Flying 2014-03

AIRLINE CAPTAINS
NEW CULTURE OF DISRESPECT?
KILLER FRONTS
SURVIVING THE OUTFLOW
ADVENTURE
QUEST
WARTIME ODDITIES
LUFTWAFFES LAST STAND
THE WORLDS MOST

WIDELY READ AVIATION MAGAZINE
-MARCH 2014-
DOING GOOD
WITH AN ATTITUDE
Plus
ANDROID
AVIATION
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HOW TO CROSS
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M A R C H
CONTENTS
2 0 14
V O L U M E
1 4 1
I S S U E
ON THE COVER
THIS QUEST KODIAK WAS

PHOTOGRAPHED BY PAUL
BOWEN IN NORTHERN IDAHO
NEAR THE COMPANYS
MANUFACTURING FACILITIES.
p.
44
QUEST KODIAK
THIS MODERN-DAY DE HAVILLAND BEAVER

IS MAKING A NAME FOR ITSELF IN THE
BACKCOUNTRY BY STEPHEN POPE
THUNDERSTORMS AND
THE DRY LINE
CROSSING
BORDERS
52
EXPAND YOUR
HORIZONS WITH THESE
INTERNATIONAL
FLYING TIPS
BY PIA BERGQVIST
58
HOW TO SPOT THIS

FATAL PHENOMENON
BEFORE IT STRIKES
BY MARGARET W. LAMB
F LY I N G M A G . C O M / 1 / M A R C H 2 0 1 4
ANDROID
APPS IN
THE COCKPIT
64
WE REVIEW THE
HOTTEST CHOICES ON
THE MARKET
BY ROBERT GOYER
78
WARTIME
ODDITIES
LUFTWAFFES LAST STAND
BY PETER GARRISON
CONTENTS 82
AIRLINE
CAPTAINS
NEW CULTURE OF
DISRESPECT? BY LES ABEND
08
ON THE WEB
LINKING IFR AND

MEDICALS MAKES OUR
SKIES LESS SAFE
FLYING S 50
AMAZING ENGINES
FLYINGMAG.COM/50ENGINES
FLYING NEWS & NOTES
FLYING SAFELY
FLYING OPINION
08 GOING DIRECT
26 I LEARNED ABOUT
FLYING FROM THAT
40 TAKING WING
FROM GLASS TO STEAM
BY SAM WEIGEL
MEDICAL REFORM AND IFR

BY ROBERT GOYER
12 FLYING MAIL
BY BRADLEY SUNSHINE
WHAT SHORTAGE?
70 UNUSUAL ATTITUDES
FEEDBACK FROM OUR READERS
AM I MY BROTHERS KEEPER?
READER LETTERS
BY MARTHA LUNKEN
15 AIRWAYS
THUNDERSTORMS IN
THE DRY LINE: EXTRA
WARNING SIGNS
FLYINGMAG.COM/DRYLINE
74 GEAR UP
THE LATEST IN AVIATION NEWS
INITIAL OPERATING EXPERIENCE
EDITED BY PIA BERGQVIST
BY DICK KARL
30 AFTERMATH
78 TECHNICALITIES
KANDAHAR KING AIR
BENT-WING BIRDS
BY PETER GARRISON
BY PETER GARRISON
34 ON THE RECORD
82 JUMPSEAT
BRIEF ACCIDENT REPORTS

FROM THE NTSB
AIRLINE CAPTAINS: ARE THEY A

DYING BREED? BY LES ABEND
EXCLUSIVE VIDEO: FLYING

IN THE BAHAMAS
36 SKY KINGS
88 FLASHBACKS
FLYINGMAG.COM/BAHAMAS
AFTER WE HAD OUR ACCIDENT
50 AND 25 YEARS AGO IN FLYING
BY JOHN KING
BY BETHANY WHITFIELD
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F LY I N G N E W S & N O T E S | B Y r O b E r T g O y E r
Medical RefoRM
and ifR
Linking MedicaLs and iFR is a Bad idea
Im baffed by the decision by the FAA and
the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association
to support a kind of reform in Third Class
medical certifcation regulations that
would allow for liberalized standards like
those for the U.S. Sport Pilot certifcation.
For readers who are unfamiliar with the
subject, Sport Pilot rules allow pilots to use
valid drivers licenses as a means of showing compliance with medical standards.
This is great for pilots but of dubious
logic. For one thing, there are essentially
no meaningful medical certifcation standards for drivers licenses in most states.
The last time I spoke to a department of
motor vehicles employee here in Texas
was almost 10 years ago, when I frst got
my Texas license. There is no end to the
number of medical issues I might have
faced between then and now, and while
physicians are required to report a few
kinds of conditions to authorities, it is a

short list compared to the gargantuan inventory of disqualifying conditions on the
FAAs rolls. So in essence, the drivers license equivalent is a cheat, but its one
that Im fne with, as Im of the opinion
that FAA medical standards are so fawed
and the system so riddled with abuse as to
make the current regs meaningless to begin with. Just dont tell anyone I said so.
My real gripe is with the decision of the
authorities and the alphabet groups to
get behind a part of the rule that would
prohibit pilots with the Third Class-EZ
certifcate from fying IFR. If theres any
logic behind this distinction, I have yet
to discover it.
The proposed restriction seems to stem
from the misguided notion that IFR fight
is somehow riskier than VFR fight. From
what we can discern from the accident
A Bold And
Independent
look At AvIAtIons
BIggest Issues
Update piReps
the national transportation
safety Boards 2014 hit list for
improving flight safety calls
for better communication of
weather hazards. For once, this
is a great idea. pilots today
have access to more data than
ever, but pilot reports, the best
potential source of data, are
mired in 1940s technology. By
utilizing automatic dependent
surveillance-broadcast and
other technologies, we have
the means to create a semiautomated weather reporting
system, with planes and pilots sending weather conditions perhaps automatically
or with a few button pushes.
those reports could then be
relayed back to other pilots in
need, providing dozens or even
hundreds of up-to-the-minute
pireps for specific locations
and altitudes.
when instrumentproficient pilots

