dad told them, "say this, say that" and, wow, the children, with more articulate voices than some of the TV talking heads crying about this, repeated what Dad told them to say.

That's it, people. Oh, yeah -- Aero Mexico..."adios, Amigo..." You idiots obviously just discovered the ATC sites and don't know that a bit of friendly familiarity occurs between controllers and pilots who routinely, repeatedly talk to one another. And English is certainly a second language for many pilots of Foreign carriers..."Duh!" is not a strong-enough word for this one.

English is THE LANGUAGE of international ATC; that's why we pilots are all getting new licenses that show our English proficiency is demonstrated. Yes, international pilots actually have to demonstrate English proficiency.

Besides, the AeroMexico pilot sounded almost as young and American as the kids...certainly as good or better than Glenn Beck or George Stephanopolous...

Yes, Dad screwed up; so did a supervisor that let this continue...and they more than know that.

So please exhale -- the blue glow you TV people are giving off with your breathless inanity over this interferes with my ability to channel the Aliens laughing their antenna off listening to you folks milk this story for more than a grade-school lunch-room's month-of-March moo-juice allotment.

Geez...that feels better...

Dave

First, take a deep breath....

2010-02-18T15:11:00.002-05:00

Now, exhale and repeat.

Yes, we had a very unhappy person chose to take their life today in an act of suicide-by-airplane that, beyond that selfishness, attempted to make it a murder-suicide act. With one person still missing and two admitted to a Level One trauma center in Austin, Texas, site of this insanity, we do not yet know whether the apparent perpetrator indeed succeeded in that part of his plot.

Thanks to what apparently is a posting of his own accounting of his life leading to today's act, we feel comfortable offering what should be one obvious conclusion -- obvious largely because it's directly observable from the news footage: photographic proof that small airplanes are ineffective as tools of mass destruction or viable weapons against modern office buildings. That doesn't take away from the very real potential for loss of life and sundry other mayhem when airplanes crash into residential buildings; actual accidents earlier this week remind us clearly. But as a machine for repeating a Twin Towers-like attack, general aviation aircraft generally lack the mass, the velocity and the fuel capacity to remotely threaten damage on the level of a wide-body airliner flown beyond redline. Look at the images.

A couple of other points seem worth noting before the hyperventilating starts to make pundits hypoxic.

First, sadly, this event shows once again that people sometimes break under the lives they endure -- and in breaking decide to lash out against the world that they feel failed them. The apparent perpetrator's own words reinforce this. Read it for yourself:

http://www.statesman.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/austin/blotter/entries/2010/02/18/internet_note_posted_by_man_li.html

Second, nothing said or written or viewed today can change the awful fact that someone apparently employed a general-aviation aircraft to close out grievances, with horrible results for him and some of the IRS employees working in the federal building.

Today marks only the opening of this chapter. How long it will run remains to be seen; probably as long as it takes the popular press, the politicians and the conflict profiteers to run through their interest level -- or until something more horrendous bumps this off the news...whichever comes first.

But whatever comes of this, what should not come of this is renewal of misguided efforts to "secure" general aviation airports, aircraft and users. Unless someone can offer up a solution capable of preventing people from venturing over the edge -- something applicable to drivers and divers and bikers and boaters as well as pilots -- nothing could have stopped this guy.

Sadly, whether a lunchroom shooting, a mall mass murder, white guys blowing up a federal building, religious extremists assassinating doctors or bringing down airliners, or a lone frustrated citizen with a little airplane, society still lacks a tool to stop an individual determined to do harm.

It's impossible for me to put myself in this guy's shoes. And a few deep breaths to clear the mind makes dealing with this no clearer or easier. But the deep breathing does help focus the mind where it should. So let's keep the focus on the mind, not the machine; in this tragic affair, the mind behind the act is solely responsible, not the machine he chose to inflict his final statement.

With thoughts for the families of those touched by this in Austin,

Dave

Can I change one of my three airplane choices?

2010-02-03T21:43:00.004-05:00

I think a Dash Six on amphib floats would be just the thing...

(Image courtesy FlightAware.com)

UAV Recruiting Video

2010-01-25T11:30:00.002-05:00

Thanks Stephen Force, Airspeed Podcast

Photographic evidence!

2010-01-23T08:56:00.003-05:00

At the considerable risk of inflating Mr. Higdon's ego beyond its to-be-determined bursting point, I offer this photographic evidence supporting at least one reason to engage in personal aviation.

The image was taken in August 2009, in the pilot briefing room at the Henry Tift Myers Airport, Tifton, Georgia. Not coincidentally, this is the airport at which I learned to fly and still visit regularly. No; I had nothing to do with the sign, nor its placement.

Jeb

Definitions

2010-01-07T19:32:00.001-05:00

AIRSPEED - Speed of an airplane. (Deduct 25% when listening to a retired fighter pilot).

BANK - The folks who hold the lien on most pilots' exotic cars or their not-so-exotic airplanes.

CARBURETOR ICING - A phenomenon reported to the FAA by pilots immediately after they run out of gas.

CONE OF CONFUSION - An area about the size of New Jersey located near the final approach fix at an airport.

CRAB - A VFR Instructor's attitude on an IFR day.

DEAD RECKONING - You reckon correctly, or you are.

DESTINATION - Geographical location 30 minutes beyond the pilot's bladder saturation point.

ENGINE FAILURE - A condition that occurs when all fuel tanks mysteriously become filled with low-octane air.

FIREWALL - Section of the aircraft specifically designed to funnel heat and smoke into the cockpit.

FLIGHT FOLLOWING - USAF Formation flying

GLIDE DISTANCE - Half the distance from an airplane to the nearest emergency landing field.

HOBBS - An instrument which creates an emergency situation should it fail during dual instruction.

HYDROPLANE - An airplane designed to land long on a short and wet runway.

IFR - A method of flying by needle and horoscope.

LEAN MIXTURE - Nonalcoholic beer.

MINI MAG LITE - Device designed to support the AA battery industry.

NANOSECOND - Time delay between the Low Fuel Warning light and the onset of carburetor icing.

PARACHUTES - The two chutes in a Stearman.

PARASITIC DRAG - A pilot who bums a ride and complains about the service.

RANGE - Usually about 3 miles short of the destination.

RICH MIXTURE - What you order at another pilot's promotion party.

ROGER - Used when you're not sure what else to say.

SECTIONAL CHART - Any chart that ends 25 nm short of your destination.

SERVICE CEILING - Altitude at which cabin crew can serve drinks.

SPOILERS - FAA Inspectors.

STALL - Technique used to explain to the bank why your car payment is late.

STEEP BANKS - Banks that charge pilots more than 10% interest for their exotic car or not-so-exotic airplane loans.

TURN & BANK INDICATOR - An instrument largely ignored by pilots.

USEFUL LOAD - Volumetric capacity of the aircraft, disregarding weight.

VOR- Radio navigation aid, named after the VORtex effect on pilots trying to home in on it.

WAC CHART - Directions to the Army female barracks.

YANKEE - Any pilot who has to ask New Orleans tower to "Say again.

...and so we end another one...here's to the New One!

2009-12-30T12:21:00.004-05:00

So many days -- 365, by my count -- so many great things...so little time to relate the good, the bad and the ugly of 2009.

Let's dispose of the ugly stuff first: Lost a few of wonderful friends this year; closing in on my 60th, it occurs to me that this will happen more not less.

The airline industry -- well, they had their good times and bad times and for my friends flying the line or working anywhere else in the common-carrier community, here's hoping that the coming year treats you better than your employers.

The business-aircraft and personal-aircraft segments had a distinctly ugly, ugly year with sales and deliveries and backlogs all off at levels of breathtaking depth. Those uglies in turn made the year ugly for tens of thousands of our friends and neighbors and fellow pilots working in aircraft manufacturing, component and systems supplies, aircraft sales, FBO operations -- you name it, if it was part of general aviation, it suffered this year.

Thankfully, the shortcomings of our aviation security apparatus didn't result in any airborne terrorist acts succeeding. For that we should all be happy.

Now, for the bad stuff.

We saw too many good GA pilots do bad in 2009; the figures aren't in, but it would surprise me if we had a safer year in '09 than in '08 -- which, given the drop in flying, would seem logical. But even in the realm of the survivable, we had too many pilots seem to suspend logic and common sense -- not anybody in our little circle, of course -- and, thankfully, walk away.

Other bad stuff: a baseless vendetta against non air-carrier airports by Thomas Frank and the editorial board of U(seless)S(suckup)A(ssholes)Today...guys, in 30 years of journalism you've set a new standard for bad, biased reporting; show a little bit of honesty and put the Air Transportation Association logo on your masthead...and watch your step -- your lack of balance always means the you're stumbling is getting noticed by others...sadly drunks don't notice their stumbling until they fall...

Now for the good stuff.

We saw a steady stream of people interested in learning to fly and acting on the urge...no, we didn't set any records and doubt the numbers, when finally crunched, will show that we even stayed even in new pilots compared to 2008...but we're still viable.

Other good things?

Well, the continuing growth in acceptance of, and expansion by, the Light Sport Aircraft segment and the Sport Pilot license option. Even my most hardened Old Fart friends are slowly coming around to the idea that it's not a risk to society for them to fly something small and simple -- without a medical. Can others be far behind?

Another good thing: we didn't get TSA saving us from ourselves -- which would have been a minor miracle considering the bad rap the agency unfairly received for a thwarted terrorist attempt wholly beyond the agency's control...but not happy that the supposedly supportive anti-terrorism apparatchiks' failure to perform.

Other good things? The FAA made excellent progress on the process of building the infrastructure to advance NextGen. In the Gulf of Mexico, the ADS-B system is live, as it already was in Southern Florida and in the Ohio River Valley around Louisville International (SDF). The agency seems to making progress in plans to implement the changeover and progress in drafting new rules to facilitate the move to NexGen...and we saw, finally, standards in the form of TSOs that avionics makers need to certify, sell and install the hardware underpinning NextGen...

And still more good? How about surprisingly strong attendance at airshows and fly-in events this year -- excepting some of the more narrowly focused trade-type events, like NBAA, AOPA's Summit, Dubai and a couple of smaller ones.

Also good, the resurgent interest many communities have shown their small airports as a good thing; nice to read about airport saves in numbers that makes me wonder whether the pace of closures is finally slowing...we can all do more...it's only the places we need to travel by air, after all -- and all worthy of public support, just like highways, in spite of the ignoramuses at that aforementioned McNewspaper.

Finally, a personal favorite good: the continuing loyalty, support, encouragement and participation of our Uncontrolled Airspace listeners stands tallest in my look back.

Fifty-two weeks, 52 episodes? Can that be right? Seems like just last week that we finished Episode 115 on Jan. 6; and a couple of days ago we canned #166 recorded Dec. 29; from our appearances at Sun 'n Fun and AirVenture and Ponca City (yeah...I know...), through meet-ups in Lakeland and Oshkosh and Wichita, New Hampshire and Florida...well, you get the picture of the year.

To all of you, thanks for the support, the letters, shout-outs, visits, messages, beers and brats and best of times. And we're still around to try for another year.

So let's do it even better, safer and happier in 2010, eh.

Happy New Year to us all.

Dave

Season's Greetings to everyone -- no exceptions...

2009-12-25T13:11:00.002-05:00

Wichita -- Nothing like the sharp edge of powder snow powered by 40-knots plus to put a pilot in a holiday mood on Christmas Eve...the winds wiped clean paved surfaces exposed to its power, driving the white crystalline precipitation downwind to pile up on upright, upwind surfaces -- or to scream over an obstruction only to pile waist deep in the wind shadow behind the object.

The driven powder provided its own wind indication downwind of objects out in open fields, evidence of the power and direction visible for days in the future. These elongated triangles of bare ground pointed downwind thanks to rotor turbulence beyond the wind shadows that sucked up snow and carried it onward.

It was Christmas Eve. And the weather was making news as it was remaking travel plans.

And knowing well the storm's likely impact on the waves of weather-challenged drivers -- not to mention the Human Mailing Tube fleets as well as on generally more-human aviation conveyances -- the decision came easily to make an early grocery run for holiday indulgences. The Weather Channel folks kept up a steady patter about the week's second major maelstrom of winter weather, one which let folks in the middle states experience much of what the Eastern Seaboard endured the weekend before.

Other than moving up my visit to the store, the weather little influenced plans for me.

No way anything under my command would fly anywhere on the Christmas Eve, and knowing that early made it easy to turn my thoughts and communiques to loved ones and friends, both nearby and distant, sharing snippets of plans, small talk about our success in evading Mall Madness throughout the season -- and the usual banter of pilots who think common thoughts of the pilots and passengers unwillingly plagued by Mother Nature's insistence that a White Christmas come to as much as the country as possible.

So it came to be, with Christmas Eve and Christmas Day across the middle and much of the eastern U.S., enjoying either fresh snow's clean sparkle or enduring the gray morass of old snow seasoned with salt and petroleum exhaust. Mother Nature will out.

That means some of us missed out on planned visits, some got part-way there, and others sat stuck on the flip side. But no matter where we landed, if in fact we lifted off at all, it's always warming and inspiring to know of so many people of so many different faiths recognizing that a shared spirit can make a holiday among all their own holly days.

Our friends who don't fly never get to experience the wonder of soaring over a winter landscape, seeing the sunrise cruising above golden plains, or watching a sunset into a vast ocean while approaching from the east. For me and many others similarly afflicted, getting airborne feels like a gift every time, even on those days when the "gift" is one we'd otherwise return to the store.

Makes me feel like every gift is a flight which can be balanced only by passing on the gift to others, to pass on the gift, if you will, as often and as well as possible.

So Merry, Happy, Ho-Ho, to friends and fellow flyers, for strangers and friends not yet met: the best of wishes for you and yours, for health, happiness and harmony.

To smoother skies and perpetual tailwinds in the New Year.

And a heartfelt "Thank you!" for making us a part of your aviation life.

-- Dave

Over the river...and over the woods...and over and over...

2009-11-27T11:50:00.004-05:00

Took a few minutes Thursday to grab a look at my favorite flight-watching web site and watched in amazement at the hundreds of dotted lines drawn across the Continental U.S...and it gave me a moment's pause to reflect on the value of our airplanes and of aviation to the nation -- and the sacrifices of those who labor in aviation at levels where flying's 24-hours-a-day, 365-days-a-year nature comes into play.

For each of those dotted lines edging its way across the map at least one pilot was at work employing great skills and well-learned knowledge to take safely to their destinations the charges in the plane.

For each of those dotted lines, someone somewhere helped prep the flight with fuel, maybe a tow or hangar removal.

Unseen on my screen was a cadre of aviation professionals at work managing those hundreds and hundreds of flights with air-traffic control services, in towers and TRACONs and Centers spending part of their Thanksgiving watching their own screens so that others could safely transit the nation.

Unseen on my screen was the workforce of our Flight Service, the contractor's employees who strive to provide a public service from a for-profit company that tries to balance the interests of its customers with those of its shareholders -- most of whom probably don't even know the company is in this business.

Also unseen, but well known from experience, was the thousands of faces wet with the tears of joy at the sight of family and friends delivered safely through the skies to experience Thanksgiving with them, of children and parents, husbands and wives and brothers and sisters and cousins and in-laws, many of them like my friends, who used their winged machines, their skills and privileges to travel to them and enjoy the glow and warmth of family and friends gathered for the holidays.

And in four more weeks the process will repeat itself with one friend flying off to see his children, another fetching parents and child to unite at a common location, and still another winging off to deliver gifts to far flung children with little to look for over the holidays save the late-night visit of an old, bold pilot bearing the ultimate gift of unselfishness and generosity.

To all in the system, to all who used it or worked it and made it happen, hope yours was a great Thanksgiving. For you, to you, our thanks.

And to all our great listeners, however you spent your holiday weekend, here's my note of thanks for you and for living in a world that lets us enjoy the freedom of flight like no other civilization in history.

-- Dave

KASH Meetup

2009-11-23T09:47:00.003-05:00

On six days notice we still managed to get 11 people to our Saturday morning brunch at Nashua NH's KASH.

One of the attendees came in his nordo/no-electical-system Cub. Here's a video of him hand-propping and departing.

Thanks to all who came out. It was great to meet you all.

-- Jack

(Thanks to listener rfelty for the pic and the video.)

Episode 160, then 159

2009-11-14T19:37:00.001-05:00

Don't Panic!

I just posted Episode #160.

Now I know that I haven't yet posted 159. It's coming. I'm relatively certain that this isn't about to become another #104 situation. #159 will be along real-soon-now.

Veterans Day: The Living Memorial

2009-11-11T11:07:00.003-05:00

Shared an adult libation recently with a good friend, a former combat pilot who flew WWII and Korea, and another good fellow who served as an air controller in the latter conflict. The subject of the moment centered in some of the military memorials they visited on different swings around the country: The D-Day Museum, as it was originally called, in New Orleans; the WWI institution in Kansas City; the WWII Memorial and Vietnam wall in D.C.

Great places, those and others too numerous to recount. But it seemed to me that, and this was my words to them: "You can see the greatest memorial to our veterans every day, without leaving your hometown, in the nation around you, the citizens here and the hope and promise still represented by our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution."

We are the embodiment of what our service women and men have fought to protect, a living, breathing memorial to the successes of their service.

Hundreds of millions of living memorials, their homes, their jobs and businesses, their lives and freedoms, memorialized daily in their abilities to go about their daily lives and benefit from the liberties promised by those ingenious documents and won by the blood, sweat, tears and lives of the women and men who served to assure it all continues.

From the Revolutionary War to Iraq and Afghanistan, rather than reuse a word getting threadbare with use and try to label every one a hero, let me raise my toast with a greater word and thank them as true patriots -- patriots willing to serve, whether in a rifle company or a supply unit, whether on the front lines of a war with no lines, or in the support offices back in the States.

As the events of the last week so tragically demonstrated, all can be in harms way on any given day. We can, it seems to me, honor them best by remembering the ideals of our nation, by living and supporting those beliefs, by working toward the common good and the guarantee that we all benefit and enjoy those promises.

Those of us who do not -- those who act to impose their own view of America on those who disagree, to those who would enforce one narrow view of the world or their beliefs on others with different visions of the same freedoms -- dishonor the efforts of those who served and they deserve none of what they receive, least of all any label approaching "patriot."

To the True Patriots among us, those who serve and those who serve to support the promise of our nation, one and all of us, and the living memorials that are America's citizens and the country they endow: Thank you all.