encounter imc, they
should have the legal
authority to fly by
ifr, regardless of
the class of medical
certificate in their
wallets.
F lY I n g M A g . C o M / 8 / M A R C H 2 0 1 4
G o I N G d I r e c t | F LY I N G N E W S & N O T E S
statistics, the opposite is true. Pilots

fying by VFR are far more likely to
become a statistic than those making
use of IFR.
So how did the restriction arise?
My best guess is that its window
dressing, plain and simple. For people who know little about fying, the
idea of fying in the clouds seems like
a daredevils feat. So preventing pilots with questionable medical statuses why else would they avoid
the aviation medical examiner?
from fying on instruments seems to
make good sense, until you think
about it for 30 seconds.
Imagine this scenario: An experienced, instrument-rated pilot decides
to forego the aviation doc and get the
medical the easy way and is fying
along with a plane full of passengers
when unforecast weather starts to
close in. Legally, what does he have
to do? Scud run? Find a sucker hole
and go and land? Pull the chute? The
same dilemma arises for all kinds of
meteorological conditions. In fact,
its safe to say that every tricky scenario that an IFR rating solves becomes a potential danger point for
this proposed new class of regulatoryhobbled pilots. The only conclusion I
can come to is that this new class of
pilot and his passengers are all going
to be at greater risk. I hope the alphabets reconsider the dubious wisdom
of this proposed restriction and
throw their weight behind supporting the rights of all qualifed pilots to
make use of the best tools to effectively limit their risks and successfully complete their fights in cloudy
or clear weather.
SaFeN up!
Not surprisingly, many of our readers
have responded enthusiastically to
the arrival of John and Martha King
to the pages of Flying.
The warm reception is not a shock.
The Kings, by virtue of their educational products, have been a fxture
in aviation for decades. Their success
has always been closely linked to two
things: the effectiveness of the products in helping pilots pass their
knowledge tests and in the couples
infectious enthusiasm for fying.
One of the Kings most endearing
qualities is that they are nothing if

not honest, and as part of that
straightforward approach, they
readily admit their fying mistakes.
This attitude gets them in hot water
with some readers, and I think I
know why.
By talking candidly about their
mistakes, the Kings are laying bare
the myth that safe pilots are safe by
force of character. This notion is
closely related to the idea that there
are people who are born pilots. Based
on decades of observations, Ive
come to the conclusion that this is
not the case. There are, I will admit,
pilots who are remarkably talented at
manipulating the controls of an airplane, but I would argue this does
not make them good pilots, just good
at maneuvering the airplane.
upsets some of our readers. One of

the Kings pet peeves is the word
safety, something with which I
wholeheartedly agree. In one of my
favorite The Simpsons episodes, inept
safety counselor Homer Simpson is
baffed by what to say to his fellow
workers to help cut down on accidents at the nuclear power plant
where they all work. So he tells them
simply to safen up! Its funny because it underscores the mindless approach to safety that fails to see the
connections between bad outcomes
and the actions that led to those outcomes. Its as though uttering the
word safety is some kind of magic
cure-all that will safeguard everyone.
The only certain thing about this
approach is that it doesnt work. This
then leads to the question: What is
foR people who know little about

flying, the idea of flying in the
clouds seeMs like a daRedevils feat.
Being a natural stick has two
potential outcomes: making one a
somewhat safer pilot by allowing pilots to escape jams through their outstanding mechanical skills, or
making one a far riskier pilot, as the
overconfdence and thrill-seeking
attitudes that great stick-and-rudder
pilots bring to the game put them in
risky situations over and over again.
A couple of the best sticks Ive ever
fown with were also a couple of the
most dangerous pilots Id ever met.
The truth is safe pilots are pilots who
give risk a wide margin.
The Kings address risk honestly. By
talking about our fallibility, we bring
to the table the lessons weve learned
from our previous mistakes. Those
pilots whove never made a mistake
are either oblivious to the mistakes
they did make or are lying about the
whole thing.
John and Martha talk about safety
in whole new ways, which is another
thing that delights me and greatly
F lY I n g M A g . C o M / 1 0 / M A R C H 2 0 1 4
safety? If safety is the absence of bad

outcomes, then Id argue safety is
nothing but a description of a particular state of affairs. Moreover, by
advising pilots to be safe, safety counselors are in essence telling pilots not
to have bad outcomes. While wellintended, its not useful advice, as
few pilots want to have bad outcomes, partly because they tend to
raise insurance premiums and scratch
the paint. The question then becomes: If the concept of safety is a
useless one in preventing accidents,
what do we talk about?
The obvious alternative is the actions that led to the accident. What
did the pilots do? Why did they do
those things? And fnally, what can be
done to prevent those things?
So, in the absence of a discussion of
safety, John and Martha will spend
their time on these three questions,
which turn out to be the most complicated ones imaginable. I, for one, look
forward to their insights.
FLYING MAIL
dO YOu HAve A
subsCRIptION questION?
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F LY I N G N E W S & N O T E S | F E E D B A C K F R O M O U R R E A D E R S
forever learning
Sky kingS
CloSe to home
In Fat, Dumb and Happy

[I Learned About Flying
From That] in the January
issue, Jim Gunn perfectly
demonstrated what a pilots
ideal course of action should
be in an un-ideal situation.
While textbook knowledge
is undeniably pertinent in
emergency situations, the
frsthand accounts of pilots
able to negotiate dead aircraft to the ground and
walk away seem like good
sources to draw from during
a sudden loss of power right
after takeoff. Thank you to
all the pilots like Jim Gunn
who have gone before me
and shared their experiences with the next generation of high fiers.
Vincent Papotto
Lilburn, Georgia
door in a high-wing airplane but not in a low-wing

airplane. Your other readers and I would be curious
to know the rationale of
this, since I believe it is
wrong and, more importantly, unsafe.
Luca F. Bencini-Tibo
Weston, Florida
I read your article Too Little, Too Soon [Aftermath,

January 2014] with a special interest and with sadness. This pilots fnal was
long, and his approach was
low and slow. Ive been extending my downwind because it gives me more time
to get set up. As the article
suggests, the danger in this
is it gives more time to get
distracted. The long fnal is
an excuse for sloppy work.
This pilot had no passengers to chat with. Was his
right hand on the throttle?
Was the stall horn blaring?
So many questions. If he
can bobble this approach so
badly, then so can I. And
just when I was starting to
get comfortable.
Greg Spicer
Michigan
As a CFI and a Mooney

Ovation owner, I was quite
surprised that article
writer Jim Gunn told his
friend not to crack open
the door prior to the offairport landing [Fat,
Dumb and Happy, I
Learned About Flying
From That, January 2014].
Furthermore, he implies
that it is OK to open the
The subject of cracking open

a door for a forced landing
is problematic. The idea is
to prevent a door from being
jammed closed from structural damage incurred in a
rough landing. Such damage can happen in either
low- or high-wing airplanes.
However, opening a door
can reduce the structural
integrity of the airframe,
though by how much is anyones guess. POHs vary on
the subject. That said, in an
emergency the PIC has great
latitude. In some cases, I
think I would unlatch the
door prior to making an
emergency landing on a
rough feld, as the upside
a better chance of quick
egress seems to outweigh
the downside. Ed.
I was truly impressed with

John Kings article in the
January issue of Flying
[The Tipping Point, Sky
Kings]. For a long time, I
have been trying to teach
the new CFIs with whom
Ive worked that if you cannot put the bulls-eye on
yourself, admit youve done
some things that might be
questionable if not
downright dangerous
then you will have a hard
time teaching others.
For John to openly write
about a succession of events
leading up to the one that
changed his behavior was
both enlightening and impressive. Unfortunately, the
path is not uncommon and
is littered with those who
never got to the changing
event. It is our job as instructors to get people to
that point and beyond. Telling our own stories honestly
is certainly one way to do it.
Alan C. Davis
Via email
I read John Kings article
[The Tipping Point, Sky
Kings, January 2014] three
times over, amazed at his
tales of imprudent risktaking. I was struck by the
honesty of his story and the
courage it took to tell of his
experiences and the mistakes
he and Martha made, especially considering they are
well-known icons in general
aviation. Thank you, John,
for your candor. I look forward to your future columns.
Robert A. Ebersole
Via email
CoSt verSuS value

As a private pilot and Archer owner, I appreciated
the article, How to Save
Money on Insurance [January 2014]. You should always ask your broker or a
fellow pilot how an insurance company performs on
claims handling. Its great
to have lower premiums,
but if you do have a claim,
its then too late to fnd out
the insurance company
has a poor track record for
claims service and payment.
Sometimes cheapest isnt
always the best way to go.
Michael W. Smith
Via email
Send mail to: edit@flyingmag.com or flying magazine, P.o. Box 8500, Winter Park, fl 32789
F LY I N G M A G . C O M / 1 2 / M A R C H 2 0 1 4
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The acquisition of Beechcraft is a
tremendous opportunity to extend our
general aviation business, Textron chairman
and CEO Scott Donnelly says. From our
customers perspective, this creates a

broader selection of aircraft and a larger
service footprint all sharing the same high
standards of quality and innovation.
With the purchase, Textron also gains
Beechcrafts AT-6 Texan military trainer,
which could be a good ft with the recently
launched Scorpion light attack jet from
Textron AirLand, a new subsidiary launched
with assistance from Cessna engineers. Its
too early to say how Textron might seek to
integrate the products. The Scorpion doesnt
have any customers as yet, but if it enters
production as planned, Textron could use it
and the Texan to position itself as a budgetconscious defense supplier.
Beechcraft exited bankruptcy with about
5,400 employees worldwide, including 3,300
at its Wichita, Kansas, headquarters. There
is little overlap among the product lines
of Cessna and Beech. Because of this, U.S.
government approval of the deal is expected
to come swiftly. The sale is anticipated to be
fnalized this spring. Stephen Pope
TexTrons AviATion
PorTfolio
CessnA AirCrAfT
Headquarters: Wichita, Kansas
Employees: 8,000
Year Founded: 1927
BeeChCrAfT
Employees: 5,400
Year Founded: 1932
Bell heliCoPTer
Headquarters: Fort Worth, Texas
Employees: 11,000
Year Founded: 1935
TexTron AirlAnd
Employees: 200
Year Founded: 2013
lyComing
Headquarters: Williamsport,
Pennsylvania
Employees: 400
Year Founded: 1929
a I r w a Y s | F LY I N G N E W S & N O T E S
hondaJeT Leaps Toward

markeT inTroducTion
certiFication oF hF120 engines brings the
Light jet cLoser to First deLiveries
now that ge honda

aero engineS hf120
engine haS achieved
certification, honda
aircraft PredictS the
new Light twinJet
wiLL be ready for
certification and
market introdUction
earLy next year.
ondaJet employees had much to

celebrate over the holidays. In
the middle of December, GE
Honda Aero Engines received the
FAA Part 33 sign off for the
HF120 engine, which powers the light
HondaJet, enabling the jet to meet its most
recent certifcation target. While the HF120
will initially be produced at the GE facility in
Lynn, Massachusetts, GE Honda Aero
Engines expects to relocate production to
Honda Aero Inc.s facility in Burlington,
North Carolina, this year.
Just days after the HF120 engine certifcation news was released, HondaJet
announced it received the Type Inspection
Authorization for the airplane. The TIA
proves that the HondaJet has met specifc
design requirements, and it paves the way