-- Dave

Terry Fowler 1959 - 2009

2009-10-25T14:16:00.005-04:00

Dear Friends,

It is with the greatest sadness that I share news of the passing of our friend Terry Fowler, Co-Chair of Sun 'n Fun Radio. Terry passed away this afternoon (Saturday, October 24) after a long battle with Leukemia. He was 50 years old. Final arrangements have yet to be made, I will pass on them as soon as possible.

Sun 'n Fun Radio would not be what it is today without Terry. His love of Sun 'n Fun and dedication to SnF Radio made it the success it is. He helped implement nearly all the technological advancements we've made and helped shape radio policies & procedures.

We will miss Terry, his smile & infectious love of aviation immensely.

Dave Shallbetter
Chairman, SnF Radio

UPDATE from Terry's family:

At his request a family only service will be held at graveside. In lieu of flowers, the family request donations be made to sun-n-fun.org. The Sun-n-Fun Fly-In was one of the happiest weeks of his life because he was around airplanes and friends; the American Cancer Society (Hope Lodge) 2121 SW 16th Street, Gainesville, FL 32608, which provided him with a home away from home during his treatments; to Amy Misakonis and her team who are running a marathon to raise money to help individuals with blood cancers (http://pages.teamintraining.org/cfl/DMG10/amisakonis); Spacecoast Feline Network, P.O. Box 624, Cocoa FL 32923; or a charity of your choice.

A celebration of life will be held at a later date. To contact the family please email them at Terry.Fowler@crashanddash.us

I had mentioned to Dave that I will do something at next year's Fly-In because it will be easier on people than having to travel.

As you know Terry was diagnosed on opening day of the Fly-In this year. I will never forget that morning. When the Dr. came in with the results Terry was thinking "a couple of pills or a shot and I will be out of here so I can get to Sun-n-Fun.

Autumn arrives on the soft ruffle of shuffling leaves...

2009-09-22T15:57:00.003-04:00

Sept. 22, 5:18 p.m. EDT; 2118 Zulu...Fall officially arrives...The Almanac

Unofficial prediction from this weekend's fortune cookie: "Your world will be soon filled with flights of fancy and sights of joy..."

How's that for a knowledgeable cookie fortune?

Few times of the year hold more appeal for flying than Fall -- for all types of flying...personal, business, recreational, commercial...well, maybe not that last one...

The days' temperatures become ever-more temperate trending toward actually cool and ultimately arriving at actually cold. Our landscape seems like a wild changeling creature, departing the verdant greens of Summer and shifting softly through the color wheel of Autumn before arriving at the stark contrasty conclusion of trees laid bare against the Earth.

The on-and-off-again appearance of snow and ice at northern latitudes and the dull desert flatscape of western longitudes makes the passing of the Autumnal Equinox a barely detectable transition save for the words of astronomers and the shedding leaves of the deciduous trees.

While the shortening days become evermore detectable and the bands of colors wave across the continent week by week until we arrive at the Winter Solstice, the quality of flying across the landscape becomes an evermore appealing act.

To watch the leaves change from aloft, to relish in the smoother skies of cooler days, to anticipate that first white blanket of soft chilled fluff makes the shorter daylight opportunities more valuable with each passing day.

And thinking ahead to the aura of a moonlight flight across a snow-cloaked landscape draws me back to passages past, when the soft yellow glow of our only natural satellite gave the landscape below a texture and glow singular in its beauty.

So here's to the Fall flying ahead, to the challenges, yes, and to the wonders, most definitely.

With a nod to music that Fall always sends me back to, a few lines from the Moody Blues album "Threshold of a Dream," a piece of spoken-word performance called simply, "The Dream."

"When the White Eagle of the north is flying overhead,
And the browns, reds and golds of autumn lie in gutter dead,
Remember then, the summer birds with wings of fire flaying,
Come to witness spring's new hope, born of leaves decaying."

And as new life will come from death,
Love will come at leisure.
Love of love, love of life and giving without measure,
Gives in return a wondrous yearn for promise almost seen.
Live hand in hand and together we'll stand,
On the threshold of a dream."

Welcome to Fall flying, my flying friends...enjoy it while you can...and then, do it again.

-- Dave

A latter-day Wright passes...but his wings live on...

2009-09-10T12:03:00.002-04:00

A quiet, humble, happy aviator passed Sept. 1, and outside a small circle of family, friends and admirers, the news generated less notice than was proportional to his impact on today's flying.

But I seriously doubt that Francis Rogallo would have been upset. He knew the impact of his most-important work -- work done in partnership with his wife Gertrude -- because he retired to a center of flying for the machines spawned by the effort: Kitty Hawk, where for decades now pilots have brought their Rogallo Wing hang gliders to soar the on-shore winds deflected off the dunes at the same spot where the Wright Brothers taught themselves to soar those same sand ridges.

Francis and Gertrude moved to the Outter Banks after he retired from active work -- which included engineering and design work in the 1930s and 1940s for the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics and again in the 1950s for that agency's successor, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

The couple, working in their home, designed, prototyped and flew in their own wind tunnels a flexible, frameless wing that held potential as a personal flying machine and as a recovery and load-carrying wing.

NACA wasn't particularly interested and, patent in hand, the Rogallos worked further on their invention -- one of about 25 inventions for which Francis held patents.

Jump ahead a decade or so to the Soviet Union's launch of Sputnik and suddenly America was interested in everything it could find to help it catch up in the Space Race. NASA approached Francis and the couple released the patent to NASA for use as a remotely piloted vehicle platform and aerial recovery machine.

Rogallo recovery devices like the Parasev were built and tested to altitudes as high as 200,000 feet and speeds to Mach 3.0, for potential use recovering capsules and rocket boosters...A combination Rogallo wing and Jeep like vehicle called the Fleep was flown by remote control and in ways was a predecessor to today's Trikes, a combination of a Rogallo wing and a powered chair.

Astronaut Frank Swigert, later to become one of the crew of the ill-fated Apollo 13, flew a full-size Gemini capsul to a soft landing under a Rogallo "parawing" design. Ultimately, NASA decided on ocean splashdowns under conventional round parachutes and Rogallo's NASA work was shelved.

But Rogallo's frameless flexwing design was still headed for greatness when, after a magazine article detailed the NASA research flying of them, tinkerers and backyard aeronautical engineers embarked on their own quests to transform the basic delta-wing design into a personal flying machine.

And thus hang gliding was ultimately born. Tens of thousands of people who craved access to the air helped drive hang gliding to a level of popularity in the 1970s that inspired dozens fo manufacturers and scores of schools. Though the boom flattened and the population declined, the movement never gave out and remains a singular way to fly even today, thanks to ground- and aerial-tow launching, as well as mountain-top and, of course, sand-dune soaring.

Decades later, a small, dedicated cadre of pilots around the world still carve their way silently through the skies suspended beneath the descendants of Francis and Gertrude's original design.

From flat kits to ground skimmers to sophisticated soaring machines capable of staying aloft for hours and covering hundreds of miles, today's machines still bear the fundamental elements of the originals.

My entry into aviation was due to the Rogallo wing and my first 300 hours were accumlated under a wing only slightly evolved from the original. My first powered flying came in a hang-glider trike powered by a small two-cylinder two-stroke engine.

More than 30 years later, when my mind turns to thoughts of my favorite flying, hang gliding at Jockey's Ridge often comes to mind -- or Lookout Mountain, Grandfather Mountain of the old East Cliff near my Indiana hometown.

It was there at Kitty Hawk that some 26 years ago my good fortune allowed me an encounter with an eldery gentleman setting up his wing to make some flights at the park near Kitty Hawk. The winds had been with me that day and the gentleman came out to fly after seeing me carve elongated figure 8s above the dunes for nearly an hour -- a long, rare flight at that site.

He accepted my offer of help on his launch and off he went, climbing slightly, turning parallel to the dunes and soaring for several minutes...then he landed and started back up the dunes. His older-generation wing differed considerably from mine and he asked a number of questions, inquiring about the double-surface, the hinged crossbar and the variable geometry system of the wing. It needed bigger air to soar than mine, so his flights ended more quickly when the winds abated.

But he was happy with his short stints aloft and seemed to care little about setting any records. He just enjoyed the experience of floating in the air, with only the sounds of the wind over the wing as background noise.

After his second flight, he started to tear down, thanked me for my help and introduced himself as, simply, "Francis." Unknown to him, I knew who he was the instant I saw him. Politeness and courtesy restrained me from acting like a kid meeting Santa for the first time.

But watching Mr. Rogallo lug his wing back to his car left me wanting to pour out the questions built up in my brain: what inspired the idea? did you ever think that your work would launch an entirely new era of personal flying?

Would you like to try my wing?

But he seemed perfectly at home there and fine being just another one of the local pilots priviledged to live at and fly above the dunes where the Wright Brothers taught themselves to fly. He did acknowledge the thrill of his flying, his personal high point, when he talked briefly about the joy he felt when he first soared long enough to break the Wrights' personal best in one of their gliders at the dunes: 8 minutes.

Eight minutes. I knew exactly how he felt, since the same joy swelled in my chest the first time the winds on the dunes lifted me high enough to make a 360-degree turn -- and let me look back at the Wrights Brothers Monument a few miles to the north.

His work and that of Gertrude lives on today and we can safely credit the evolution of hang gliders into ultralights to that same groundbreaking work.

In fact, it was better than groundbreaking -- it was skybreaking.

In memory of all you gave us, Francis, I hope you're soaring some great dune in the sky, where the winds stop only when you're ready for a break.

I, for one, will never forget our brief meeting or the lifetime in aviation your work gave me. You will be remembered forever as the Father of Hang Gliding and a Pioneer in Personal Aviation.

Thanks, Francis and Gertrude.

-- Dave

Thoughts on our fellow flyers on Labor Day

2009-09-07T11:00:00.002-04:00

Sometimes we seem to take for granted the luxury of our end-of-summer holiday, our last long-weekend opportunity until Thanksgiving and one that comes while the weather is still good enough to enjoy pretty much anything we want to pursue...save for skiing, maybe...

But the occasion is more than an excuse for some extra discount shopping, one last getaway to the campground or even a short holiday trip via private plane.

This holiday, helped into existence by a then more-influential Labor Movement is a reminder of all those people who labor to serve their fellow citizens in all arenas -- blue collar, white collar, no collar. Like the phenominon of "the weekend" itself, this three-day variant actually has many parents, from those in organized Labor to those with religious motivations and others with social consciousness about giving people time with their families.

Remember, it wasn't too long ago when "weekends" didn't exist as a two-day break from the labors of paying bills and feeding families -- let alone holidays tacked on to the now-traditional two-day weekend to give us and our families three-day breaks like this one.

So in light of these facts, it's particularly worth remembering our fellow citizens for whom today -- and Labor Day Weekend -- are nothing different from the rest of the 365 days on the calendar.

Today, airline pilots and their flight attendants in the main cabin are working -- as are cargo flyers, search-and-rescue aviators, aero-medical crew, law-enforcement flyers, as well as ramp crew to service our aircraft when we stop at the FBOs on our Labor Day Weekend flights, stand-by mechanics and, of course, those fine folks staffing the towers and tracons and en route centers, the flight service-station network, weather observation stations and the staff who maintain the equipment that makes their work possible.

All these jobs are staffed and operating or standing by to help the rest of us along in our holiday-weekend pursuits, to help us when we're lost or hurt or just need a few gallons of fuel, a crew car of some air in the tires. All these folks are missing out on part of the joy of this end-of-summer fete' and away from families and friends who miss their participation.

So here's a thought for the day or the week: Take a moment, if you cross paths with any of them, look 'em in the eye and say, "Thanks. I appreciate you being here and working today." And if the opportunity arises, buy 'em a cup of coffee or a soda, shake their hands and leave it at that.

There's no doubt in my mind, they will appreciate your comments and your offer.

Happy Labor Day to us all.

-- Dave

Unprecedented -- and irrefutably necessary...

2009-08-20T11:36:00.003-04:00

It happened Monday, after a weekend of dueling press releases and press conferences -- and in 30 years of covering aviation, it struck me as absolutely unprecedented. And it was, according to contacts in and out of the National Transportation Safety Board.

Monday, following equally unprecedented public rejection of preliminary information from the NTSB investigation of the Hudson River mid-air, the NTSB ejected the National Air Traffic Controllers Association from its role as a "party" to the investigation. Sadly, by the time the dust settled and the ejection was past, the NTSB corrected some badly portrayed information in its press release from Friday, Aug. 14.

It happened this way: the NTSB release in effect said a controller who had handed off the Piper Saratoga should have seen and warned that pilot of dangerous potential traffic conflicts ahead of him; NATCA strongly disagreed with the portrayal, issued its own release and called a press conference to make its case -- all outside of the NTSB rules and the agreed-upon process. NTSB staff next reminded NATCA of its obligation and its responsibilities but on Monday, NATCA officials repeated the process with another press release and press briefing in effect ratcheting up the dispute.

So the NTSB pulled the plug on NATCA's participation. And then the board clarified its report to note that the controller in question could not have seen the threatening traffic. But, again sadly, the damage was done for this inquiry.

My observation of "sadly" comes because that sort of correction is not unprecedented in an accident investigation of this type and now NATCA's knowledge and voice will be missing from the remainder of the inquiry. As one contact, a former special assisant to a board member told me Monday, every one who agrees to serve as a party to an investigation -- from the airframe and engine representatives to the maintenance and ATC reps -- is briefed on their role, has the rules explained, and signs an agreement to let the NTSB be the source of all public info released during the investigative process.

When disputes happen -- and they happen regularly within investigations, my contact confirmed -- the drill is to handle them within the context of the team and the NTSB process.

During a period of my career when covering the Safety Board was a regular part of my beat, the NTSB was always forthcoming with what it could safely say it knew and unwilling under any circumstances to engage in conjecture or hypotheticals; the participants, the "parties" worked as groups, weighed evidence and information, and generally came to a consensus that moved forward toward a final report and probable cause. Sometimes, rarely, information was poorly worded, or misinterpreted between the field and a press officers who handled the media; sometimes the information changed as new evidence came to light. And the ever-present "eye-witness accounts" so attractive to the media often ebbed and flowed with theories and explanations -- most of which eventually proved incorrect and the board in time disposed.

Overall, the process has generally worked well and served the public interest in improving safety. That's how the process is designed to work; that's how it's worked, effectively, for the more than four decades since the board's creation.

Imagine, for a moment, how different these decades of excellent -- not perfect, but damned good -- investigative work would be received if every party headed out on its own and issued its own interpretation of evidence and information...imagine how difficult it would be to establish even a hint of credibility about the results, if every party could offer its own self-oriented spin on the information.

NATCA is coming off a period in which its membership struggled under an FAA management that refused to engage in meaningful exchanges about important issues; the controllers union did great service to its membership and the public in taking on some of the foibles of the past FAA management. Now it has new management and new progress at the FAA.

But it appears that NATCA's staff fell into old habits and confused the NTSB for the FAA in taking public a solvable dispute. It's paid the price in the NTSB's decision to protect and secure the integrity of its investigative process.

And that's how it should be. Hopefully, when the next sad occassion requires the participation of NATCA as a party to an investigation, it won't make the same error of judgement and it will make clear to the safety board that it now understand the process and its responsibilities.

-- Dave

Oshkosh 2009 Highlights

2009-08-09T13:11:00.003-04:00

Really nice video of highlights from AirVenture Oshkosh 2009. Not from EAA but from an attendee. Another example of all the personal media that came out of this year's fly-in.

They flew in, they flew out -- and in between they, and time, flew, too...

2009-08-04T17:52:00.003-04:00

Whatta week, whatta hoot, whatta blast.

Sitting back in my office in Wichita, it's difficult to conceive that Oshkosh 2009 is over...it's over, I'm out.

So much fun, so much flying, so many old friends, so many new...and so great to see so many of you great folks there...and so great hearing from so many who couldn't make the trek.

The sense of melancholy that accompanies last-day coffee always surprises me a bit, knowing that just a few days earlier it felt like it would never end and continue through an eternity of aviating and air-show living...

Not suggesting that such an eternity wouldn't be a lot like heaven...but would expect the porta-potties to be, well, a bit more upscale.

To all who said "Hi," or pinged their greetings, thanks. You became a higher point in what was already for me the high point of any year.

To those who didn't make it or pay attention, "Hello! Here's next year's dates: July 26-Aug. 1..."

The best time to start planning for next year's Oshkosh is the day after the last one.

Be looking for ya!

Clear!

Dave

Mission Accomplished!

2009-08-03T09:04:00.001-04:00

UCAP Meetups at Oshkosh

2009-07-30T14:13:00.005-04:00

We had our second meetup last night at a local food&beverage place called Friar Tucks.

About 15 people in attendance, counting Dave, Jeb and me. Had a great time.

Spent about a half hour in the bar waiting for our table, then gathered around three tables all pulled together.

Lots of good conversation, making new friends. Hangar, err, restaurant flying.

JimG was taking pics. I'll post a link to them when able.

Big Thanks to our Listeners

2009-07-30T09:16:00.003-04:00

We usually don't make a big deal about audience size. As a rule we're pretty happy that there's even a couple of people listening.

But I'm pleased to report that, as of this morning, July 2009 has become the best month ever for downloads of UCAP podcasts.

Thanks to everyone who listens.

Predator UAV at OSH Behind the Scenes

2009-07-28T12:22:00.002-04:00

EAA produced video.

Recording UCAP #146 at Oshkosh

2009-07-28T07:39:00.002-04:00

Photo by Phil Weston.

Oshkosh Pics

2009-07-25T18:31:00.002-04:00

I've posted some early pics from AirVenture Oshkosh 2009.

Good Morning from Oshkosh

2009-07-24T10:49:00.002-04:00

Today is my first full day here in Oshkosh for AirVenture 2009.

Although there's a lot of activity around the field it's nothing compared to what is to come.

Exhibitors are setting up all over the field, in the new and old exhibits areas. A handful of attendee airplanes have already arrived, but the North 40 parking areas are still mostly empty grass. That will change very soon.

As EAA has been telling us all winter, there are some notable changes to the grounds. More on that as the week progresses, but I can attest to the fact that the grounds have seen more year-to-year change than I've seen in over 10 years. Not since the arrival of the big exhibit hangars and the permanent Forum buildings, have we seen this much change from one year to the next.

One area that is already hopping is Camp Scholler, which, as usual for this time, has lot and lots of people already set up.

Dave is in town, we met up with some OSH friends and ate at the legendary Ardy & Ed's last night. Jeb was here long enough to drop of Dave Allen, then he headed off on a secret mission which we hope to hear more about real-soon-now.