for the FAAs test pilots to begin the fnal
testing phase. Provided the airplane lives up
to the numbers shown in the engineering
testing phase, the HondaJets cruise speed
will top out at 420 knots, beating out
competitors in its segment by about 15 knots.
HondaJet has also taken steps toward
having a support network in place once
the airplane enters the marketplace. Its
customer-service facility, which is headquartered in Greensboro, North Carolina, has
received Part 145 certifcation. Initial
services will be limited to component-level
repairs, but the company expects to provide
additional services, such as heavy maintenance and major repairs, there at some point
this year. Pia Bergqvist
production update
THE PRODUCTION FACILITY IN GREENSBORO, NORTH
CAROLINA, IS IN FULL SWING, WITH SIX HONDAJETS
MAKING THEIR WAY DOWN THE ASSEMBLY LINE. THE
FIRST CUSTOMER AIRPLANE IS NEARLY COMPLETE, BUT IT
WONT BE HANDED OVER TO ITS NEW OWNER UNTIL THE
CERTIFICATION PROCESS IS FINISHED.
ge honda hF120 engine

THE NEWLY CERTIFIED GE HONDA
HF120 ENGINE IS RATED AT 2,095
POUNDS OF THRUST AND BOASTS
AN IMPRESSIVE 5,000-HOUR TBO.
HONDAJETS UNCONVENTIONAL
DESIGN MOUNTS THE ENGINES
ON TOP OF THE WING, WHICH THE
AIRPLANE-MAKER CLAIMS LOWERS
THE NOISE IN THE CABIN AND
MAKES THE AIRPLANE MORE FUEL
EFFICIENT.
YOUR FLIGHT IS OUR MISSION
A E R O S PA C E E V O
50 amazing
engines
brs parachute increases

useFuL Load For cessna 182
saFety device provides severaL
additionaL beneFits
FLying counts doWn the best poWer pLants ever
s much as we pilots love the almost magical power of wings,

we should arguably have an even keener appreciation for the
power plant, that one piece of hardware that creates every
pilots best friend in times of need: thrust. Coming soon to
fyingmag.com, well unveil our tribute to the greatest power
plants ever, starting the roll call with No. 50 and counting down to the
No. 1 most signifcant engine to ever power an airplane.
There are no spoilers here, but we will tell you that the list contains
some remarkably well-known engines you might be able to guess a
few of them but it also shines a light on some that will surprise you,
including one that might ignite some controversy about the whole
global warming debate.
Along the way, well highlight some engines that were among the
most produced in history, as well as a couple that barely reached
double digits. Well showcase engines that produce unbelievable
amounts of power and others that produce so little its a wonder they
ever got an aircraft aloft.
And if you think you might know which engine well name as the top
dog, well, we think you might be surprised. We are, however, willing
to give a few hints. Think lots of heat, shiny metal and abundant noise,
and youll be on the right track.
To check out Flying magazines 50 Amazing Engines, visit fyingmag
.com/50engines. And be sure to tell us what you think!
aircraft Power PLantS have made an incredibLe

tranSformation Since a 12 hP engine firSt ProPeLLed the
wright brotherS into fLight. check oUt oUr LiSt to See
oUr take on the moSt amazing engineS of aLL time.
brS cLaimS more than 300 LiveS have

been Saved aS a reSULt of PiLotS PULLing
their ParachUteS in SitUationS SUch aS
LoSS of controL and StrUctUraL faiLUre.
After more than three decades in business and
more than 30,000 parachutes installed, St. Paul,
Minnesota-based Ballistic Recovery Systems has
established itself as a major player in the aviation
industry, providing parachute systems for an
increasing number of general aviation airplane
types, including some light-sport aircraft.
However, for some owners the reduction in the
useful load that results from the installation of the
BRS equipment has been a deterrent.
But Cessna 182 model P and Q owners who are
interested in the system will no longer have to
worry about losing load capabilities. BRS recently
announced that due to an increase in the gross
weight of 160 pounds, the installation of its system
will now give Cessna 182 owners an additional 65
to 75 pounds of useful load after the STC installation for the BRS parachute equipment has been
completed. No additional modifcations or hardware are required.
Now, operators can fy with the assurance of a
BRS on board and have an additional 65 to 75
pounds of useful load to utilize as they wish, says
Boris Popov, founder and senior vice president of
BRS Aerospace. This is a win-win opportunity for
operators. P.B.
OUR FAMILY OF CUstOMeRs | A LetteR seRIes
Even though our maintenance team is highly experienced,

we learn something new from FlightSafety each time.
to fnd out about the many benefts of being a Flightsafety Customer, please call
scott Hunter, Director Worldwide Maintenance training sales, at 800.291.0679.
mxtrainingsales@fightsafety.com fightsafety.com A Berkshire Hathaway company
CITATION SOVEREIGN +
From GrEAT
AUTHorITY ComES
GrEAT PoWEr
With a powerful 3,000nm range, an all-new interior, and the most advanced avionics suite
in the world Garmin G5000TM the citation Sovereign+ has the versatility to move your
business forward. The worlds leaders rely on cessna: This is aviation authority.
LEARN MORE ABOUT THE SOVEREIGN + AT cESSNA.cOM
cessna ciTaTion m2,

sovereign+ Faa cerTiFied
deLiveries oF neW airpLanes commence aFter green Light
WHEN ITS YOUR JET,
essna marked two important milestones recently and added a few new
additions to its bizjet feet with the certifcation of the companys Citation
M2 and its updated Citation Sovereign, now referred to as the Sovereign+.
The jets received the offcial FAA nod in December, two years after the M2
was frst introduced in 2011 at Cessnas Wichita, Kansas, headquarters and one
year after the Sovereign upgrade was announced by the company at the National
Business Aviation Association Convention.
The seven-seat Citation M2 is certifed for single-pilot operation and targets
Cessna Citation Mustang pilots looking to take the next step up in performance.
Powered by dual Williams FJ44 engines, the M2 maxes out at a top cruise speed of
400 ktas and a range of 1,300 nm.
The nine-seat Citation Sovereign+ is an upgraded version of the companys
original Sovereign, which customers have been fying since 2004. The airplane now
features Garmin G5000 avionics, winglets and autothrottles. The jets range tops out
at 3,000 nm, and its dual Pratt & Whitney Canada PW306D engines provide enough
thrust for a top speed of 458 ktas. The Sovereign+ is being offered with a Sovereign
Shield maintenance program that covers all parts and maintenance costs for the jet
for the frst fve years or 1,500 fight hours. Bethany Whitfeld
bizjet specs
CiTATion m2
CiTATion sovereign+
rAnge: 1,300 nm
rAnge: 3,000 nm
mAx Cruise sPeed: 400 ktas
mAx Cruise sPeed: 458 ktas
seATing CAPACiTy: 7
seATing CAPACiTy: 9
useful loAd: 3,809 pounds
useful loAd: 12,645 pounds
TAkeoff disTAnCe: 3,250 feet
TAkeoff disTAnCe: 3,650 feet
EXPERIENCE
MATTERS
Cessnas service professionals
have more than 10 years of experience
on average. Thats longer than some
of our competitors have been in
business. When it comes to the service
of your aircraft, trust the experts.
Cessna: This is aviation authority.
FIND US ONLINE AT
CESSNA.COM/CITATION-SERVICE
dick koenig To Lead corporaTe angeL neTwork

Former FLying pubLisher joins business aviation charity
for cancer patients to treatment centers
using empty seats on business jets.
Koenig is replacing Peter Fleiss, CANs
longtime leader, who is retiring.
Photo courtesy of Scott Slocum.
Cold start. Hot start. Every start.
SlickSTART
SlickSTART is so effective, even sub-optimal fuel mixtures and

seriously fouled plugs wont stop the capacitive discharge output
from providing the ignition boost your engine needs for reliable
starts every time. Its inexpensive, easy to install and requires
no maintenance! If you want to deliver up to 340% more spark
energy to your plugs, overcome poor engine priming and reduce
electrical stress to your battery and starter, then SlickSTART is the
answer for you! For more information, call or log onto
www.championaerospace.com.
Trust is earned
The board is delighted to have Dick

join CAN after 37 years with Flying, 26
of those as the magazines vice
president and publisher, CAN
Chairman Randall Greene says.
Koenig is a former Army and Air
National Guard helicopter pilot with
7,000 hours in rotary and fxed-wing
aircraft. His fying time includes tours
in Vietnam and Korea. He also sits on
the boards of Women in Aviation, Sun n
Fun, the Lindbergh Foundation and the
National Aeronautic Association.
I am honored to have been selected

to follow in Peters footsteps after his
extremely successful leadership term,
Koenig says. Along with CANs highly
talented and experienced staff and a
cadre of dedicated volunteers, we plan
to continue Peters work. I am looking
forward to working with the many
fight departments, cancer treatment
centers and the countless industry
supporters representing every segment
of the aviation market.
Fleiss has been named executive
director emeritus. During his tenure,
the organization tripled the number of
patients fown.
Since arranging its frst fight in
1981, CAN has provided almost 45,000
fights to adults and children traveling
to cancer treatment centers that are
often hundreds, or even thousands, of
miles away. Volunteers and a small staff
coordinate the medical travel needs of
patients by scheduling fight activity
with more than 500 participating
corporations (including half the
Fortune 100) resulting in about 250
patient fights each month, according
to the organization. Last year, CAN
received a Flying Editors Choice
Award for its efforts. S.P.
PHOTO BY Jim KOePnicK
Former Flying Publisher Dick Koenig

has been named executive director of
the Corporate Angel Network, an
organization that arranges free fights
aopa announces FLy-in daTes and LocaTions

piLot organization brings events cLoser to its members
Last fall, the Aircraft Owners and
Pilots Association announced that it is
doing away with its big annual AOPA
Aviation Summit convention and
focusing instead on smaller gatherings

around the country, events named
AOPA Fly-Ins. These regional fy-ins
will feature exhibits, static displays,
clinics, pilot town hall meetings and

more. The fy-ins will be strategically
spread around the country at various
locations each year. AOPA recently
released the locations and schedule
for this years events, of which there
will be six evenly spread around the
United States.
In addition to the six regional
events, AOPA is bringing back the
annual homecoming fy-in at its
headquarters in Frederick, Maryland.
AOPA representatives have said that
the group will reinstate the annual
Aviation Summit unless thousands of
people attend the regional events. But
with the fy-ins taking place closer to
members; with similar offerings as far
as exhibitors and seminars; and with
incentives, such as free lunch, the
events have great potential for
becoming successful. AOPA also hopes
that since the events are closer, pilots
will be inspired to fy there themselves,
which would give a much-needed
boost to aviation businesses around
the country. P.B.
AoPAs 2014 fly-in sChedule:

APril 26
San Marcos Municipal Airport, Texas
mAy 31
Indianapolis Regional Airport, Indiana
July 12
Plymouth Airport, Massachusetts
Aug. 16
Spokane Felts Field, Washington
sePT. 20
Chino Airport, California
nov. 8
Malcolm McKinnon Airport, Georgia
experience FLying With the redbird jay simuLator

sim brings the stories Within FLying magazine to LiFe
This latest ski plane scenario is part
of an ongoing series that will allow
Jay fiers to try their hands at the
obstacles and circumstances that fll
the pages of Flying every month.