More later.

Clueless In Paris

2009-07-15T19:00:00.004-04:00

France's equivalent to the NTSB--the Bureau d'Enquetes et d'Analyses, or BEA--on July 2 released its interim report on the loss of Air France Flight 447, an Airbus A330 that crashed into the equatorial Atlantic Ocean early on the morning of June 1. To geeks like me who pore over these things, the interim report is extremely valuable in assembling and organizing in one place many--but not all--of the known facts about this tragedy. It is not, however, a final report and does not state a probable cause for the accident. Its initial findings and some of its details, however, are important. Just as important? The interim report highlights how clueless officials are in understanding what went wrong and how it might be prevented in the future.

Primary evidence thus far comes from a series of ACARS (aircraft communications addressing and reporting system) messages, the few bits of found wreckage and the condition of recovered bodies. Using those resources alone and trying to determine why a modern transport operated by a world-class carrier crashed into the ocean isn't for the faint of heart. Until the cockpit voice and flight data recorders (CVR/FDR) are found, investigators have very little with which to work. Still, in reviewing the interim report, I'm struck by what's in it, as well as by its omissions.

For example, the BEA's English-version interim report uses four pages to explore the miscommunication between Brazil, Senegal and other nations' ATC systems--plus Air France's Operations Coordination Centre--and resulting delay in determining the flight's status and launching initial search and rescue efforts. While relevant to ATC coordination issues someone may wish to address soon, that material doesn't explain the crash sequence.

Similarly, the interim report notes, at "this stage of the investigation, the BEA has not yet had access to the autopsy data" resulting from examination of passenger and crew bodies found so far. Why? One source points out the autopsies are being conducted by Brazil, and France has not yet formally asked for the data. Another points out it's likely some portions of the interim report likely were prepared in the days leading up to its release, and not all statements in it were current at publication. This and other comments by BEA continue what many observers, including me, consider a disturbing trend by the French to minimize Brazil's knowledge, expertise and efforts.

To its credit, however, the BEA goes into great detail on the ACARS messages received in the flight's last few minutes, their timing and their relative significance. Thankfully, one of those messages is a routine position report, one placing the flight slightly left of course at which is widely believed to be the beginning of the accident sequence. The 23 other ACARS messages detail warnings and faults the crew experienced. As the BEA states, "At least one of them corresponds to an inconsistency in the speed measurements," meaning the crew and the airplane's automation were unsure of its airspeed.

The interim report notes at least three ACARS messages have yet to be fully interpreted: "This message has not been fully explained at this stage of the investigation." Why these messages have not been interpreted is anyone's guess; it would be appropriate for the BEA to say why they're not explained and to publish the explanation when it's available.

The interim report also details some of the conditions experienced by three other airliner crews flying through the area at roughly the same time. Significantly, all three crews elected to avoid the convective weather Flight 447 apparently entered.

Nevertheless, the BEA indicated it is focusing on erroneous airspeed indications as a precipitating event. The BEA has asked "Airbus, the NTSB, IATA, the DGAC and all French operators" for data on any incidents "during which a loss or inconsistency of speed indications was observed or reported by the crew" while in cruise.

Initial findings from the interim report help us understand the BEA's future efforts. Noting the wreckage found so far "consists mainly of light items" from within the cabin, plus some external parts of the plane and secondary control surfaces, the BEA concludes "identified debris thus comes from all the areas of the plane." In particular, the vertical stabilizer's damage indicates it broke off from the fuselage "during a forward motion with a slight twisting component towards the left."

The BEA's final initial finding states, "visual examination showed that the airplane was not destroyed in flight; it appears to have struck the surface of the sea in a straight line with high vertical acceleration." The translation from French is a bit awkward but this phrase is taken to mean the aircraft hit the ocean in a relatively level attitude, and at a high rate of descent with relatively little forward motion.

Unless the CVR/FDR are located, retrieved and their data analyzed, the few clues gleaned so far won't tell us much. We may never know exactly why the crew decided to enter weather everyone else was avoiding, why there were erroneous airspeed indications and how the airplane ended up hitting the water in a high descent rate. Like the rest of us, the BEA is clueless.

-- Jeb Burnside

The foregoing appears in the August 2009 issue of Aviation Safety, the monthly journal of risk management and accident prevention.

Notes from Independence Day...

2009-07-05T13:03:00.003-04:00

The staff at the Jayhawk Wing Hangar consisted of just one before my arrival. At a table inside the hangar at Dead Cow International Airport Commemorative Air Force Col. Mike Flynn prepared the Wing's Fairchild PT-23 for an Independence Day appearance at Newton City County Airport.

Twenty-five miles away at EWK members of EAA Chapter 88 prepared for their annual Independence Day Fly-In; these great folks volunteered their Fourth of July to this event, some to prep pancake batter and all the trimmings and gather the ingredients for the charcoal-coooked burgers and hot dogs coming for lunch, while other went about the business of preparing the grounds and ramps for the impending arrival of dozens of planes, scores more fly-in visitors and hundreds of citizen visitors eager to spend a mild Saturday morning experiencing a typical mix of the humanity of aviation.

A few miles to the west on a private grass strip a group of vintage-aviation aficionados prepared to serve up a few hundred freshly flipped flapjacks to the flock of flyers already winging toward the smell of hotcakes and hot ham.

As Col. Mike completed his pre-flight work, another Dead Cow denizen arrived a bit belatedly, Ben. After enduring a bit of good-natured ribbing, Ben, Col. Mike and I joined to roll the PT -- "Miss Mickey" -- from her home and onto the ramp; Ben showed me how to help and together we next tackled rolling his recently restored Cessna 195 from her shelter.

Across the nation other aviators and their families took a tact a little different than those millions starting their day in anticipation of lake swims and campfire cook-out to come, while children of even advanced ages anxiously awaited the fireworks in the forecast.

Like thousands of others across the nation these two airplanes and three pilots joined in a celebration of our freedoms by exercising the flying privileges those freedoms allow.

First, the airplanes from Dead Cow dropped in on that early morning pancake breakfast hosted by the local Vintage Aircraft folks and the owner of the 2,450-foot private grass strip where we landed. When pilots utter the words, "Grass Roots Aviation," this strip and that morning gathering covered the image to a T.

That breakfast visit lead to an invitation to us in the C-195 to fly "top cover" for an Independence Day parade at a nearby small town. In the company of eight other aircraft -- two of them Stearman with smoke systems working -- flew two passes up the parade route.

None in these nine cockpits needed to hear any cheers; drawing cheers never occurred to anyone.

Pride in aviation, pride in America, pride in American Aviation, that was the gift, the ability to celebrate with such an act served as the reward. Besides, as anyone so blessed will testify, in the midst of performing a fly-by, the cockpits all stay busy keeping track of each other. No one on the ground wants to see a show that none of the pilots intended. So the pilots never actually see any sign of reaction down there.

From the parade route the C-195 turned northeast for a relaxed 2,500-foot cruise to Newton to partake of grass-roots flying of another form. The Chapter 88 gang worked full tilt checking in pilots and their planes, selling tickets for the evening banquet, and turning visiting children into documented Young Eagles courtesy the volunteer pilots and EAA.

The ramp held general aviation in its many forms, ultralights, trikes, homebuilts, spam cans, antiques and more than a few classics. The small improptu gathers of old friends and pilots and others who "get it" made a three-hour visit pass by at near Mach speed and soon the C-195 needed to wing its way home.

As the Businessliner touched down on the grass at Dead Cow and the crowds thinned at Newton, the PT-23 and Col. Mike cruised lazily home to the Jayhawk Wing Hangar to rest from a long day of enlightening many into the world of a World War II student pilot.

The Chapter 88 banquet most likely proved a fun evening for the participants and a well-earned reward to another successful Independence Day gathering.

Three landings and 50 miles of flying; operating at three airports, visiting two events, becoming a special event at a parade; spending time with dozens of friends and aviation lovers. What more could an aviator want out of a Fourth?

This day arose out of a decades-long tradition of flying on special days -- this day especially. But the more who do, the better.

No fireworks can match -- though we did envy the aviator flying a small GA airplane above Wichita last evening, when fireworks displays seemed to erupt above the black horizon at every point on the compass.

Hope your Fourth was as flyingly fulfilling.

Dave

UCAP Fly/Drive-In

2009-06-28T10:42:00.003-04:00

Here's the motley crew from yesterday's really fun UCAP event at Barnes Westfield Airport (BAF).

l to r: Mike Wise, "Maxflight" & Lisa, Jeff O'Halloran(kneeling), Rick Felty, Jeff Ward (peering over from the back), John Wellington, Jack Hodgson, Doug Fortnam, Kim & "Turbo" Ed, & Mike Smith. All standing in front of Mike Wise's Sting S3 LSA.

Jeb on a/c tiedowns for Av Consumer Magazine

2009-06-23T10:16:00.003-04:00

The Verdict is in -- and TSA should heed it NOW!

2009-06-18T17:11:00.002-04:00

If you haven't aready heard, let me pass on an interesting piece of good news for general aviation: Richard L. Skinner, Inspector General of the Department of Homeland Security, released a report on general aviation, TSA's role and the overall security picture...and he said:

"We determined that the general aviation presents only limited and mostly hypothetical threats to security."

In other words, as a security threat general aviation poses little -- and what the threats the TSA wants to clamp down on are "mostly hypothetical" and the aircraft in general are too light and of highly limited capacity to do damage.

Isn't that what we've been saying for several years?

Mr. Skinner's report notes that reports if suspicious activities to the AOPA Airport Watch Hotline have resulted in only rare instances of cases that might pose a real security threat. And the department's own Office of Intelligence has concluded that there are no credible threats of crop dusters being used to mount a chemical or biological attack.

OK. The verdict is in. Time for the TSA to withdraw the Large Aircraft Security Program proposal totally and turn its resources to watching for real threats. And time for the TSA to simply kill off the recently inacted insanity requiring background checks, fingerprinting and airport-specific badges for GA tenants at air-carrier airports with physical separation between the two operations.

We do not need these skeenkin' badges.

Of course, we pretty much all recognize that this could change; but between the AOPA Airport Watch Program and its activities, hotline and how-to pamphlet, we're all sensitive to the appearance of suspicious activities -- and those reports to the hotline have proved this system works.

So TSA -- do the right thing.

And finally, to Prof. Lawrence M. Wein, the professor of management science at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, maybe you should manage to read Mr. Skinner's report.

After your little OpEd in The New York Times this week, you may want to update your MBA approach to general aviation security because it's wholly lacking in logic, devoid of effectiveness and even more impractical than anything the TSA has come up with -- at least, anything that's made it to the light of day.

The good professor was discussing the lack of an "overarching strategic plan" at DHS, observing all the ways terrorists might sneak a fissile weapon into the U.S. -- across borders, via boats, and, of course, airplanes. He identified four modes with no less than 132 different paths possible.
Here's what he said about general aviation:

"What about attack by a small plane? Given the impracticality of shooting down a tiny aircraft before it could detonate a bomb from the air, the best approach is to begin screening all domestic departures of small airplanes. This effort should be folded into the Securing the Cities Initiative."

Guess for someone sitting in a bastion of theoretical management practices where process is king, the good professor might have his supporters.

But his approach -- even absent the report from the DHS IG -- was lacking wholly in practical aspects and logistical basis. Every flight? Really?

How? With what army? Oh, yeah...let's not forget, the terrorists will just naturally stick with using an established airport with establishment security screening becuase we know how important it is for terrorists to obey the laws of the nation they want to attack.

Please. Every flight screened? Really?

REALLY!?!?

Get a grip, Professor. And come back when you've come up with a recommendation that we also start screening every trip by a pick-up, minivan or SUV.

Really. And read Mr. Skinner.

He seems to be the half of this week's DHS news that has a grip on reality -- let alone practicality.

-- Dave

Something about this bothers me...

2009-06-01T15:13:00.004-04:00

The headline from today's AOPA Aviation eBrief says this: "General aviation applauds changes to TSA Security Directive." The AeB references a story by an old friend in aviation journalism, Benet Wilson, as sound, sturdy and sober a realist as you're apt to find in the business -- particularly that part of the aviation journalism community anchored inside The Beltway.

So the gist of the story never felt questionable or in-doubt to me.

No, what made me stop and cogitate was the concept represented by the headline and the underlying story. Aviation group leaders in essence applauded an uncommon application of common sense by the uncommonly obtuse at the TSA.

Seriously. Think about this for a brief moment.

Back last year here came the TSA with another cockamamie regulation issued not as a proposed rule but as a fete de compli -- a done deal as Security Directive SD 1542-04-08F. It came out of the blue aimed at all tenants of airports with any level of commercial serviced.

The requirement: each airport impacted must write and get approved a new security program for creating and issuing steenkin' badges to all tenants and those who want to move around the movement areas. Oh, yeah, the program has to show how the airport's program will assure fingerprinting, criminal background checks and the issuance of new badges specific to this program.

The rules require each airport to come up with its own steenkin' badge -- steenkin' badges only legal at the airport of issuance. Without a steenkin' badge, everybody using the movement area of such airports must be escorted by someone with a steenkin' badge -- or else that person and the airport could be in deep skeenk.

Brilliant.

Now prior to this new steenkin' SD, airports at which GA and Common Carriage Carriers shared access to ramps and hangar areas already lived with such steekin' badges requirements; no real incidents are cited or known about other airports at which GA and Common Carraige Carriers have their own, separate and distinct, operating areas, while sharing a runway.

So no idea what problem this steenkin badge idea deems to solve. They won't say -- at least, beyond the boilerplate "to enhance the security of"...like the Cheetos tiger intones, "Blah, blah, blah."

And it gets better, of course. The TSA also never made available a full list of affected airports -- nor did it publicly reveal the full details of the program. You know, the Catch 22 of the War on Terror: You must follow rules, but you can' t know what they all are because you might use them! Maybe to comply!!

Yeah, right...can't have people actually knowing enough to comply, now, can we? The might help the terrorists, you know.

So the applause seems a little bit like applauding your boxing opponent because he stopped hitting you after knocking you down.

It makes little sense from my seat. Applauding a reduction in ridiculousness should actually involve reminding the TSA of the steenkin' badges aspects of this whole mess: use of directives to avoid actual user-involved rulemaking; no use of common sense in the structuring of the program or the rules underpinning it. No complete info available to the public.

So letting transient pilots hit the head or go to the phone to call for service is some small progress, a tiny victory over the total "Duh?!?" of the original document. And accepting an ill-advised rule enacted by a dubious process for a doubtful purpose warrants no applause from my seat.

We can't keep accepting little losses from this agency in hopes it will wise up later; we keep up the pace of lost access and flexiblity liked that proposed in the Large Aircraft Security
Program proposal, adding further government control access and flexiblity, and we'll be on our way to extinction as a mode of personal and small-business travel.

Instead of applauding the TSA showing a tiny bit of common sense, we should be showing uncommon unity and calling for the agency's sunset.

Maybe then we as a community can create an agency capable of meeting both sides of its mission: enacting sensible protections without nonsensically stifling private aviation and commercial -- something, somehow, the TSA has managed not to visit or otherwise eviscerate rail and bus, truck and car rentals, or private maritime travel.

It's time aviation got as much consideration. In the meantime, no applause from this cockpit.

-- Dave

In remembrance...

2009-05-24T12:00:00.002-04:00

This weekend we pause from our usual lives' rhythms to remember those who've fallen in defense of our ideals, our Constitution and the freedoms it guarantees. For the defense and protection of those beliefs, millions have served, millions have fallen.

They fell not for the flag but for the ideals it represents.

They sacrificed not for the President but to preserve and protect the Constitution that created the office.

They died not for themselves but for their fellow Americans.

They lived, as well, and not always with ease or expectation of reward. So we also honor those who've served and returned, those still serving -- and the idealism and courage of those who will.

Please keep in your thoughts those friends, neighbors, relatives, and those we don't know.

Without the bravery of those willing to support our ideals, our freedoms would not exist -- and without those ideals, no amount of bravery or military might could ever grant us that which exists in nature.

They are our fathers, uncles, brothers and sons, mothers, sisters, aunts, and daughter, prom dates and classmates, coworkers and competitors, homeless on the streets and residents of our homes for those no longer able to care for themselves.

They are our fellow Americans. They are our fellow citizens. They are us.

In your honor, in our honor, we pause to reflect, to remember -- and to salute with the simplest form of recognition we have: our "Thank you."

-- Dave

We need to talk, Mr. President...

2009-05-16T11:39:00.003-04:00

...because signs of misinformation -- OK, make that outright errors -- appear all over the FAA budget proposal your Administration released May 12. It makes a body wonder whether a truly bright, facts-based judgment is lacking because of bad advice from folks at The Office of Management & Budget, DoT...somewhere.

Those signs appear in some goals the FAA budget proposal cites.

First off, in the past two months your Administration twice published FAA budget blueprints outlining a move to funding the agency from direct user fees...your May 12 blueprint, at $9.6 billion annually in fees starting in 2011 came in almost $2 billion higher than the first one; OK, funding the FAA at a higher level to meet ambitious goals for NextGen and ADS-B is fine by most of us -- long as the FAA actually makes a buck's worth of progress for every buck spent...heck, we'd probably be singing praises at $0.80 worth per buck...but I digress.

Second, along the way the blueprint calls for reducing the public coffers of the General Fund to about 10 percent...

So we go along flying, happy and serving the country's 4,500 or so non-airline airports through 2010, paying our way with excise taxes and General Fund contributions -- and suddenly we cut the public share and shift to $9.6 million in Direct User Fees? Uh, how much of that $9.6 million does the OMB feel will be left to actually use for FAA needs? $9 billion? $8.75 billion? $9.25 billion?

We respectfully ask this question 'cause for every buck collected in aviation excise taxes it costs our good Federal Government fractions of a penny to administer and account for...by the most-conservative estimates, the costs of creating a system to Track Use/Users, Bill For, Collect, Account and Handle that $9.6 billion in Direct User Fees is gonna cost us about 1000 percent more -- a not-insubstantial 3 percent...or more; as noted, the estimates tend to play down the costs so they're conservative.

Now by my math, 3 percent of $9.6 billion comes to about $288 billion! Now if that's low by even the tiniest bit, we're looking at $300 million; compared to the three hundredths of a percent the excise taxes cost -- about $3 million -- to handle the current Excise Taxes levied, this is categorically not a smart-government example. It's not even a good business model.

And, on top of reducing the funds available to the FAA through the genius of Direct User Fees your people propose reducing the General Fund contribution -- while they also propose raising public funding for roads and rails and rivers.