Learn more about how to access this
Flying scenario by visiting fyingmag
.com/jay-march. B.W.
new simulation scenario is

available for users of the Jay
fight simulator from Redbird
Flight Simulations. This month,
aviators using the simulator will have
the opportunity to fy a Maule
M-7-260C ski plane from Talkeetna,
Alaska, up the Ruth Glacier to the
Don Sheldon Amphitheater, which is
nestled within the rustic beauty of the
Denali National Park & Preserve.
Once there, sim fiers will land and
pick up two passengers before
returning to Talkeetna through the
arresting scenic views provided by
this one-of-a-kind landscape.
The Redbird Jay was frst launched
at Sun n Fun last year. Marketed in
partnership with the Aircraft Owners
and Pilots Association, the Jay was
crafted as an easy-to-use simulator
that would specifcally allow pilots to
fy scenarios that pushed their limits.
The Jay comes with a screen display,
yoke, trim, throttle and mixture
control, among other features.
Rudder pedals are optional.
To locate your Robinson dealer,

visit www.robinsonheli.com
or call 310-539-0508.
I LEARNED
ABOUT
FLYING
FROM
THAT
F LY I N G s a f e ly | B Y B r a d l e y s u n s h i n e | N O . 8 7 7
From Glass to steam
FLYING ReAdeRs sHARe

LAstING LessONs FROM CLOse
CALLs ANd NeAR dIsAsteRs
once youre hooked on automation, can you turn back?
I adjusted the captains seat a fnal time

and exhaled a hushed whistle. My eyes
darted across the DC-9s cluttered instrument panel. Endless dials and
knobs were embedded in the gray metal. A seasoned DC-9 pilot would view
the layout as a smile from an old friend.
I felt like I was shaking hands with a
stranger that had been crisscrossing the
skies for decades. When the DC-9 frst
few in 1965, I wasnt even a blip on its
green-and-black radar screen. The aircrafts impressive production run was
nearly over by the time I was born.
This meeting between old and
(somewhat) young continued as I
reached up to the overhead panel, my
fngers brushing against the DC-9s
beefy switches and square blue lights.
The faded white labels etched into the
blackness around them were a timeless
guide to operating this classic.
The introduction concluded with me
lightly tapping the attitude indicator.
Gone were the colorful EFIS tubes of
modern aircraft, the prominent and
centralized FMS computers preceded
by bulky radio knobs. GPS and moving
maps werent even a glint in the DC-9s
windscreen. The 10,700-foot runway
beyond wasnt electronically displayed
it was simply the way skyward where
the DC-9 was most at home.

I lightly gripped the paint-chipped
yoke with my left hand and gently
placed my right atop the thrust levers. I
eyed the rectangular master warning
and master caution lights, half-expecting
them to illuminate as the DC-9 sensed
my unfamiliar touch. Turning to my
friend Matt Pieper in the right seat, I
asked, Are you ready? Shall we see
I L e a r N e d a B O u t F LY I N G F r O m t h a t | F LY I N G s a f e ly
if we can fy this thing?

Absolutely, Matt grinned.
Alright, well proceed as briefed.
I scanned the instruments and
looked toward the runways end. The
cockpit foodlights contrasted with the
gray overcast lingering 200 feet above.
My feet slid off the brakes and down to
the rudder pedals. Slowly, I nudged the
thrust levers forward. The clocklike
engine instruments edged upward and
the Pratt & Whitney JT8 engines whine
cycled higher.
Here we go, I half yelped as I
pushed up the throttles. Set thrust.
Matts left hand guided the twin levers toward our target setting, but the
DC-9 continued crawling along at near
idle thrust. It seemed to move when it
was ready. Several seconds later, seemingly satisfed, the JT8s spooled to a
muffed roar. I was pushed against my
seat as we accelerated. Imperceptible
rudder pedal pressure kept the DC-9
tracking centerline.
Thrust set, Matt said.
I placed my hand back on the throttles. The nose wheels below the cockpit
thrummed against the pavement as
they picked up speed.
Eighty knots, Matt called.
Checks.
The runways distance markings
began passing quickly, white fashes
disappearing beneath the DC-9s venerable wings. My brow furrowed as the
time to abort our fight narrowed.
V1, Matt announced as we exceeded
To see more of Barry ross

aviaTion arT, go To BarryrossarT.com.
takeoff decision speed. My right hand

moved to the yokes other worn grip.
We were committed there was no
turning back now.
Then a few seconds later: Rotate.
I eased back on the yoke and grinned
as the DC-9s nose slowly and smoothly
lifted off the centerline. The runways
pavement steadily fell away as gray sky
enveloped the windscreen.
The control forces were a mixture of
balance: heavy but responsive, stiff but
stable. Their sturdiness felt wonderful
in my hands.
Positive rate, Matt announced.
Gear up.
I centered the aircraft at 15 degrees
of pitch on the attitude indicator. The
airspeed and altimeter needles pointed
faster and higher. When the cockpit
darkened seconds later, the DC-9 was
engulfed in cloud; its landing lights
refected the gloom. As the JT8s
pushed us deeper into the grayness, I
hoped their whine wasnt a horrid protest. Exploring an unfamiliar aircraft
on the ground was acceptable; taking it
airborne was another matter.
Matt and I werent rated in the DC-9
and had never received training in the
type. Perhaps most glaringly, our careers involved only aircraft with computerized glass instruments displaying
airspeed trend vectors and GPS maps
that redefned the term situational
awareness. The DC-9s steam gauges
indicated only essentials. Pilots rely on
traditional instrument scans and mental math to calculate time, speed and
distance. If issued an altitude crossing
clearance, a DC-9 driver would mentally compute the required descent rate; I
would reach for the FMS keypad.
My eyes strained amidst theses differences. Looking at the DC-9s panel
was like scrutinizing a newspapers fne
print. I glanced at the master warning
and caution buttons. They remained
dark, but they felt like two angry eyes
watching me, appalled that I had taken
the DC-9 aloft.
Fortunately, this experience occurred in a simulator not an actual
DC-9. The device is owned by ABX Air
Services at Wilmington Air Park in
Ohio. ABX Air no longer operates the
DC-9, but it still provides the simulator to companies fying the aircraft.
Ironically, the box is practically
brand new. Manufactured in 2003 as a
DC-9-30 model, it utilizes the latest in