What did General Aviation ever do to America to deserve the treatment of a shunned relative?

It's as if suddenly General Aviation was an enemy of the people -- in the irony-tinged way of an Ibsen title -- when every unbiased survey and study demonstrates that private aviation contributes mightily to the nation's well being, from economic to industrial to philanthropic.

Like the guy Bill at breakfast this morning. He recently rented a private aircraft, paid his own money, to fly a medical patient four hours home from treatment in a local hospital. Now recognizing that somewhere some airline executive gnashes teeth at the thought of some kind soul depriving his company of a paying passenger out some feel-good motivation, this pilot Bill also paid to use the Air Traffic System by paying excise taxes on the 150 gallons or so of avgas the plane used...and he didn't even use the system. Didn't need to.

But he gets no dispensation from the Excise Taxes and felt no real pain paying those Excise Taxes -- contained, as they were, in the cost of the fual...oh, yeah -- the Excise Taxes were proportional to his time in the sky, since that Excise Tax payment was keyed to the fuel purchased, which was in direct relationship to the time the engine ran...

Simple, eh? So simple even Congressmen, Congresswomen and Senators figured this out a half-dozen White House occupants back...

And about this reduction in the General Fund contribution: somewhere some errant soul is likely to resurrect or otherwise cite a study undertaken by the Reagan Administration that "concluded" that there is no "public benefit" from aviation...hence, no real justification for any General Fund contribution.

These guys could have justified anything they put their minds to and the White House wanted to sever any linkage between public benefit and aviation so it could sever any relationship between FAA funding and the General Fund.

Between the firefighting aircraft in California this month to the efforts of private aircraft on behalf of the public -- search and rescue, serving communities without commercial service, aeromedical and on and on -- you are smart enough and perceptive enough to understand the falisy of that old study's conclusion.

We even know of a presidential candidate who owes part of his success to the savvy deployment of a private aircraft during the campaign, allowing the connection to cities and towns impossible otherwise. Take a look in a mirror...you'll see him smiling back at you.

So, Mr. President, please do yourself a favor and, in the process, the American public at-large, and those who fly for fun and for hire: get a second opinion, from some of the committee chairmen on Capitol Hill, from the aviation groups...even the Air Transport Association knows User Fees cost more.

And these fees won't change the problem of shrinking fund contributions when flying itself is declining across the board, commercial and private alike, from the economic malaise.

Check around; you'll learn your proposal is backward and wrong. And then you can do what smart politicians do to succeed: make a new decision.

Respectfully,

Dave
Adendum: Reader Bob Collins' comment on my post is correct -- mea culpa on my part; calculated it correctly, then wrote it incorrectly...corrected both Billion-versus-Million misstatements...and think the point still holds...guess my brain had trouble believing anything still costs only in the millions in these days of billions and trillions getting so much more mention.
dh

Unusual Attitudes

2009-04-22T11:52:00.012-04:00

It's Day 2 at this year's Sun 'n Fun Fly-in and Jeb and I were in exactly the right place at the right time last evening. We we're offered the chance to fly this morning with the Aeroshell Aerobatic Team.

We reported to their parking area out on the edge of the warbirds parking area. We were introduced to our pilots and each climbed into the back seat of a T-6.

I won't rehash the whole flight but it was awesome.

This was my first experience with flying (riding along) aerobatic. I wasn't sure how I'd react, and I'm pleased to report that it was nothing but exhilarating.

We flew out in formation. Really close to the other planes. After traveling about 10 miles out and climbing to a few thousand feet, we did a formation loop, followed by a formation barrel roll.

I could really feel the G forces, but other wise it was just a blast.

After the barrel roll I realized that we were headed back to the airport, and I was actually disappointed. I was more than ready for more.

Our thanks to the folks at the Aeroshell Aerobatics Team for squeezing us in at the last moment. And a huge thanks to listener Tony who made the initial contact for us.

Check out my flickr account for about a half dozen pics from the ride.

It's Aviatin' Time!

2009-04-18T12:07:00.002-04:00

A few months ago, when most of the country still suffered under the chilled embrace of Winter, Spring at times seemed impossibly far away. Winter Storm Warnings, blizzard conditions, punishing winds...some days it felt like these phenomena drew paychecks and mission statements from those who strive to reduce General Aviation's extraordinary impact on American life...

Even after the "official" arrival of Spring March 20, some days it just didn't pay to drive to the airport. But there's no keeping down a good bunch of pilots, aviators, planemakers, vendors and all of our collective community.

As this gets written, evidence of that fact already exists on the grounds of the Sun 'n Fun Fly-In on the south side of Lakeland Linder Regional Airport (LAL); that evidence erupts into a full-blown international statement of our love of, desire to and right to fly starting Tuesday, April 21.

And for the ensuing six days, the entirety of the aviation community -- those off site as well as on-site -- plan to celebrate our community, our flying, and our contribution to the social and economic well-being of this country...the country that arguably lead the world into the Aviation Age.

We'll set aside differences, live with flaws and fly as though our lives depend on air beneath our feet -- because to so many of us, our lives to depend on it. Some because of livelihood, some because of passion alone, and to the truly afflicted, because of a blend of both.

Mostly we'll come together to renew friendships and enjoy fellowship with fellow flyers, make new friends, see new things and experience the community in a way only possible at shows like Sun 'n Fun and AirVenture -- and thousands of smaller ones in between, from EAA chapter fly-ins to niche-aviation gatherings, to airport appreciation days and plane-old-down-off-the-ramp spontaneous gatherings.

So Horrah! to the new show season and Hurray! for us all. After all, what better way to extend our lives than to fly somewhere for fun.

Remember, "Time spent flying is not subtracted from your lifespan."

Hope to see you out there...

-- Dave

One.

2009-04-14T15:38:00.004-04:00

The NTSB in early April released preliminary general aviation accident data for 2008. No one should be happy.

For example, there were 1559 accidents involving Part 91 operations, 275 of which involved fatalities. Those fatal accidents killed a total of 495 persons, one fewer than the previous year. One.

After all the training improvements, the influx of new, well-equipped aircraft, all the new, high-tech equipment being installed in older ones, after weather-forecasting and observation enhancements on the ground and in the air, only one.

And the accident rate jumped up, from 6.92 accidents per 100,000 hours in 2007 to 7.11 in 2008. This is despite an overall reduction in accidents, from 2007's 1650 to 1559 last year, and stems from fewer flying hours, a reduction of almost 10 percent. These results are pretty sorry for an industry desperate to be taken seriously.

Looking backward, 2006 was a very good year, with an overall increase in flight hours and a 20-year low in the accident rate. But 2006 also came with a huge spike in fatalities, from 563 in 2005 to 705.

On its face, there are no easily identified reasons for these poor numbers. One could argue 2008's high fuel prices sharply reduced flight hours and, instead of cutting back on business and personal transportation, we flew fewer training and proficiency missions. If so, that didn't work out too well.

And it gets worse: 2008's Part 135 numbers show 56 accidents killing 66 people, "the highest number of fatalities since 2000," per the NTSB. Thankfully, Part 135 operators did manage an accident rate (1.52) virtually unchanged from 2007's 1.54.

I was recently asked if general aviation is safe. It's a relative question, of course, and my response went something like this: If you look at the entire universe of non-scheduled, civilian flight operations and remove from it things like bush flying, flight-testing, aerial application, buzzing an ex-spouse's home and the like, and concentrate on well-maintained aircraft flown by proficient pilots in manageable weather, yes, GA is a very safe transportation mode. And I think the record supports me. The problem, of course, is when we stray from these qualifiers, as we apparently did for much of 2008.

What makes my head explode is this stuff isn't rocket science. Carry enough fuel for the flight, plus reserves. Avoid weather for which you're not trained or prepared. Ensure the aircraft has no outstanding maintenance issues. Use landing areas appropriate to the aircraft's performance and your ability.

Can we all try these things during 2009 and see how it works out in a year or so?

[Note: The foregoing is the full text of my editorial in the May 2009 issue of Aviation Safety. Click here for an NTSB table summarizing GA's accident history over the last 20 years. -- Jeb]

View from my front yard

2009-04-13T20:07:00.003-04:00

Saturday, early afternoon. Seriously.

Jeb

Do Wah Diddy

2009-04-12T09:21:00.003-04:00

Here's a couple of clips from the movie Stripes, which was mentioned in UCAP#128.

Let's not go crazy out there...this incident holds few lessons...

2009-04-08T12:03:00.002-04:00

OK, folks, enough already; yeah, yeah, the story is known: 31-year-old student pilot Yavuz Burke, known also as Adam Leon,"stole" a Skyhawk from a Canadian flight school and embarked on a transnational dash hoping to commit suicide by F-16...

...and the cries are familiar: secure the airplanes, we've got to stop this madness and stop leaving unsecured airplanes on ramps...

Please...give me a break here. I mean, enough already. There's not a single, solitary security step out there that would have, could have or should have stopped Mr. Burke/Leon, from his sad pursuit of the afterlife -- none, nada, zippo, zilch. Get it?

Yeah, yeah, I've read and acted on the security recommendations from those out-of-control make-believe "experts" at the Transportation Security Administration. As for AOPA's Airport Watch Program, heck, I wrote the original working with AOPA staff to produce those very commonsense steps. And what that book recommends would not have changed anything about this disturbed individual's actions.

Why? Am I deranged, suggesting nothing could have stopped or changed his action? Well, many would leap to agree -- I often feel deranged, maddened beyond reason when our alleged protectors misuse their authority to add rules through the "directive" process rather than the All American rule-making process; guess after the response to their Large Aircraft Security Program proposal, the TSA folks find the uncertainty and opposition unpalatable and the opportunity to just dictate irresistible.

Reference the wave of new badging requirements sweeping the country; stupid, short-sighted and dictatorial -- not to mention useless, ball-less and unjustified. Not that any of these facts matter to the TSA.

So getting back to the no-joy ride of Mr. Burke/Leon, let's look at the arguments.

Background checks...well, he'd passed one and had just been vetted to become a naturalized Canadian citizen; so no joy here;

Keeping aircraft secured on the ramp...well, of course that's just common sense. But the guy was a legitimate student pilot -- so he had legitimate student pilot access to the aircraft. Does anyone now suggest we keep students from their classrooms? Thought not. Even if the school kept the keys locked away, this guy had legitimate access...so no joy here, either.

Ditto for prop locks, hangering between students, etc, ad nauseum...

Now, should we make student carry an observer? What happens to solo requirements? Or the illegality of a soloed student carrying a passenger...yeah, we know -- gets complicated, doesn't it?

Sorry TSA and the world, all that you've done, all you're proposing to do and all you can think of in your bleak imagination will, where general aviation is concerned, serve only to make us all suspects and protect us from our own mobility.

Nothing you can devise can stop a guy like Mr. Lean...nothing. Couldn't stop that guy with the Piper who tried to fake his own death, either -- and he was a poster child for upwardly mobile, affluent business aviation.

Crazy is as crazy does -- and trying to match the possible crazies of the world with TSA crazy will succeed only in stifling, maybe killing, general aviation. But then, maybe that's TSA's intended victim.

I'm open to counter ideas...but badges and background checks up to our rudder tips can't stop individualized crazy. It only encourages institutionalized crazy -- like the TSA.

Tailwinds.

Dave

UCAP Wichita Meet-Up...

2009-03-23T16:02:00.002-04:00

Wednesday, March 25
5:30 p.m. to about 7 p.m., give or take a few minutes...

The Stick & Rudder Club at Savutes

3303 N Broadway St

Wichita, KS 67219

Here's a map:

http://maps.google.com/maps?oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&q=savutes+wichita&fb=1&split=1&gl=us&cid=0,0,10317613485974766690&ei=W-rHSefIN53snQfWxajsDA&sa=X&oi=local_result&resnum=1&ct=image

Looking forward to seeing and meeting some of UCAP's Wichita posse...

-- Dave

Probably gonna want to build airplanes too. Such a tragedy.

2009-03-16T13:02:00.001-04:00

Found by Dave H.:

The Wright old days sure look familiar...

2009-03-13T14:55:00.003-04:00

They were so tactile. So in-touch and unobstructed. These traits still stand among the many strong appeals of the hang gliders and ultralights that started me off in aviation. These traits help keep me on the look-out for opportunities to still fly some of my old favs...when we can make it work, well, we go flying in something of the Lightest Stuff.

In between those too-infrequent opportunities, unfortunately, great memory jogs -- sights and sounds that send my mind's eye back into the air in one of the Lightest Stuff -- seem few and far between. When they come, they're worth savoring -- half out of nostalgia, half for the inspiration to get aloft again.

So this little film clip, a scant 3:29, seemed worth sharing because it performed the flashback function better and more viscerally than anything I've seen in years -- outside of actual airtime.

Wilbur Wright, 1909, ostensibly the world's first aerial photography work.

When the clip shifted from ground-based footage to the flyers' P.O.V. , it took me back to my earliest flying, the stuff that lasted far too short and stayed close to the ground throughout. As low and slow as you'll see in the clip.

http://www.europafilmtreasures.eu/PY/322/fiche_technique.htm?ID=322

Hope you enjoy this little slice of history...great way to go into the weekend.

-- Dave

User Fees and Economic Recovery...Hummm...

2009-03-08T12:42:00.004-04:00

Funny how repeating cycles can make new things seem decidedly familiar...happened recently with the convergence of an economic downturn and a new budget proposal with a hauntingly familiar item tucked away inside: converting some of the FAA funding stream from excise taxes to direct payments from users...user fees. Yawn...have heard this all before; we'll fight, likely win, waste a lot of effort unnecessarily, and then go back to focusing on the economy...

Well, this whole recycling of an issue to fight sent my mind wandering a little, thinking of the relatively few U.S. pilots who've used user-fee-financed services in their international travels and remembered our own experiences on two trips, one on which a third party carried the bulk of the bureaucratic load, the other on which the paperwork fell to me as Senor Capitain to a host of officials at about a half-dozen Mexican airports.

Naturally, that experience gave me a different, less abstract perspective on the issue.

With today's forefront focus on the economy and on issues of job-retention and job-creation here in the good ol' US of A, it recently occurred to me that someone at the Office of Management & Budget might have read this tidbit of mine from AvWeb back in the heady old days of 2000: http://www.avweb.com/news/atis/181949-1.html. It speaks to user fees from our flights around Mexico between Christmas 1999 and Jan. 5 2000.

We were, then, as we are now -- in a debate with others about the fundamental foundation of financial funds for our Friendly Aviators' Agency. Check it out and check back here...we'll wait...

Now that you've seen the AvWeb piece, think about this. If this is actually the case, that OMB did read the article, in the spirit of the piece let me suggest the fine Fed folks first fall back from any and all plans, programs and contracts that target increasing efficiency and cutting costs by increasing automation and reducing human staff...say, maybe starting with the weather service staffing as ATC facilities -- call off the reduction plans.

Then let me suggest reversing the private-contract solution to Flight Service and reopen at least the old Automated network, if not the pre-automated 480-station network -- all updated with modern digital comm and data acquisition hardware...heck, you could just help staffers buy a house near the airport and operate their stations as home-based federal employees, adding jobs and saving on facilities costs...

But maybe, in the unlikely event the OMB reader did realize my year 2000 piece on flying in Mexico was actually sardonic...in that case, we're hoping OMB's alt.user.fee idea is equally farcical...sure seems that way to me. But think you should seriously consider keeping functions that can use lots of people...it's good for the country.

Happy flying, everyone...

-- Dave

Dan Gryder on GA's allure.

2009-02-16T19:53:00.003-05:00

In a UCAP Forums thread about an impromptu trip to Key West, he wrote this, which pretty much sums up what I think is the best thing about GA.

...I generally have some kind of aviation adventure that pops up about that often, most totally unplanned, or little planning, but lots of fun. When you have general aviation, there are no limits. Also I prefer to fly low level, in uncontrolled airspace with the radios off and looking out the window where I can.

O'Brien thinks it may have been icing

2009-02-13T07:16:00.003-05:00

Former CNN Aviation Reporter Miles O'Brien is the main-stream-media guy I trust most when it comes to reporting on aviation news. In his blog he's put together a case for last night's Continental 3407 crash possibly being the result of icing. His conclusion:

You have to wonder if Continental 3407 was flying on autopilot - carrying enough ice on its wings that its normal approach speed was simply too slow for it to stay in the air. So when it slowed down, it simply dropped out of the sky. You have to wonder…

Panorama of ice airport

2009-02-06T12:15:00.003-05:00

Listeners must get a good laugh from the fact that as much as I moan about the winter weather, I am endlessly fascinated by the Alton Bay Ice Airport. I don't really understand it myself.

Here's a cool panorama shot (use your mouse to scroll around the 360 degree view) of the airport from just a few days ago.

http://www.mosscreekmedia.com/pano/2009/0201/pano1.html

This is from Jonathon Fee in a posting to the AANH message board.

USAirways 1549 radio calls

2009-02-06T09:53:00.001-05:00

Here's a pretty nice presentation of the just released radio calls from US Airways 1549 as it went into the Hudson River:

UCAP Restaurants map fixed

2009-02-05T17:23:00.001-05:00

I fixed the problem with the map for the restaurant list not appearing. Check it out, it's back.

-- Jack

"What we've got here...is failure to communicate."

2009-01-29T11:22:00.004-05:00

Most of us over the age of -- well, most of us -- will recognize that quote from the movie Cool Hand Luke; it was from the Captain of Road Prison 36 to prisoners after he sapped Luke in front of his fellow inmates. Then he continued, "Some men we just can't reach."

These two quotes came to mind after hearing of the latest political dust up involving a company using federal money to survive and its embrace of business aviation. This case involved Citigroup and it's imminent acceptance of a shiny new $50 million Dassault Falcon 7x, one of a new generation of large-cabin jets offering extraordinary efficiency -- fuel wise and otherwise.

The Obama administration essentially shamed Citigroup into canceling the order, though the company plans to go forward with its intent to sell three of its five existing jets, according to press reports. And the company will eventually get back its $5 million deposit -- when someone else buys that airplane.

But once again, business aviation -- and by default -- all of general aviation is getting an unwarranted black eye.

Although my friend Ed Bolen, president and CEO of the National Business Aviation Association, wrote a letter to President Obama righteously objecting to the tone and tenor of Washington demonizing and denigrating business aviation, part of the problem is long term and ongoing.

Our failure to communicate.

Citigroup, like the Big Three Detroit automakers before it, missed an opportunity to at least speak up in its own defense and detail the economic benefits of its ownership and use of private aircraft.

Yes, that communicating is also the job of Ed and the association he heads -- but such statements of fact should not have to wait on NBA, nor any other association. If a company does its work and finds economic benefit in owning an airplane -- from a Cessna piston single to a Citation Columbus, a Mooney to a Falcon, a Bonanza to a Hawker 4000 -- it should be adamant in its assertion of those facts. And an actual assertion, not a tepid defense. In general, business airplanes help their companies be profitable and aren't "perks" like some politicians want us to believe; and companies that operate aircraft tend to be more productive and profitable than companies in the same field who do not embrace private aviation.

Yesterday is was a pleasure to hear the first public speech by Craig Fuller, the fledgling president of the almost-70-year-old Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association. Speaking to the Wichita Aero Club, Craig said something apropos to this discussion: "Experience taught me long ago that if you do not define yourself, you are defined by your adversaries." He brings an accurate perspective borne of his 28-year history of working in Washington's political arena.

That's part of our problem with Washington these days; we're letting the politicians define us. Of course, it might not have hurt had Citigroup decided to rethink it's plans -- or at least have a plan for selling its logic, just after it accepted billions in funds from the Troubled Asset Recovery Program. By doing so, Citigroup admitted it's a troubled company; it should have known, thanks to the Detroit Debacle of a few weeks ago, that a new jet would just look wrong.

Which points up the need to be smart and ready to argue your fact.

This job of defining aviation realistically so that others can't demonize is is not something limited to the halls of associations; just because we pay dues to AOPA or NBAA or EAA or any other alphabet group doesn't let us off the hook.

Here's what Craig said during his talk: "All of us in aviation have a role to play. We must be engaged in the political process. We must define ourselves so our adversaries don't. We cannot afford to be passive and wait for better days."

Twenty-five years ago, I made a similar statement to a group of communicators representing members companies of the General Aviation Manufacturers Association. They had just been told by a senior aviation reporter for a weekly news magazine that the current cycle of opposition to general aviation would eventually abate and things would be fine again.

My message went over like a leasure suit at a debutante's ball: "Whatever we lose in this cycle won't come back unless we fight to keep from losing what they want to take away."

Interestingly, Craig noted that in an election-night poll of people who voted, 62 percent viewed general aviation as important to the nation and its economy and health.

So we have most of the public already on our side.

Don't ever be a failure to communicate what makes general aviation worthwhile to the nation, our economy and our safety. We're far too important. But it wouldn't hurt of some businesses acted more wisely when under the microscope.

An opportunity to be smart is coming this weekend, when the Super Bowl gets played in Tampa. I'm not holding my breath that all companies will be smart. And I know that many of the jets that fly to the area will be owned by individuals -- individuals who should also be willing to speak up about the jobs they support through owning a private aircraft.

We all must define general aviation lest people with points to score define us in ways that portray us inaccurately.

Some we just won't be able to reach. But most we can. And we must reach as many as we can -- including that part of the public who work as politicians.

-- Dave

Mr. President: In the interest of economic recovery, may I offer five ideas from aviation?

2009-01-20T14:20:00.006-05:00

Mr. President:

First and foremost, President Obama, congratulations on your inauguration; a nation hungry for leadership stands ready to pitch in and help -- help ourselves out of the quagmire in which we find ourselves in so many areas. And, as you said, putting aside old ways must be part of the marching orders; so must putting to use good ideas, another point you made in your inaugural address a little while ago.

Naturally, different Americans will see benefits through the lenses of their own circumstances, work and lives. Count me as among them as a pilot, past aircraft owner and occasional user of airline services.

It's with that understanding, and in the spirit of advancing ideas that can help the country -- economically, in our security and our relations with others -- that I humbly pitch five thoughts that seem to me to have potential, to offer value from their result.

First, already more than a dozen aviation groups have voiced their suggestion that some $3 billion from any economic stimulus bill go toward infrastructure investments that can advance the much-needed Next Generation Air Traffic Control network -- you might have heard it called NextGen from your DOT transition staff. But to take the idea further than establishing a way to finish the ground hardware and software, to embrace more than commercial interests to general aviation, may I suggest a funding mechanism that provides private aviation with a 50 percent share of the costs they will incur in adding the equipment needed to make them completely compatible with this new system. Whether through tax credits or direct funding, the benefits would be huge.

Only with a complete changeover to the ADS-B and GPS technologies that underpin NextGen by all of America's civil aviation users can our national air-traffic network realize the full benefits of the new system and help reduce delays, reduce traffic conflicts and provide the in-cockpit weather and information. And do so in a time frame that precludes even greater problems in the short term. Private-aircraft owners are ready and willing to do their share -- if doing their share provides real benefits. The initial proposal by the Federal Aviation Administration stretches out more than another decade -- and offers private aviation no benefit to making the investment...zero.

Accelerating the infrastructure investment could make the transition happen years faster, to the benefit of all users, flyers and non-flyers alike. Government sharing the costs will help that transition, provide private users with the benefits absent from the FAA's proposal, and accelerate the savings potential of NextGen to the point that it would more than offset the public-sector investment in private-sector aircraft.

Second, designate some of the economic recovery funds to the development of new airports and the expansion of existing ones. Understand that adding all the capacity possible to the airspace will ultimately fail as a tool for reducing delays and expanding air commerce -- without a parallel focus on increasing pavement on which to put the added aircraft expected over the next 20 years. Physics -- something no politician, not even the recently departed President -- make cramming ever-more airplanes onto existing runways impractical, if not impossible, and beyond a certain point, unsafe.

Further, many a small and medium city could benefit from the economic engines that are our general-aviation airports. Those locations with runways today, ones typically lacking in airline service, remain connected to the broader world of business and the global economy through the movement of private aircraft in and out of their airports. Expanding new-airport construction to cities and towns lacking such runways would provide construction jobs short-term and service and instruction jobs long-term, to the benefit of the nation's economic growth through the growth of the economies of so many small towns and cities now bypassed by the world.

Third, reign in the Transportation Security Administration's creeping regulatory embrace. Recently, the agency, by administrative fiat, imposed new rules requiring private pilots to succumb to fingerprinting and criminal background checks and special badges merely because they base an airplane at airports with airline service -- regardless of the degree of separation between the private operators and the commercial operations.

And the pending proposal known as the Large Aircraft Security Program provides nothing close to the security that it's title seems to promise.

Private aircraft owners don't go to the trouble of learning to fly and the expense of acquiring aircraft to dispose of them as weapons of minor destruction -- and they are too small to be true weapons of mass destruction. The requirement that pilots undergo criminal background checks and fingerprinting injects the government into the role of deciding who can fly what -- an imposition placed on no other mode of private travel. It's unreasonable intrusion, something our Constitution was written to preclude.

Private aircraft owners and pilots don't haul strangers, making moot the proposal's plan for pilots to have private companies vette their passengers against the error-prone terrorist watch list -- an insult, at its least, when we think of being forced to submit the names of our families, our friends and neighbors simply because we chose to fly them with us.

Private aircraft pilots need not have the heavy hand of an intrusive government decide they can't carry a survival kit because it carries a knife, pliers, ax or screwdriver. The whole idea that pilots need protection from themselves or from their friends and families borders on ludicrous -- and it stands to interfere with the legitimate use of airplanes in private flight by private companies.

More and more these days, it seems that the TSA is acting as a surrogate for the airline industry by acting to incrementally reduce the ease and flexibility, the worth and utility, of owning and flying a private plane -- as if, with enough action, we'll all be forced to pay a common carrier.

So please, scrap the entire proposal and send the TSA back to work on something that makes sense, something that doesn't make us all criminal suspects simply because we can fly ourselves. Remember, 18 of the terrorists of 9/11 would have passed the same sort of criminal background checks the TSA would require of us to fly our own planes. Sanity must return.

Fourth, find a way to revamp the management and culture of the FAA itself. For the past 16 years, the value of aviation knowledge seems to have declined within the very agency that exercises the most influence over the aviation industry. The FAA has had two consecutive administrators with only ancillary connections to aviation -- but no first-hand experience in flying, running aviation businesses or aircraft companies, for years hallmarks of a long line of outstanding (and mediocre) people tapped to lead this vital agency.

The FAA's morale and staff retention cannot take another unknowing outsider who qualifies only as a general executive and has no real aviation knowledge. The learning curve is steep, the specifics technical, and experienced knowledge critical. From the administrator down to line inspectors and other enforcement people, the agency's efforts to train outsiders to a level commensurate with aviation's needs has lead to bad leadership, wasted resources and vengeful enforcement actions from officials upset that the people they were inspecting were more knowledgeable than themselves.

If it means creating a way to offer premium compensation to have pilots hired as pilot inspectors, airline operations experts to serve as primary operations inspectors, and experienced aircraft mechanics to oversee and enforce maintenance regulations, that's not compromising the independence of the agency. It's helping to assure the quality and value of what the FAA is charged with overseeing. The days of maintenance inspectors with no aviation maintenance experience must end; the days of non-pilots serving as Flight Standard enforcers must end.

The days of aviation experts and aviation experience returning to primacy must return. And your temperament and potential make you our best chance of seeing that happen in decade.

Fifth, and finally, direct your administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration to rescind the labor contract unilaterally imposed by now departed administration Marian Blakey. This contract damaged the quantity of veteran controllers by creating a hostile work environment and encouraging their early retirement. This contract ill serves U.S. air commerce, private aviation and air safety -- and we've not yet hit the big bubble in potential retirements that will surely come if the FAA's hostile management of ATC continues.

Additionally, consider temporarily rescinding the mandatory retirement age of controllers so that veterans can stay around long enough to help professionally train their replacements to a level of excellence currently absent from the process. As currently managed, the FAA is increasingly dependent on forced overtime -- exhausting the existing workforce at many facilities -- and under qualified trainees forced to work position before they are fully trained.

None of these ideas will be easy sells to many; they weren't meant to be. As you said today, the road ahead will be hard; there will be challenges. But the alternative is unacceptable.

These ideas will improve aviation, generate jobs and advance America's most crucial role as a leader in world aviation. Aviators, aircraft owners, mechanics, controllers and their support staffs all stand ready to help you make these things happen.

Just ask us.

The time has come.

Good luck Mr. President, and thanks for your time.

Dave Higdon
Pilot

UCAP SFO Meetup A Success

2009-01-04T15:30:00.002-05:00

My thanks to the listeners that came out to say hi at our first SFO Aviation Meetup. It was an "intimate" group. But fun.

The allotted two hours quickly turned into three.

We drank coffee, beer, ate french fries, and watched the zeppelin float past.

We should do this more often.

Merry Christmas -- An Interview with the World's Oldest ATP

2008-12-23T23:27:00.004-05:00

Gang, listeners, children of all ages...

Thanks to some connections of mine with our Friendliest Aeronautical Agency, UCAP was able to land an interview with The Man, the Great Old Elf Himself -- yes, The World's Oldest ATP.

Strictly a FAR 125 driver, the Great Old Elf (GOE) continues to ply his trade in large measure because he avoided flying for any of the FAR 135 or FAR 121 carriers -- the passenger airlines. And his lengthy career has not been without its foibles, close encounters, close calls and near misses. Not for publication, he talked about dodging traffic along the Atlantic Seaboard, the TCAS system screaming near Heathrow, the almost unintelligible controllers over France -- "English isn't their first language, you know," he said -- and the unrelenting demands for vectors from the St. Louis TRACON. And he wouldn't touch issues of the missles over the Middle East or the interceptors over Russia. "Those folks are lucky I even wander into their airspace."

But he says he still loves his job and was heading back to Hangar I -- for "Igloo" -- to prep for his longest flight and duty day starting the evening of Dec. 24. He wanted our loyal UCAP listeners to be aware that they can sit and track his progress that night thanks to the cooperation of our trusted guardians of the sky at the North American Air Defense Command, or NORAD, at this link:

www.noradsanta.org

So with no further ado, let's get on with the interview.

UCAP: First thing, Santa, on behalf of all of us children who work on and listen to Uncontrolled Airspace, let me offer our deepest thanks for you taking time to talk with us.

Santa: No problem. You could say I'm a long-time listener, first-time Blogger. Glad to do it.

UCAP: So when did you first know you wanted to fly?

Santa: ...Man, it's been so long ago, it's sometimes hard to remember; but I can tell you that I was no bigger than knee high to an Elf -- I couldn't even reach the bottom of a sleigh.

UCAP: Did you have trouble finding an instructor?

Santa: Trouble finding an instructor? I had trouble finding somebody who'd even admit to the idea of flying! And trouble finding a sleigh that would work, a flight crew, you name it. The Wright Brothers thought they had it bad! And I'd already been flying for...well, for quite a while -- and I'll leave it at that.

UCAP: A lot of people credit you with coming up with the idea for your, well, unique propulsion system. What inspired that idea?

Santa: The inspiration was watching a bunch of reindeer trying to keep their feet warm! That's the whole key to what makes 'em work! They really hate having cold hooves -- that and they take themselves very lightly, if you know what I mean.

UCAP: Now that's an angle I'm sure none of us would've ever thought of.

Santa: Well, what really nudged them from just large, high, long leaps to actual cross-country flight was convincing them that between midnight Dec. 24 and midnight Dec. 25 that they risked permanent hoofbite -- that's frostbite to them -- if we stayed on the ground longer than the average round trip through the average chiminy.

UCAP: Then how to you ever get them to land?

Santa: Oh, leg warmers stuffed with pre-heat pads, wired to a big battery underneath the sleigh.

UCAP: So there's some real technology at work here.

Santa: Well, some technology, some psychology and a little physiology -- their little hooves are very sensitive to the cold. That's why we can turn in such a high number of cycles in such a short period of time. They're anxious to get back off the cold, cold ground. They even think that sand is just a gritty form of dry ice -- and they don't ask too many questions as long as they know that Mrs. Claus has plenty of alfalfa and clover waiting for them at the end of their duty day.

UCAP: That brings up a question a lot of us have had since childhood: How to you stay awake and alert through such a long duty day. I mean, in 24 hours you fly more cycles than a CRJ first officer at the bottom of a regional airlines seniority list.

Santa: That's partly a product of the environment. I mean, the cabin heat isn't very effective. I used to stuff hot coals into a covered skillet and put it on the floor just to keep my toes from freezing -- now we use those chemical warming pads they sell for sore muscles. But otherwise, the cold, crisp air keeps me going strong. That and these neat battery powered glove warmers this pink rabbit dropped off a few years ago -- even included a lifetime supply of batteries. Personally, I think he's in the battery business...

UCAP: Now when you started, air traffic conflicts must've been non-existent but...

Santa: You don't know the half of it; birds, everywhere we flew, birds, until a few hundred years ago when contraptions from some guy named daVinci kept popping up. But no one believed his stuff was practical and it pretty much died out within a few years.

UCAP: Traffic conflicts? In the Middle Ages?

Santa: Well, nothing like today, you know. It all started a few years after I dropped off some drawings in the stockings of those two bike mechanics in Dayton, Ohio. Been worse every year since!

UCAP: So today, NORAD tracks you, the FAA inspects you and the DoT checks your paperwork. That must be something of a hassle.

Santa: Sure, -- it might be if the guys they sent weren't so worried about getting lumps of coal in their stockings...that and what their wives would do if they found out that their hubby had a hand in grounding Santa! So they handle it very, well, nice. And I'll have to leave it at that.

UCAP: Has modern technology been any help to you?

Santa: Let me tell you, if it weren't for some of those modern boxes under my seat, the kids in Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas and -- the worst -- New York area would've stopped getting anything on Christmas day decades ago. I mean, Jeez! How many movements do those airline guys think they can squeeze into one space in 24 hours? If it weren't for getting priority handling from ATC, I'd never get west of New Jersey!

UCAP: If those areas are the worst, where are the easiest areas?

Santa: Bedford Falls. Seems like there's never any traffic over Bedford Falls -- or over downtown D.C., the past few years. It's like the airspace doesn't know aviation exists there...never tried to figure out why, though. Just count it as a blessing and move on as fast as I can. And after D.C., my time-to-climb numbers and cruise speeds all get better because I get to offload a lot of coal in that airspace. ...I think you know why...

UCAP: What's your ground support like?

Santa: Fortunately, I've got the best ground support an old elf could ever wish for. They know the machine inside out -- and they fit into every nook and cranny, inside out. But you can't rush 'em or they get, well, a little short with the Mrs. And Mrs. Claus! She's absolutely top notch in the dispatch department, checking the manifest, working out the international clearances and remitting the ridiculously high overflight fees they demand for handling in Europe, the U.K. and Canada. I tell you, whoever came up with those schedules has gotta be a product of the Washington think tanks. Cost too much, the billing forms are complicated, we have to satisfy dozens of bureaucrats -- and the service is far inferior to what we get over the States. And for handling by the U.S. ATC, we just pay a simple excise tax on the alfalfa and clover bales. Couldn't be easier or simpler. And the controllers themselves couldn't be nice or better -- well, maybe except a couple of TRACONs...but that's a story for another day.

UCAP: So your elves and The Mrs. handle all the ground chores, the reindeer handle the propulsion engineering. What's the toughest job in your operation?

Santa: Oh, the guy who handles the sanitary engineering job. No Ramp Rat servicing the lav holding tanks of a 747 or A380 ever had to put up with the (expletive deleted) that my guy has to handle...Ooops! Sorry! I can't say (expletive deleted) here can I...Sorry! Cut out that part, will you?

UCAP: Not to worry; our producer, Jack, will take care of any (expletive deleted) that shows up.

Santa: That's a relief! Now, where was I...Oh, yeah. The sanitation job. Let me leave it this way: you try riding behind nine flighty, overworked reindeer for 24 hours straight and see if you don't need help with the sanitation problem. But I've got a couple of IA's working on a field-approval fix to that problem that is a Green solution and will reduce our carbon hoofprint.

UCAP: Uh, OOOKay...

UCAP: Ever think about upgrading your hardware to something more modern?

Santa: Well, every few years we'll get a visit from some of the marketing guys with the factories in Savannah, Seattle, Toulouse and Wichita. Those Wichita guys are really persistent. But so far none of these geniuses has been able to show me anything with equal capabilities -- nothing that can compete with the STOL performance, full-hay payload, top speed, alfalfa efficiency and maintenance simplicity. You know, sometimes the older designs just can't be improved upon. But they keep trying.

UCAP: How about recreational flying the rest of the year?

Santa: Well, I wouldn't want this to get out, but I've got my eye on one of those new LSA things -- in fact, I think the Mrs. may surprise me with one this year...I've only been hinting about it since last year's Sebring show. We went ingognito and kicked a few tires, got a couple of demo rides... but I don't want her to know I suspect; no sense spoiling the surprise, you know.