simulation technology.
I had always wanted to fy this distinguished aircraft. As I manipulated its
yoke, I imagined the thousands of airmen that had coaxed the DC-9 across
time. Pilots that few the aircraft in the
1960s may have grandchildren piloting
it today. If only for a while, it was gratifying to experience the DC-9s history
a durable link between aviations
past and present.
Yet I had some questions: How well
could two EFIS pilots fy the DC-9?
How diffcult is the transition from automated cockpits to fight decks devoid
of technology? Would our instrument
scans be adequate to fy the aircraft
raw data the fight directors buried within the DC-9s panel?
When I trained 12 years ago in the
CRJ, my frst glass airplane, the instructor insisted that going from steam
to glass was easy. Returning to steam
from glass, though, was like sending an
email through a telegraph. I currently
fy next-generation Boeing 737s, and
Matt pilots Embraer 145s. Both have
glass cockpits. We were going to learn
if the instructor was correct.
Matt and I tried to prepare. We discussed what calls to make and checklists to utilize. We spoke with my friend
Joe Seymour, a former DC-9 instructor
pilot who provided various details concerning pitch and power settings and
approach profles. We reasoned this
expertise and our briefngs would suffce. They certainly helped; however,
the DC-9 had other plans.
Where are we? I asked. After some
air work, we prepared for Wilmingtons
ILS 22R. My basic attitude instrument
fying was acceptable, but there was a
problem: We were lost.
Were on a right downwind, Matt
replied.
So were past the airport?
I think so. Stand by.
When the DC-9s trim switch is held
for three seconds, a loud buzzing occurs to remind the pilot of the horizontal stabilizers movement. It couldve
also signifed disgust at our lackluster
situational awareness. Spoiled by GPS
maps, we struggled to interpret the
DC-9s indications. I pulled my thumb
off the electric trim.
Eventually, Matt tuned the nondirectional beacon that was the ILSs
I L e a r N e d a B O u t F LY I N G F r O m t h a t | F LY I N G s a f e ly
outer marker. The ADF needle on the

small radio magnetic indicator swung
directly to the right. Were abeam the
outer marker.
Flaps 5, please. Well start slowing.
I glanced at the radio magnetic indicator, having completely ignored it in my
scan. The instrument was obsolete in
modern cockpits yet pivotal in the DC-9.
We continued toward the approach.
When established on the localizer, we
confgured to Flaps 15. The DC-9 responded well to subsequent pitch and
power changes. The trim buzzer sounded, but it was expected as my thumb
jabbed forward. Matt and I tried to
determine if we needed any wind correction. While EFIS cockpits display
wind direction and speed, the DC-9
makes its pilots derive their own
crabbed headings.
When the glideslope came alive, we
extended the landing gear and the faps
to 25 degrees. When the diamondlike
symbol centered, I called, Flaps 40,
fnal items.
As we slowed to our approach speed
of 135 knots, I advanced the thrust levers to maintain speed. The DC-9 settled into its fnal approach attitude, its
nose held high. Minor control inputs
kept the localizer and glideslope centered, the needles familiar constants in
the time-frozen panel.
Five hundred feet above ground,
Matt said as we slid down the glidepath. The clouds stubbornly remained.
Slightly left of course.
Correcting. The DC-9 was nimble
during all phases of fight, but it
wouldnt prevent a go-around if my
fying resulted in an unstabilized approach. My hand tightened around the
thrust levers, ready to shove the JT8s to
go-around thrust.
Matt peered over the glareshield in
search of the runway environment. His
head nodded as he periodically crosschecked the altimeter. My lips pursed
a silent plea willing my harried instrument scan to endure a bit longer.
Approaching minimums, Matt
called. I bumped the thrust levers forward. Checks.
Matt leaned closer to the windscreen,
as if a few extra inches would matter.
Streaks of gray raced over the windows,
the runway still behind the veil of reduced visibility. Perhaps it was ftting.
Attempting to conquer steam gauges
with our glass experience was admirable; assuming the DC-9 would tolerate
this challenge was foolhardy. Flying the
proven aircraft to minimums was our
punishment a careful-what-youwish-for admonishment cloaked in the
ghostly beeps of NDB identifers yet to
go off the air.
There were two possibilities when
the altimeters needle reached decision
height: see the runway or go around.
My eyes lingered on the instrument a
second too long. When I shifted my
scan to the left, the localizer was creeping off center.
Matts voice was the reprieve. Runway in sight, he announced. Twelve
oclock.
I looked up and saw the pavement
unfolding across Wilmingtons green
There was a thud as we touched down

not a jarring impact, but the DC-9
made it known it was on the ground.
Its speed-brake handle screeched backward as the nose gear thumped against
the centerline. We deployed the thrust
reversers, although most of our momentum seemed to be absorbed in our
frm landing. We stopped about 6,000
feet down the runway.
With the parking brake set, I slid
backward and exhaled. My shoulder
harness whipped free. The DC-9s instruments were motionless, a steam
gauge laboratory fnally at rest. I actually felt like a wild-eyed scientist as the
creator of this experiment, with my
glass cockpit background as the control. My eyes were also tired from reincarnating my dormant analog scan.
the old instructor was riGht: its