UCAP: So do you have any advice or encouragement for our listeners who are still trying to find their way into aviation?

Santa: Sure! Just take a look at me! If a height-challenged elf from the wrong side of the North Pole can learn to fly and land a job as great as this one, anyone with a little drive and a bit of alfalfa can make a go of becoming a pilot -- even those really tall guys over 5-6!

UCAP: Just one last question, please, Santa.

Santa: Make it quick! I've got a slot reservation into JFK and I can't afford to miss it.

UCAP: What's you favorite part of being the world's oldest ATP? The flying? The giving? The sights you see?

Santa: Well, those are all important elements and I love all of 'em. But my real favorite is hearing from my littlest fans and knowing that they never tire of leaving out my favorite snack.

UCAP: Oh, you mean the milk and cookies?

Santa: Naw, not the milk and cookies. The cases of Leinnies they ship north to the house for when I get home! I don't have to worry about getting out to the store for another 51 weeks! And the job security is excellent! Who else are they gonna get who would take on all the work it takes doing the post-flight maintenance after a 24-hour duty day and a few billion flight cycles and chiminy squeezes -- not to mention flying behind nine little (expletive deleted) making machines? Oops! Sorry...did it again...

UCAP: This has been a real treat, Santa! Thanks again!

Santa: Sure...now, before I go, I hope you, Jack and Jeb weren't really counting on anything this year...I've had some pretty ugly reports from the folks at the TSA, you know...and they want me to, to... Well, I can't actually talk about that. And besides -- I don't know anything about anatomy.

So let's leave it at this before we launch:

Merry Christmas to All! And to all, a good flight!

-- Dave

100th Episode Pic from EAA

2008-12-15T14:38:00.003-05:00

Here's a scan of one of the signed photos we received from Tom Poberezny and EAA. It's an incredibly touching gesture which the three of us agree we will value forever.

New Restaurants Section

2008-12-13T18:46:00.002-05:00

The popularity and success of the UCAP Airports Restaurant List has resulted in us spinning it out into its own section of the website.

Check it out here:

http://uncontrolledairspace.com/restaurants/

Reps Gone Wild! Or, The Sad Saga of Congress & Detroit

2008-12-10T11:28:00.003-05:00

OK, there's no getting around this image breaker, so let's get it out of the way right up front.

When the head men of Detroit's Big Three Automakers headed to D.C. in November, those hats they had in hand spent the trip in the coat closet of three large-cabin business jets. They didn't mean for it to look the way it looked -- callous, pampered execs so filled with the hubris of self-importance that they just couldn't help but pick the company jet without thinking of how it looked.

Call it force of habit; call it short sighted. Some of my pilot friends -- many of whom fly such executive jets for their weekly rice bowl -- call it "stupid, plain and simple stupid."

And watching a variety of Members of Congress take turns flailing the flesh of those poor, suffering multimillionaires was, well, alternatively painful and maddening.

The same Big Three Automaker head men, only slightly more contrite, last week returned to address those same Congressional panels, this time with something akin to actual plans for their own recovery. And with memories of the prior visit's loss of flesh still fresh in their minds, they all noted right up front that they'd all driven the trip -- and they all drove hybrids, it seems.

Wow! How about two weeks too late in the smarts department? Why would I say this?

Because, again with fresh memories of the visions of executive excess still dancing in their heads, some House lawmakers insist that any aid come with one particular string attached to go with many others. These watchdogs of the taxpayers' money -- what?!? -- these Members of Congress want the automakers to shed their corporate-aircraft fleets. No owning, no leasing. I'm surprised these custodians of our cash coffers didn't flail them for failing to car pool.

Sorry, but no sense, Members of Congress. No sense at all, this insistence on losing the private planes.

So how about a little quiz and maybe a salient solution for this issue?

First, would all the Members of Congress who have never benefited from the access and efficiency of a private aircraft -- any private aircraft, ultralight to ultralarge biz liner -- please raise your hands? Wow...that's not many of you...not many at all.

Second, would all if you who support such ill-informed ignorance of the facts tell me why this requirement -- along with the salary cuts, benefits reductions, etc. -- wasn't part of the language attached to the bailouts for Wall Street banks and investment houses? Eh? You're awfully quiet here.

Third, would you entertain a sensible alternative to your no-plane, no-sense proposal? It's a method dear to the heart of the White House, the GOP in general and even a significant number of Democrats: A cost-benefit analysis.

Impose a limit on the fleet; restrict use if you want -- but make the restriction based on the costs versus the benefits of taking the company jet. Too complicated, to obvious you say? How would we know, who would decide and how fast can such analysis be done, you asked?

Man, I'm so glad you asked. There just happens to be a computer-based software tool that performs exactly this function and it's employed by hundreds of companies daily to help them decide when company staff goes commercial Human Mailing Tube and when they go private aircraft. The National Business Aviation Association commissioned its creation to solve this very real question for company finance managers, execs and board members.

It's called "Travel$ense" and it's available through NBAA. And it's nothing short of brilliant in the depth and range of factors used in the equations.

First, the user plugs in the aircraft type, and the program helps with operating costs based on user-supplied figures for fuel, insurance, maintenance reserves, crew costs and wait times. Travel$ense also factors in such variables as hotels and meals if required. And finally, it looks at real-time air fares for proposed trips, rental cars if needed to get from the airline airport to the ultimate destination -- important since the company plane can go places the Airlines don't -- as well as the cost of staff time using the airlines versus the company jet. And if the airline trip can't get the employees home same day, it also will look at real-time room and meals costs -- for one person or dozens.

Then it caculates the real-time, relative costs of (a) going by Commercial Human Mailing Tube and all necessary sundries; and (b) the actual costs of using the company plane, along with any necessary sundries. As most of us know, many times the private plane can accomplish the trip in less time -- say same day, in many cases -- where the airline times lose out.

But when all is said and done, the CFO, CEO and Chairman of the Board can all see which mode makes the most financial sense to the company.

Requiring the use of Travel$ense or some comparable, equally effective way to calculate the cost-benefit numbers for the company plane and the airlines makes huge sense for a company trying to make the most with little.

Allowing the companies to keep what they need for company travel and requiring the calculations to show the gain for using those aircraft would likely bring an end to such madness as allowing multimillionaire execs to ride home for the weekend -- at company expense -- but it would preserve the sensible, cost-beneficial aspects of corporate aircraft for companies with very real financial issues, as well as security and efficiency issues solvable far more inexpensively by using business-aviation aircraft.

And it would also help change the equation in how the public views the whole field of private aviation after hearing repeatedly that the company planes are used only when they make financial sense.

Of course, that requirement could still result in a dent in FBO business when companies found they could no longer find themselves required to attend a meeting in Louisville, Ky. -- curiously the day before the Kentucky Derby -- or in Indianapolis the week of the 500, or in whatever city the Super Bowl lands in -- the day before the Super Bowl.

In other words, CEOs and high-flying execs would no longer be free to be stupid about their business-aircraft use. And that would reduce the so-called excesses of corporate aviation to only those able to pay their own way -- the very rich -- and Members of Congress, who we know aren't always quite that bright.

Final Flight

2008-12-09T11:51:00.002-05:00

Here's a posting forwarded to me by listener Richard H. It's from Mark V. on the Aeronca List. Hope they don't mind me republishing it here.

======

Date: Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 9:41 PM
Subject: [f-AA] ###"The Final Touchdown"###

Two items non Aeronca related I'd like to pass along to this group who I suspect will appreciate them. The first is a self written text from a local aviator who recently passed. Following the text is is a short 4 minute youtube video a friend of mine made 3 winters ago that is befitting the text.

Respectfully,

Mark

Dutch Redfield was a Professional Flight Instructor at Pan Am. A respected author, terrific human being, and a lover of every aspect of aviation. Fitting for him to write his final chapter.

Holland "Dutch" Redfield
1916-2008

"The Final Touchdown"

During a lifetime in aviation, I have experienced only one forced landing. It was not difficult. The dead-stick glide began at three thousand feet. There were several suitable fields from which to choose. Things worked out nicely. Yet I know that I have one more forced landing lurking and waiting for me out there. I believe that at
this stage of my life, I am ready for it. Perhaps there will be warning, maybe not.

Will there be time for me to plan a good approach to this final touchdown? Will it be a hasty no power, no options, straight ahead steep descent to a walloping hard touchdown? Or will it be a soft afternoon peaceful glide?

Whatever, for this final glide, I ask only for an open cockpit, so I can, however briefly, savor for the last time the feels of flight, as biplane wings forward of me exquisitely frame and record the slowly changing, tilting scenes as I maneuver and silently bank and glide onto what I have long known will be my very final approach.

Please, no helmet, so old ears can best sense vital changes in speed, relayed through the lovely sounds of whistling interplane struts and wires, and so cheeks and bared head can best read changing airflows swirling behind the cockpit's tiny windshield.

Below, in a forest of trees lies a grassy field long ago set aside for biplane flyers of old. It looks small, tiny. With lightly crossed aileron and rudder I'll slip her a few inches over the fence. I'll level her off, then hold her off, with wheels skimming the grass tips.

The lift of the wings, the sounds of flight, rapidly diminish. With stick full back, lift fades, a slight tremor, then she and I are bumping and rolling across the beautifully sodded field. The wooden propeller remains still.

We roll to a stop. I have no belt to loosen. I raise goggles and slowly climb out. Suddenly there is applause, then bear hugs and slaps on the back. "Hey, you old goat, you really slicked that one on!" I am with old friends.

Dutch Redfield

Dutch passed away in his sleep on November 13th.

(Minnesota looks just like this video tonight)

_______________________________________________
Aeronca mailing list
Aeronca@westmont.edu
http://mail.westmont.edu/mailman/listinfo/aeronca

YAJP (Yet another jet pack)

2008-12-06T09:31:00.001-05:00

[Video found at Dvorak Uncensored

What ARE they drinking at EPA -- and DHS?

2008-12-03T17:35:00.003-05:00

The entertainment never stops! Not even with only 48 days to go before a major changeover in the powers in Washington, D.C.

Our fine friends at the federal level are really beginning to make me worry about their mental faculties -- and I'm not talking about the fine folks at our Friendliest Aeronautical Agency.

I'm talking about the dutiful people who worry about threats from our air and water at the Environmental Protection Agency and the nice folks who worry about threats from bad people at the Department of Homeland Security.

For most of the past eight years, the EPA has acted to reduce or otherwise eliminate protections, while the DHS has worked to guard us against, largely, us. We see the results of the latest DHS concern in the form of its Large Aircraft Security Program proposal;. from the EPA, its a proposal growing out of a court decision essentially forcing the department to regulate Greenhouse Gases, or GHGs -- something the agency's bosses have steadfastly resisted for most of the last six years.

So what does the EPA do, when forced to? Propose GHG regulations with no -- zero, zip, nada -- sense of proportionality. Stay with me for a few graphs and you'll see what I mean -- and where the lines cross.

Years ago, the EPA evaluated GHG emissions and found that general aviation contributed only 4 percent of all the GHG produced by aviation – and that aviation in total produced only small minority percentage of the overall contribution of transportation equipment…which, in turn, was not a majority contributor of total GHGs emitted by the U.S.

We could have told the EPA that proposing to regulate GHG -- and, also, lead emissions -- for GA was impractical due to the small scale of use and the high cost of any conversion or equipment changes to the aircraft.

After all, according to various sources, U.S. use of avgas in 2006 totaled only 236 million gallons or so; that’s less than one half of one percent of what our cars use – and far, far less than what the kerosene-burners in Diesel- and turbine-powered vehicles burn.

So why – no, seriously, why? – is the EPA wasting valuable staff time and federal dollars, staff time and association dollars, and my time and dollars, even proposing such a non-useful set of rules change encompassing general aviation.?

No, seriously! Why?

Isn’t the administration that loves to tout its devotion to the cost/benefit equation?

Unless the Bush EPA wants to tell me why it’s OK to let coal mine operators dump tailings into a stream, as it's about to allow in a loosening of rules, but horrible to let a relative handful of pilots contribute an inconsequential amount of GHG (or tetra ethyl lead) to the environment, it’s hard to believe these ostensibly smart people are serious.

I mean, geez! It took me only three minutes of Internet search time to come up with figures confirming – yes, factually – that avgas, in particular, and Jet A as used by general aviation – amount to a miniscule percentage of the fossil fuels pumped and burned in this country.

As concluded by an earlier EPA analysis of GHG emissions in the U.S., a good method for assessing the contribution of transportation segments is the amount of fuel they burn. Check with the handful of refiners; check with theFBOs; check with the distributors, pilots -- hell, try Wikipedia, for taxpayers' sake!

Guess what, EPA?

GA comes in dead last in the race – behind recreational boats, behind commercial marine vessels, behind our personal cars and commercial Diesel trucks, which all ran ahead of commercial jets.

EPA didn’t even need AOPA’s response. AOPA used EPA’s own GHG emission inventory to point out that general aviation’s contribution is a miniscule 0.74 percent of the overall transportation sector – which means GA’s contribution to the whole of GHG emissions is even smaller! When you peg the piston segment, well, that’s smaller still.

This proposal makes an observer wonder whether the EPA people who proposed this rather draconian idea for a totally inconsequential mode of travel might be sharing a water cooler with their federal colleagues over at the Department of Horrible inSecurities?

Both the EPA's GHG proposal and the DHS’s proposed Large Aircraft Security Program rules stand as sparkling examples of a skewed philosophy of applying to totally non-existent problems wholly ineffective solutions.

But then, why should I expect anything better in the final year of an eight-year run than we’ve gotten in the previous seven?

So if the EPA is open to a suggestion, withdraw your GHG NPRM, rewrite it with at least a nod to the segment with an inconsequential impact, and then resubmit. You'll be cost effective by saving us and you a lot of wasted staff time and money.

Although my expectations are zero for this, maybe EPA’s example would serve to enlighten the DHS and result in that department in withdrawing its LASP proposal – at least, that is, until the DHS can answer the basic question of how its proposal would do anything to improve security.

At least EPA has an answer to how the rules its proposed could improve air quality.

To its credit, DHS did recognize a point of diminishing returns for its theory on "enhancing" aviation security by ignoring airplanes weighing 12,500 pounds or less. But so far, DHS has failed to say anything more useful than the LASP proposed would “serve to enhance” aviation security as a justification.

And that statement carries the weight of credibility not even equal to the weight of hydrogen. Which means it might fly – but it won’t carry anything.

-- Dave Higdon

Bax on Intimidating FBOs

2008-11-29T10:33:00.006-05:00

We often talk on the podcast about the sad state of FBO marketing. About how intimidating it is to walk into your average flight operation.

Rereading one of my all-time favorite aviation writers, Gordon "Bax" Baxter, in his book "How to Fly". Bax wrote this back in 1980.

The FBO does not think of himself as an "airplane store". He usually does not advertise, promote, or even leap up and greet you at the door with a "May I help you?" He thinks of himself first as an aviator. A pilot, who is just doing all this charter flying, airplane renting and student instruction to keep him and his true love, the airplane, together at night.

He still sees himself somewhat as we first saw him when he stood up in the cockpit of that biplane and raised his goggles and grinned down at us. The message was, "If you boys are really worthy, I will let you enter into all this with me."

Although the cost is much the same, walking into the airplane store to buy flying lessons is not going to be very much like walking into the car store to buy a new Cadillac. Aside from the indifference, there is outright snobbery of the kind that smites any "new boy" at the golf pro shop or at the sailing marina. As in any other form of clubhouse snobbery the atmosphere is greatly improved if an old member of this club brings you out as a personal friend and handshakes you all around.

A thaw will begin as soon as they see that you are serious about wanting to learn how to fly. You will become a full member of this club as soon as you come in, shaking your head and laughing, from your first hour of instruction. They will be laughing with you, not at you, and you will soon sense that there is a comradely protection extended toward the student from the entire aviation community. Everything that you do as a beginner happened to us, too, and the memory stays scented green forever.

"How to Fly" by Gordon Baxter, 1981, Summit Books.

Wx Forecast: Winter Wonder Skies

2008-11-18T12:23:00.002-05:00

What a sobering sight with so much Fall left to use: Snow...snow in Pittsburgh Sunday during the Steelers game; snow falling Monday and Tuesday -- and in the northern part of my native state, Indiana...

Guess my instinct comes down to, "Don't complain...you suspected this was coming..." Well, yeah -- we've had our suspicions...for weeks.

For weeks, the neighborhood squirrels have been packing away acorns and walnuts like shoppers grabbing deals at a Going Out of Business sale. Migratory birds filled the park next door, gorging themselves on seeds and berries -- a collection that delighted the resident daylight predators, a Cooper's Hawk and a Broadwinged Hawk...their hunting has been great. And overhead, the southbound retreat of Canada Geese, ducks and other waterfowl at times resembled the Eighth Air Force assaults on Germany during World War II. With flight after flight, in long wedged-shaped patterns, stretching back to the north, these endless waves of long-distance travelers often resembled the lines of airliners stretching out from DFW, when the bursts of strobes and flashes of beacons illuminated the aerial highway through dusk and well into the dark.

Combined, the urgent actions of squirrels and birds seem to hint at a whopper of a Winter ahead -- possibly one as snow-storm intense as the last, when waves of storms taxed road and runway crews alike, tapped salt supplies to near exhaustion, and gave even well-equipped, seasoned and experienced aviators purposeful pauses in the flying plans.

This is the time of year when pre-flight inspections often require us to unwillingly abandon gloves to handle cold-soaked metal, try to coax from their reluctant reels the temperature-stiffened air hoses we need to replenish our tires; when we resurrect in our vocabulary undesirable words like "pre-heat," "known" and "forecast icing," and when we become aware that "braking conditions good" isn't merely an adjective for a China shop. Not when those conditions can so often be the opposite.

But these harsh Winter conditions always -- remember, always -- give way to more hospitable conditions.

And there are some major appeals to flying after Winter storms pass. Usually, we get the kind of winds that east-bound pilots dream of, that they dread later, when west-bound. So there's a 50 percent benefit potential right there.

The airplanes themselves, when warmed and coaxed to life with proper TLC, in fact love Winter conditions; engines perform better, climb rates improve -- heck, you can see density altitudes actually well below field elevation. What's not to like about that?

But the greatest appeal for me is the view from aloft, post-snow-storm.

Above, the sky never appears bluer or cleaner than on the backside of a Winter front. It's a blue so bright and clear that it blatantly begs to be cruised.

And when we accept that invitation into the Winter Blue, we are treated to a view below unavailable from a naked Earth. Below us, the Winter landscape takes on a snowy softness, with rounded features and diaphanous shadows in the early and late hours of the day. The wind often sculpts the snow around, over and behind objects as diverse as rolls of bailed hay -- watch for the wedge-shaped shadows on the leaward side of those huge wheels -- fences, treelines, buildings and roads.

Snow-cloaked mountains and hills may shield their contours -- but they never better show off their leafless trees and rock faces. And mountains take on an altogether different look when powder coated in white.

And there can be as much to see on a night flight as during the day. A moonless Winter night reveals a sky so black that it sucks light like a sponge, reflecting nothing -- but revealing the leaking light of billions of celestial bodies with such clarity that you feel tempted to climb forever just to see them more closely.

But it's the Moon-lit nights that appeal most to me. Cruising in a darkened sky, that otherwise cold-hearted orb rules the night landscape, reflecting its silver light to our sight with details that twinkle back a quick wave, a flash of light that's gone in an instant -- but repeated with our passage over every river and pond and lake. Moon lights the snow-sheathed landscape which shimmers with the sheen of our natural satellite, with shadows softly sculpted that undulate with the rise and fall of Terra.

The darker the cockpit, the more our eyes reveal; the more our eyes reveal, the more entrancing and enchanting the whole experience -- and the less willing we may be to end the experience.

While numb fingers, chilled ears and chapped noses may be a painful price to pay for the proscribed pre-flight proceeding Winter flight, only Winter flight itself can balance that discomfort with a scenic feast that can live on in our minds long after the chill has gone.

Be smart; be careful; most of all, be prepared. Don't fear the Winter. What you stand to gain is a reward unparalleled. Personally, I'm looking forward to an open runway surrounded by snow for just that reason.

-- Dave Higdon

List of Airport Restaurants

2008-11-16T10:05:00.002-05:00

I've started a new section in the wiki. A list of airport restaurants. I've put a few in there to get it started, but let's see what we can do here.

You Might Be A Pilot If...

2008-11-14T12:27:00.004-05:00

Steven "Airspeed" Force has collected a list called "You Might Be A Pilot If..."

For example:

"You read back your fast food order at the drive-through and end it with your license plate number."

There's lots more. Check it out.

FOLLOWUP: Many people have added new entries to the comments section of Steve's post. My favorite is from our own Dave H:

"...when you're on a rough road and call the State Police road-condition hotline and ask for higher..."

A Day For the Vets...

2008-11-11T12:29:00.002-05:00

You could barely tell that Veteran's Day approached, looking at the Sunday newspaper. Just the usual pitches for big discounts at businesses who noticed the unfortunately timed Tuesday date for the day set aside to honor those who've stood for their country, their state, town, but mostly for their loved ones -- the families left behind.

It's always a little bit dyslexic, this holiday. As worthy and important as Memorial Day, as significant as any President's Birthday, Veteran's Day escaped the long-ago rush to align some holidays with weekends, thus creating a long-weekend opportunity to the benefit of families and businesses, alike. But partly because Veteran's Day continues to fall on its original date, it suffers a little from a disconnection that does not afflict Memorial and Labor day holidays -- the two that now perpetually fall on a Monday.

But from the list of low key commemorations around the nation, it's clear that Veteran's Day does not suffer from a disconnect with large numbers of people. They remember. We remember.

We always should.

Veterans, of course, whether personally subjected to a moment of recognition, still stop and think about their time, their friends alive and lost, and their good fortune at surviving their personal time in the military.

My military stint kept me far from direct conflict and largely out of harm's way. But not so for many of my childhood friends, neighborhood mates whose names now serve part of the collective memory of Vietnam commemorated on those sobering black-granite walls in Washington, D.C. They come to mind often. They remain forever my young buddies.

But the people who come to mind most often are the ones of my father's generation -- The Greatest Generation, as coined by author and journalist Tom Brokaw.

Growing up, my neighborhood friends and I were regularly glued to the tube to watch the show "Combat" or "12 O'Clock High" and we regularly filled front-row seats at the LeRose Theater in my hometown where, around Veteran's Day each year, we could count on a heavy dose of movies like "12 O'Clock High" or "The Longest Day" and "Sands of Iwo Jima, " or one of my favorites of the day, "The Flying Tigers."

Not until years later did we grow beyond our youthful fascination with global war as seen through the eyes of Hollywood and come to see the reality, either through our own eyes or the eyes of our fathers, uncles, grandparents -- the men and women who fought and survived with scars both visible and invisible to the human eye.

Thoughts of my father, wading shore from a Higgins Boat on beaches in Africa, then Sicily, Italy and, ultimately, Normandy, always flit through my mind when watching modern retellings of these horror. Whether through films like "Saving Private Ryan" or the masterpiece series "Band of Brothers," the inglorious horror and savagery that comes through those works gives me shivers of fear. And I can see bits of my father in the eyes of many of the actors portraying real soldiers in a real war.

The movie "Midnight Clear" and "The Battle of the Bulge," and the "Brothers" segment on Bastogne collectively helped me understand my father's long-time distaste for snowy days and chilling cold. But it was "Band of Brothers" that sealed it. While my buds and brothers reveled in the chilled powder sledding behind our house, my father involuntarily flashed back to December 1944 when he served under Gen. George Patton and helped the Airborne liberate themselves from Bastogne. The cold cut through the underclothed relief troops just as it did the Airborne soldiers.

Less than a month after entering Bastogne and finally into Germany, a Nazi mortar shell ended my father's war. By the time we was recovered enough to return to his unit, the war was over.

The segments in the 1949 movie "12 O'Clock High" that portray Gregory Peck's character, Gen. Savage, has come to represent my paternal uncle, Phil. He learned to fly before the war through the Civilian Pilot Training Corps and was called to fly to bombers in 1941. He arrived in England in 1942 and flew B-17s on long, dangerous, palm-sweating missions deep into Germany and back again to England. He lasted 17 missions -- better than many -- before the wicked toll of Germany 88s and Me109s forced him and only two other survivors of his crew to bail out over occupied France. Safe on French soil, he made contact with the Underground and was about to get smuggled out of the country when the Gestapo changed his plans.

He lived out the war in a Luftstalag-- better than many -- and served as the inspiration for my father's decision to transfer to a unit going ashore on D Day. The younger brother determined to find and liberate the older. Of course, that didn't happen; war has a way with dictating its own terms.

Unlike many vets of the air war, my Uncle Phil continued to fly as a civilian and, fortunately for me, gave me that first airplane ride that spurred me to fly.

Others also come to mind. My friend Chauncey, now in his 80s, was a 22-year-old Captain in the Army Air Corps, flying B-29s in the Pacific Theater; he survived to view Japan's surrender from the right seat of his bomber, "Goin' Jessie!" My uncle, who was the gunner in a Navy TBM, survived a shoot-down and a splash; later, he loved to fish but hated to swim. A couple of other friends who survived flying P-47s in Europe and Corsairs in the Pacific continued to fly -- but they wear their status unwillingly. My late neighbor, Emeline, who nursed the wounded with shells falling around her in the Phillipines.

Not "heroes" in their minds, like my father and uncles and other friends, they were called or volunteered to do what had to be done -- nothing more, nothing less.

Most of us can rest easy tonight because of people like these; most of us -- and our families -- can go through life with little worry about the need to face down a rifle-toting soldier or an aggressive fighter pilot.

Most of us -- even those of us who served in the far flung fields of fighting in Southeast Asia, in Korea, even in the Middle East theaters of Afghanistan and Iraq -- can feel fortunate that we''ll never have to fight in a war that engulfs an entire world.

Most of us are here because of those scared, scarred, stoic and step-up men and women who served and died and lived through World War I or II.

This day actually started as Armistice Day -- commemorating the day Germany surrendered in a rail car in France, at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.

But by whatever name we call it, it's still The Day to remember the sacrifices of ourselves and our forefathers.

The freedom we enjoy to fly unbound across this great nation exists only because of them.

Eleven passed shortly ago, but not without my own silent salute to all Veterans, past, present and future: Here here, to us, to them.

-- Dave

Flying Into Fall...

2008-11-01T13:05:00.002-04:00

Cross-country flying offers so many vistas to enjoy, regardless of whether you're screaming along in the low five-digit altitudes or cruising lazily and low at a relative crawl. The passing of night into dawn and, eventually, full daylight; the reverse process with its scenes of lengthening shadows and encroaching dark while the sky itself turns in a spectral performance of changing shades of fading colors until the denizens of the darkest skies punctuate the black fabric with their flickering pinpricks of light.

Watching towboats edge dozens of barges upriver against the ceaseless Mississippi current, the bumper-to-bumper tail-and-head lighting of traffic stretching out for miles in two directions, the changing texture of landscape from plains and prairies to urban islands and on to the undulations of the mountains seams that stitch together disparate pieces of Earth or the marshes of coastal lowlands that sparkle and shine between their patches of ever-wet green.

While worthwhile high-sky watching at any time of year, Fall in particular seems to populate some of those memories strongest in the old cranial logbooks of past flights.

No particular reason jumps out for this tilt; but the distinctive nature of the season seems most likely the cause.

Memories of silently slicing the sky scant feet above a mountain overflowing with the browns, reds and golds of the seasonal change; the air wafts at all altitudes with the distinctive scent of the season -- a pungent, pleasant aroma of leaves passing from their glorious Spring green to the dried-and-brittle finality of their brief lives.

The mental images of cruising a few thousand feet up purposefully proceeding and, in a few short hours, overflying a landscape glowing with the bright greens of lush life, transiting to the territories topped with the reds, golds and yellows of trees in the full thrall of fall, before passing over dark-green-t0-blue swaths of evergreens standing closer to the aircraft, and finally arriving at latitudes where Nature passed southbound days earlier, leaving behind bare and stark the upturned branches of the forest below. At some times of day, those trees almost seem to reach up toward the airplane and wave a plaintive greeting and a pained request to not look to closely at their naked state.

Thankfully for the trees, they always bloom green again. Thankfully, this seasonal transition lasts only long enough to experience fully before lamenting its pass.

Thankfully, that Fall experience comes around every year, varying each time in intensity and duration.

Regardless of the depth and breadth of the Fall flying experience, those hours spent watching the world pass below are never wasted time when the views produce the proper proteins for later replay. And those memories are always s important to retain.

Think of the loss if a soul were to never again go aloft and those mental replays were to fail. Lost forever would be the warmth and joy of those moments. Along the way, a little of ourself would be lost, as well.

Thankfully, those privileged to taste the high life of flight need not worry that it fades -- it never goes away as long as those tapes can keep playing. And as long as someone can help us into the cockpit, we can always enjoy a little refresh run, even if we're not the ones still moving the controls.

Fall is back. Enjoy it before it's gone until next year.

-- Dave Higdon

The Ultimate Head Game -- Safer Piloting

2008-10-24T14:50:00.003-04:00

KANSAS CITY -- You might mistake the crowd assembled outside the ballroom of the Hyatt Regency Crown Center for a collection of insurance agents, bankers, medical professionals or any other type of business people. Six-hundred souls, milling around the multiple tables of the Continental Breakfast and stands of Starbucks coffee dispensers, mostly 40- and 50-somethings, a good contingent of 30ish and more than a few whose years stretched into their 60s and, fewer, their 70s.

But the overwhelming presence of aviation-themed embroidery adorning the ad hoc golf-shirt uniform offered strong hints of the aeronautical nature of this gathering. Some of those stitched statements heralded the wearers' membership in a corporate flight department while others attested to the equipment they flew.

And despite the sponsorship of this event by one particular planemaker, the aircraft varied in origin widely and without regard for the name dominant on the banners welcoming pilots to the 12th Annual Bombardier Safety Standdown. This year's Global War on Error occured at a new location after a decade-plus in its hometown -- Wichita, The Air Capital.

The change in venue, however, portended nothing in the way of a change in focus -- the same focus of its former founder, overseer, sparkplug and team leader, Bob Agostino. Bob likely was the name most mentioned by veteran Standdown presenters and participants -- participants which included at least one other veteran of the Bombardier Flight Demonstration Team, the Learjet-based unit that labors long and hard to host this free four-day indoctrination in an oft-overlooked aspect of safe flight: the human aspect of safety.

When first conceived and executed at Learjet in 1997, the Standdown hosted six Learjet flight-deparment pilots, and the two-day focus as on preventable errors that contributed to preventable accidents.

Eleven years and 12 Standdowns later and that focus remains unchanged.

The scope, though, now reaches far beyond six in-house aviators to corporate and private pilots from across the spectrum and around the world. Six-hundred this year -- out of about 1,000 application. More than 550 came last and more than 500 the year before. Since Bombardier first took Standdown public 10 events back, attendance has soared -- and demand has long exceeded capacity.

The value -- the reason behind that demand -- stems from the non-traditional aspect of the training. Although simulators of sorts are involved, there are no Level D Sims instucting on the finer points of the dreaded one-engine-inop ILS to minimums in Level 3 weather; no discussion of mechanical failures or ship mechanics. No, the sims involved during the workshop-structured first day expose participants to smoke-filled cabin evacuation scenarios -- complete with rocking cabins and safe but irritating smoke. They also use sims of a sort to teach CPR skills, the use of portable automatic defibrilators, emergency oxygen, water egress from an overturned cockpit and the proper use of a liferaft.

Experts dominate the remaining three days, with lectures on fatique, on flight psychology, on the marks of an airman, the importance of judging correctly the runway conditions, stabilized approaches, even the importance of sleep cycle management and medical issues to help pilots stay safe and retain their certificates.

After attending as a journalist, as a photographer, my presence this year as a pilot provided me with an opportunity to focus on the training and lectures in a way difficult when attempting to "cover" an event. As in past Standdowns, though, I came away with knew and important knowledge and information, an appreciation for my own skills, and a welcome realization that as we age, we should never become the Old Dog for whom there are no New Tricks.

To that end, one of the true "closers" of this mindset has become a tradition over the past few years, a talk about the benefits and desireability of professionalism by a gentleman I've come to know a bit through our mutual attendance -- an aviator of unparalleld perspective, one Capt. Gene Cernan, Naval aviator, Gemini program astronaut, commander of Apollo 17 and the last human to leave a footprint on the Moon. Now in his mid-70s, Capt. Cernan continues to fly regularly in the Cessna 421 he owns and to advocate for general aviation and aviation safety.

The 12th Standdown, as it has in the past, left me as in awe as ever at the effort expended by the staff charged with organizing a couple of dozen presenters and lecturers, the briefcases stuffed with the documents we'd see in the presentations, and in providing a truly singular opportunity for several thousand aviators to learn more about their own minds and bodies and how to use them to conduct flights with fewer risks of harm.

Miraculously, Bombardier continues to offer, stage and support The Global War on Error at no cost to the participants like me. The cost of transportation and lodging covers the entry fee into Standdown. Continental Breakfasts; healthy lunches, a welcome reception and a safety-awards banquet are all included in the free admission. There's even an annual T-shirt and that smart-looking black briefcase adorned with the War on Error Standdown logo for us to carry around, proclaiming to the world our belief in safety and desire to be the best aviators we can be -- on our own time, no less.

Thanks to Bombardier, to Learjet, to NBAA, the FAA and the NTSB for throwing their support behind this event. Another thanks goes to to Bob Agostino and the mindset he brought and the team he brought to the party. And that brings me to those who deserve thanks the most of all: to the dozens of Learjet staff who work long, hard and selflessly to give us mortal aviators something unavailable anywhere else -- a chance to hear how we can improve our flying by improving our minds.

-- Dave Higdon

Sometimes ya needs the speeds ya needs...

2008-10-11T12:56:00.002-04:00

What a difference a mission can make. What a difference a few days can make.

What a difference GA makes.

The Mission: attend the 61st convention of the National Business Aviation Association, in Orlando, roughly 1,100 nautical away from The Air Capital. Down on Sunday, the day before Opening Day; back on Wednesday, Closing Day. And in between, squeeze in as many conversations, work as many stories, catch up as much as possible on the wild, wonderful world of business flying.

Suitable to our mission was our mode of transportation: My Friend's Piper Malibu -- converted from a Continental six to a Pratt & Whitney PT6A turboprop and now called "JetProp." The benefits of My Friend's wings are both wholly utilitarian and suitably comfortable. After all, who can't sit for four hours when winds, true airspeed and fuel combine to give you a non-stop leg to our destination airport, Kissimmee Gateway Airport (ISM).

The Day: One with the potential for challenges. But thanks to an adjusted departure time and the savvy of both on-board aviators, we not only beat weather closing in from the West on departure from Jabara Airport (AAO), we beat developing weather on arrival. Three-hours, fifty-seven minutes, multiple cloud layers, premature descent instructions, frequent vectors, and VFR conditions for the final five miles -- yeah, 5 -- couldn't erase the gains accomplished through 260-knot true airspeeds and the 20-plus knots of push we experienced up at FL260.

The lovely folks at Kissimmee Jet Center even brought our matching-model Rental Wheels directly to the aircraft so we could offload before even seeing the Rental Wheels forms. Nice...and couldn't complain about the severely low daily rental rate or the (these days) shockingly low fuel prices: $4.65 for the Jet A JetProp needs, and $4.85 for that 100LL elixer needed for the suck-squeeze-bang-blow set. As someone later noted, it's amazing at how adaptable we all are when news of under-$5-per-gallon go-juice makes us go wide-eyed in Amazement!

Returning four days later, fuel prices remained the same, checking in the Rental Wheels could not have been easier, and with no add-on ramp or handling fees (like other FBOs on the field that we won't name to avoid embrassing them...), an IFR flight plan on file for Little Rock's Adams Field (LIT), and we were on our way -- with quite the different day ahead.

This was a textbook day for marketing Datalink Weather services and Sferics devices. Lacking either one of these and lacking on-board radar would make now an unwise time to play tag with the clouds.

Thanks to our Doppler Weather Radar image, updated every few minutes on the Multifunction Display, My Friend and I watched and listened as traffic ahead sought and received permission to vector as needed to avoid the line of storms, Level 1 to Level 4, churning from the Florida Panhandle up into East Alabama, West Georgia, and stretching from the Gulf up into Tennessee...

Courtesy of the Stormscope, we noted the areas of most-probable turbulence. With these two informative images to guide us, My Friend and Jacksonville Center coordinated a lengthy excursion of our GPS-direct course between the Seminole VOR near Tallahassee (TLH) and LIT...and what an excursion we needed, at times putting us right of course up to 30 degrees and left of course as much as 70 degrees.

This was no time to fret over time lost and headwinds gain through these heading changes.

This was a time to use every tool and every learned judgment in a play to avoid the discomfort of an errant error in decision making. This was a "Don't-Come-Here" system punctuated by spots both merely soft and totally absent of threat -- at least, up at FL260.

While we twisted and turned, Vectored and return and recross our route over the course of 40 minutes, my mind often turned to those at half our altitude and lower, down at those flight levels more familiar to the majority of us.

Part of me marvelled at how painlessly we transited the system and theorized at, from the images available, a comparably equipped piston bird could make the same crossing, albeit at the expense of a longer period of time and turbulence.

And part of me wondered, so equipped, whether I'd exercise the option that day and make my play, or whether I'd opt to sit out things at George T. Lewis Field on Cedar Key (CDK), enjoying a mid-day beverage and congratulating myself on my patience and judgement.

In the end, it came to me, the decision would have been a "Go" because past experience increased my comfort level -- and the forecast for the next day was even worse.

Somedays, it does pay to pay the piper and put the Piper through its paces.

And that applies, high and low -- at FL260 or at 8,000 msl -- when the equipment gives your the pictures you need to negoitiate wisely.

On this day, size and speed mattered less than informed judgement. Lacking the "informed" aspect, however, absent the technological edge, well, that would have been rolling loaded dice, with Mother Nature serving as the House in this game of chance.

Dave

Photos from Steve Fossett recovery effort

2008-10-10T08:42:00.003-04:00

Here's an interesting series of pics from one of the Steve Fossett recovery crew members. There's not a lot of actual photos of the wreckage here, but it's interesting to see the terrain, and get a feel for the activity in the search/recovery area.

Clean Flying Down at the Grass Roots of GA...

2008-09-29T17:52:00.003-04:00

The jaunty little Cessna 120 occupied a front space in the maintenance hangar at Dead Cow International, so anyone familiar with the pecking order knew this airplane was the top priority in the shop -- as opposed to the planes behind the 120: a Cessna 180 and an Ercoupe 415A.

A mutual flying friend, struggling with illness, old age and finances, sold his personal 180 to the Leprechaun after years of using it as a jump and photo plane. The 180 arrived at Dead Cow with something north of 65 squawks to resolve, in need of some exterior paint and TLC, and a whole lot of patience. Now, with the 180's physical rehabilitation complete, it awaits only a couple of items: completion of all the paperwork -- "That's my next project," said The Leprechaun -- which is the same status of the Ercoupe, which belongs to another elderly aviator friend. And some of its work and paperwork are of dubious validity. So The Leprechaun has his work cut out for him with those.

That's why they sit far back in the hangar. We call that last spot, farthest from the hangar door, "The Well of the Souls," a phrase coined by a known aviator who suffered through some major repair of his own plane for about seven months -- six of which back in The Well of the Souls. We've always theorized that the coiner was a fan of Indiana Jones and could relate to the remoteness and isolation Indy and his girfriend experienced surrounded by snakes in that film's Well of the Souls.

There's some synergies here...

So planes like the jaunty little 120 always stand out to visitors. We know it's not long for the shop, in for something as minor as a mag timing check or an annual, and headed back out the door to the runway as quickly as The Leprechaun and crew can manage it.

So it was with this jaunty little 120 Cessna. It seemed to speak to fun, simple flying through its bright-white paint, adorned with a single red trim stripe down the length of the fuselage, across the top and back up to the cowl again on the opposite side.

After only four days -- four days because of a wait for a part -- the owner arrived to reclaim his jaunty little 120. That the day of freedom was here was apparent pulling into the Dead Cow parking lot. The 120 gleamed sparkling clean in the evening sunlight sitting on the ramp in front of the open hangar door. Test run, test flown, paperwork done, she seemed as anxious to soar across the green-gold landscape of early Fall and after a suitable amount of trips between car and cockpit, the owner seemed to have all in hand to help the jaunty little 120 make its escape.

The owner turned the prop a couple of blades, belted in, locked the door and turned the key; with hardly a second blade passing by, those 85 horses in the little Continental came to life and settled into the low rhythm of its idle, while the owner contacted Clearance Delivery, obtained a squawk code and taxied to the departure end of 17 after first making a 360 turn to check that the pattern was clear. That Citation X headed to the arrival for ICT was of no consequence, so up the runway he went, contacted the tower, and started his take-0ff run...

...from the grass strip parallel to Dead Cow's paved 17/35...

"He likes his flying grass roots," The Leprechaun noted...

Grass roots, it occured to me, right down to the grass strip.

"Sure is a clean little bird," a voice said aloud.

"The cleanest...true grass roots," said the Leprechaun. "Since we're not flying, why don't you buy us a beer," he said quietly. Two bottles of a crisp, clean lager opened, we settled into the shade of the hangar to watch the jaunty little 120 ply its way downwind to its homefield...just in time to see Dead Cow's resident flight instructor, a not-so-jaunty little 150, turn final.

Happy little airplanes at a sleepy little airport with good company and a Beer:30 solution...

Grass Roots gets no better.

Dave

Cruising the End of Summer...

2008-09-22T17:47:00.002-04:00

A pilot could hardly ask for a better day on which to launch an end-of-summer day of flying as we had around the Air Capital on Sept. 20. A small pilot club to which I belong planned a mid-day fly-in and lunch meeting at a tiny little prairie strip about 25 miles north of Dead Cow International.

With an invitation from The Leprechaun and a loaner Aeronca Chief available, we twisted ourselves into the tandem cabin, fired up the 85-horse Continental, and motoring off Runway 35, launched for an late-morning cruise in the low-and-slow lane.

We weren't past Dead Cow on our northbound track when The Leprechaun asked me to take the plane so he could enjoy the landscape slipping past below while sipping the black coffee I'd brought him. Green fields, grain elevators, other small airports and an occasional airplane slipped by us as we beat a track northwest from The Air Capital.

Now for anyone who's tried, there's no surprise in the challenge of keeping a trimmed attitude from the back seat of a Champ; no instruments -- not even a skid ball, and a panel and horizon mostly hidden by the shoulders and head of The Leprechaun up front.

But a little maneuvering allowed me a view of the tach and altimeter over his left shoulder and the airspeed indicator over his right. Between them, these on-and-off views of the dials helped me maintain level flight; a view of two big grain elevators just south of our destination airport helped me maintain heading.

And the little 85 churned along, dragging us across the textured Kansas landscape to the long, wide grass runway awaiting us.

Confirmation of the accuracy of my method came about five miles out, where even from only 800 agl we could see the row of 20-plus airplanes parked along the east-west taxiway at our destination.

Now if only those X-ray glasses would come through -- then I could have logged at least one takeoff and landing, at the party destination and at another grass airport we visited en route back to Dead Cow.

Throughout, the bumps of solar-heated air were moderate, the winds light and easy to endure.

And all the way, the 85-horse heart of the little Champ beat heartily enough to show 100 mph on the airspeed dial.

Can't think of a better way to wrap up a week than a little low-and-slow cruising, a few hours hangar flying with fellow aviation addicts, and the view available only from a small plane with a couple of vintage aviators in tow.

Dave

A New Look

2008-09-18T12:51:00.004-04:00

We've made some changes here to the UCAP homepage.

Most important is that we've made a live connection between the "Episodes List" and the RSS Feed. The RSS Feed is the official list of eps, and now, when it is updated, the info here on the homepage will be updated at the same time. This should help those listeners who visit this page to check for new episodes.

The other change is that we've moved the blog here to the homepage. We're gonna reactivate it with more frequent postings about the podcast and aviation in general. Having it here on the homepage will make it easier to keep track of.

We always love hearing from our listeners. If you have any comments on this new look please leave them as comments to this blog post or on the Forums area.

When Bad things Get turned into Good things...

2008-06-08T12:50:00.002-04:00

Great story around this week, about a little airport in Alabama reopened!
And after sitting idle from being closed four years ago...amazing and worth considering.

Seems too often too many of us, jaded, perhaps, a a bit cynical, look at an outcome and say, "Well, that's the end of that...another one down the tubes..."

Here is proof positive that people can change outcomes with smart, diligent, never-say-die effort.

I'm betting there are other stories of a similar but less-extreme nature, worth hearing...

Maybe a local community that rallies to protect an airport threatened by an unfriendly airport-board member, incompatible development plans or because someone covets the real estate for "what it could be" -- if, of course, it was something less useful. Maybe its a story of how an airport, airplane or pilot helped someone, gave 'em a new chance, changed their life or saved one...maybe it's nothing more than a tale about one pilot making a new one by simply being the person who explains the joys of the GA community and small-plane flying to someone who converts, joins in and makes a difference of their own...

So here's an invitation to give us an earful...we'd love to hear any such stories, regardless of how small or seemingly inconsequential...UCAP has a place to make others aware -- so make us aware.

And remember the ultimate selling point of becoming a pilot: Time spent flying is NOT subtracted from your lifespan.

Dave

When Worlds Collide

2008-04-19T09:02:00.002-04:00

The tech/hacker DIY world, is about to meet the aircraft homebuilder crowd. Several EAA chapters are gonna appear at the next Makers Faire and introduce people to the world of building your own airplane.

The results could be very interesting.

From EAA.org:

Several California EAA chapters will participate in the 2008 Bay Area Maker Faire, coming May 3-4, at the San Mateo County Event Center and Fairgrounds in San Mateo. Maker Faire is a two-day, family friendly event that celebrates the do-it-yourself mindset. It’s for creative, resourceful people of all ages and backgrounds who like to tinker and love to make things, organizers say.

Participating EAAers will introduce Maker Faire attendees to aircraft homebuilding by displaying several experimental aircraft, and a hands-on riveting station. Member will also be available to answer questions about the aircraft they built, and about EAA’s support for people who make their own airplanes. The DVD, Oshkosh: The Spirit of Aviation, will also be shown continuously at the display.

Heading home, loaded with lots of new ideas.

2008-04-13T17:42:00.002-04:00

I'm sitting in the terminal in Sarasota FL waiting for my flight home. I just had a great week at Sun 'n Fun 2008.

We recorded two episodes (#76 & #77), and had a great time seeing all the sights, hanging with old friends, and meeting new ones.

I had many chances all week long to talk with people about the podcast, and it's filled my head with all sorts of ideas about places to go with this exercise.

The first one is not a new idea, but a return to an old one. This blog.

With the advent of the Forums area, this blog has gotten a little neglected, but I want to change that. In the coming days I hope to return to posting GA news and pointers here. Let's see.

-- Jack

Florida and its Use Tax Controversey...

2008-03-21T16:59:00.002-04:00

Putting this everywhere UCAP listeners might go, so here goes...

A few moments ago a press release from Sun 'n Fun landed in my e-mail addressing aviation-media reports about a tax issue in Florida that could expose aircraft owners to thousands of dollars in taxes if they visited the state during their first six months of ownership but had not elsewhere paid taxes on the airplane an equivalent to the Florida tax.

Well, turns out the problem wasn't exactly as portrayed; it sounded credible, given what we know is happening in other states...but not in this case.

Here's the skinny straight from the Sun 'n Fun release; and a note: John Burton, Sn'F president, is someone I've known nearly two decades and dishonesty has never been one of his faults.

So, with no further ado...
==================================================================

March 21, 2008

Sun ’n Fun has recently been made aware of media reports of a “Florida Tax Ripoff” and the impact this may have on the Sun ’n Fun Fly-In, which opens Tuesday, April 8, and runs through Sunday, April 13.

The reports erroneously describe “non (Florida)-resident pilots who have been caught in the FL tax trap” and who have been “targeted for ‘use tax’ by agents of the state’s Department of Revenue . . . despite the fact that the targeted aircraft were not owned or operated by state residents.”

This is inaccurate and misleading. Sun ’n Fun contacted the Florida Department of Revenue and received a definition of the regulation in question. Language within the Florida Tax Code quoted in the media reports clearly indicates this tax affects ONLY those owners who have:

Purchased their airplane in another state (outside of Florida) within the past six months but who have the aircraft titled, registered or licensed in Florida and have not paid Florida tax on that airplane.

This DOES NOT impact Sun ’n Fun Exhibitors who bring aircraft to Lakeland.

It DOES NOT impact aircraft owners whose airplane is more than six months old, which comprises a vast majority of aircraft being flown to Sun ’n Fun.

It DOES NOT impact aircraft owners who have owned their airplane more than six months and have it titled, registered or licensed in another state.
It DOES NOT impact aircraft owners who have purchased an airplane within the past six months and have it titled, registered or licensed in another state (other than Florida).
And it DOES NOT impact aircraft owners who have purchased their airplanes within the past six months in Florida and have paid the appropriate tax.

The bottom line is that the Florida Tax Code in question has the capacity to impact a minute number – if any – of the aircraft flying to Lakeland for Sun ’n Fun. More importantly, the Florida Department of Revenue has assured Sun ‘n Fun that there will not be any agents assigned to the Fly-In event conducting “ramp checks” and that out-of-state aircraft flying to Florida for Sun 'n Fun are not subject to the "sales/use" tax as long as the aircraft owner is not trying to avoid taxes owed because he/she is a Florida resident or operates a business in Florida and uses the aircraft for that purpose.

We look forward to seeing you at Sun ’n Fun!

John Burton
President
Sun ‘n Fun

==================================================================

So, if you had decided against attending Sun 'n Fun because of worries over this, well, now you can come and watch Jack, Jeb and me blather on during our two live podcasts -- after the opening-day air show on Tuesday, April 8, and at 10 a.m. on closing morning, April 13. We'll be on the porch of the Sun 'n Fun Radio station, where our musings will be broadcast live on the station's frequency, 1510 a.m....

Ya'll come by, no, ya'here??

Dave

Mountain Landing

2008-02-12T09:12:00.000-05:00

Homework assignment

2008-01-03T06:18:00.000-05:00

In a recent episode, the gang discussed a current FAA regulatory proposal in which the agency asks the public to submit suggested regulations it believes should be eliminated or amended. I noted this wasn't the first time the FAA had done something like this and took as a homework assignment the task of looking it up. As it turns out, I didn't have to look far: The 2007 FAA document delineates the agency's previous efforts.

Here's the poop (links where available):

In response to a [1992] request for public comments designed to "weed out unnecessary and burdensome government regulations, which impose needless costs on consumers and substantially impede economic growth,"...the FAA received more than 300 comments.
In January 1994, the FAA published a request for public comments.... [It] received more than 400 comments from 184 commenters.
In August 1995, the FAA published its proposed plan for periodic regulatory reviews for comment.
In May 1997, the FAA published its first request for comments under the three-year review program. The agency received 82 comments.
In July 2000, the FAA began the second round of regulatory review under the three-year program. Some 476 comments were received and published.
In February 2004, the FAA began its third round of regulatory reviews. It received 97 comments from 30 different commenters and
published results of the review in June 2007.

The current regulatory review announcement is also available [PDF].

Don't misunderstand -- I'm not suggesting the FAA is always right; I'm just trying to close this loop and demonstrate this is not the first time the agency has asked the public to suggest outmoded rules.

Jeb

Hot 'lanta

2008-01-03T06:00:00.000-05:00

From the AP:

For the third year in a row, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport has retained its title as the nation's busiest airport in terms of flights, according to preliminary government data released Wednesday.

The Atlanta airport logged 994,466 flights in 2007, up 1.8 percent from 976,447 flights in 2006, the Federal Aviation Administration said. Flights include takeoffs and landings.

Its rival, Chicago O'Hare International Airport, was listed second busiest, with 935,000 flights in 2007. That number was down 2.4 percent from the 958,643 flights it had in 2006, the FAA said.

The FAA only released preliminary data for what typically are the nation's top three busiest airports — Atlanta, Chicago's O'Hare and Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, said spokeswoman Kathleen Bergen.

Full story here.

I will not soon fly myself to either location.

Jeb

Gloria Winters Trivia

2007-12-21T14:02:00.000-05:00

The Gloria Winters Trivia question has been answered and the "winner" will be announced in UCAP#60.

Thanks.

-- Jack

F-16s in the pattern at Lake Parker?

2007-12-13T07:27:00.000-05:00

From SnF's Donna Gabriel (and a guest on our SnF episode):

SUN ’N FUN CAMPUS, LAKELAND, Fl. – (December 11, 2007) – The United States Air Force (USAF) Thunderbirds military jet team announced today that the Sun ’n Fun Fly-In has been included on this year’s Thunderbirds schedule. The announcement was made today at the International Council of Airshows (ICAS) Convention currently underway in Las Vegas, NV. The 2008 Sun ’n Fun Fly-In will be held April 8 – 13 at Lakeland Linder Regional Airport in Lakeland, Fla.

“Sun ’n Fun is honored and excited to hear that the world’s most recognized military jet team – the Thunderbirds – has included our event on their 2008 schedule,” said Sun ’n Fun President and Convention Chairman John Burton. “Their participation will add to the aircraft and activities already being planned for this year’s Fly-In. We look forward to having the Thunderbirds here in Lakeland and know they will find the people and businesses throughout Lakeland, Polk County and central Florida to be avid enthusiasts and most hospitable hosts.”

The Thunderbirds plan to arrive at Sun ’n Fun during the early portion of the Fly-In and remain through the remainder of the week. They may engage in individual media flights and possibly a team orientation flight prior to their scheduled performances on Saturday and Sunday, April 12 and 13.

According to the U.S. Air Force, the Thunderbirds (officially named the U.S. Air Force Air Demonstration Squadron) perform precision aerial maneuvers demonstrating the capabilities of Air Force high-performance aircraft to people throughout the world. The Thunderbirds squadron is an Air Combat Command unit composed of eight pilots (including six demonstration pilots), four support officers, three civilians and more than 130 enlisted personnel performing in 25 career fields. The air demonstration is a combination of formation flying and solo routines.

I'm looking forward...

Jeb

Student Pilot Crashes Sim

2007-12-12T18:38:00.000-05:00

Too funny. Be sure to check the byline and read all the way to the end...

Reducing delays?

2007-12-06T08:06:00.001-05:00

The Air Transport Association, which represents major U.S. airlines, asked readers of its daily electronic news summary to participate in an online poll gauging their recommendations on the best way(s) to reduce delays. Since the readership is mainly comprised of airline industry insiders, the results -- which basically echo the ATA's wish list -- are predictable.

Nevertheless, the statistical and virtual "tie" between ideas like peak pricing, building more runways and peak-hour bizjet restrictions is rather interesting.

A screenshot of the then-ongoing poll taken Monday, December 3, 2007, is below.