more diFFicult to transition From
Glass to steam than vice versa.
felds. We were slightly off centerline,
and I corrected visually. Approach lights
fashed beneath us as we descended
toward the runways threshold.
Landing, I replied.
The master warning and caution buttons were in my peripheral vision as I
concentrated on the touchdown zone
markings. If their blankness indicated
surprise, there was still opportunity to
witness failure. Of the nearly 1,000
DC-9s built, the number of landings
feet wide was incalculable. My touchdown wouldnt scratch this tally, but I
could still dent some aluminum.
Pavement began unrolling beneath
the DC-9 at 50 feet. We passed over the
runways numbers, the white centerline
markings splayed before the aircrafts
lifted nose. At 30 feet, I applied back
pressure and eased the thrust levers
toward idle.
The main gear should have touched
as the thrust levers bumped their stops.
Unfortunately, as the engines idled, the
DC-9 still streaked above the runway. I
nursed the yoke, willing the mains to
kiss the rubber stains beneath them.
The old instructor was right: Its

more diffcult to transition from glass
to steam than vice versa. Rather than
sending an email via a telegraph, I likened our DC-9 experience to an old
rotary telephone. We remembered how
to dial, but its circular wheel had to be
conjured from the depths where obsolete things are stored in our minds. The
DC-9 had a dial tone; it was simply
hard to hear over the spinning gyros
powering its steam instruments.
A week later, I was prefighting the
737, tapping the FMCs keypad reassuringly. Our route displayed on the inboard display unit, indicating the exact
time between waypoints. As I silently
typed, I heard the thundering roar of
turbojet engines. I looked up and saw
a DC-9 climbing away, dark exhaust
spewing from its JT8s.
I refexively waved. It was a greeting
to an aircraft I had the pleasure of
meeting. It was also a heartfelt acknowledgement of its timeless success.
I smiled as the DC-9 disappeared from
view, its pilots connecting the aircrafts
dynamic past to the present.
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E x c l u s i v E ly o n l i n E a t
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AFTERMATH
ACCIdeNt ANALYsIs
tHAt GOes beHINd ANd
beYONd tHe RepORt
F LY I N G s a f e ly | B Y P e T e R G a R R I s O N
Kandahar King air

A high price to pAy for A moments inAttention
Since 2009, 42 Air Force
MC-12Ws have been deployed to
war zones in the Middle East.
The MC-12W is a modifed
Beech King Air 350, externally
similar except for a plethora of
antennas and several unsightly
bulges, including a huge belly
pack. Communications and
surveillance equipment and
stations for two technicians
replace the usual executive
amenities.
Last April, an MC-12W
crashed during a surveillance
mission 110 miles northeast of
its base in Kandahar, Afghanistan, killing its crew of four.
The terrain elevation in the
planned working area was
between 6,000 and 7,000 feet.
On arriving, the crew began to
orbit in left turns at FL 200. A
large cumulus was building; the
airplane circled into and out of
it, encountering some precipitation and moderate turbulence
but no lightning or icing.
The airplane was not
equipped with a fight data
recorder, and so investigators
reconstructed the accident
sequence from the cockpit voice
recorder. Thirty-seven minutes
after takeoff, the pilot requested
and received clearance to climb
to FL 230 to get out of the
clouds. He started the climb on
autopilot, evidently using the
vertical speed, or V/S, mode.
Signifcantly, he did not use the
fight level change, or FLCH,
mode. In FLCH mode, the
autopilot holds airspeed; the
rate of climb to a target altitude
depends on the power setting. In
V/S mode, the pilot selects a

climb rate and the autopilot
adjusts speed that is, angle
of attack to maintain it.
According to the Air Force
accident report, V/S is habitually used by half the pilots
presumably meaning MC-12W
pilots for altitude changes
even though there is a slight risk
that with insuffcient power the
autopilot will maintain the climb
rate by raising the nose until the
wing stalls.
And that is what happened.
Not long after the start of the
climb, the pilot noticed his
airspeed decaying and said, A
little slow, correcting. Seven
warning horn and then the

clatter of objects fying around,
suggesting the temporary
weightlessness of a spin
departure. The bank angle
warning stopped, but that did
not mean the airplane was
upright. Instead, it meant the
PFD had shifted to its declutter
mode, in which distracting
information is removed and red
chevrons appear pointing
toward the horizon.
Twenty-two seconds after the
start of the upset, the mission
commander took control of the
airplane. It was then descending
at more than 11,000 fpm. Two
seconds later, the overspeed
the autopilot was disengaged, and

a warning tone indicated the angle
of banK had exceeded 50 degrees.
seconds later, the mission
commander, who was the senior
pilot but occupied the right seat,
said, All right, frewall. A
second later, the autopilot was
disengaged, and a warning tone
indicated the angle of bank had
exceeded 50 degrees.
The mission commander
again called for full power and
ordered, Eyes inside, eyes
inside, meaning that the pilot
should rely on the instruments
rather than outside visual cues.
The CVR recorded the stall
warning sounded; the airspeed

had surpassed 245 kias.
The King Air crashed less than
a mile horizontally from the
location where the stall occurred.
Debris was confned to an area
100 yards in diameter with the
exception of the right wingtip
and winglet, which separated
before impact and came to earth
a third of a mile away.
The investigation suggested
that the accident was initially
precipitated by loss of airspeed
due to pilot distraction the
E2 = Exceeding Expectations. Nose to tail, inside and out.
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pilot was changing orbit position at the

same time as the autopilot was taking
care of the altitude change and that
rapid application of power at a high
angle of attack caused the nose to slice
to the left and the airplane to enter an
incipient spin.
Although the pilots reaction to the
stall appears to have been inappropriate at one point he exclaimed,
Whoa, pull up! the wing seems
somehow to have gotten unstalled and
the spin to have been replaced by a
rapidly rotating spiral. Its likely that
neither pilot fully understood what
was happening, even after the airplane
emerged below the clouds.
Although this accident was of an
unusual kind, several things may be
learned from it.
First, vertical-speed hold is a
potentially risky autopilot function for
climbing and should be used only
when ample excess power is available
to ensure that speed will not be lost. It
does not relieve the pilot of the need to
monitor airspeed.
Second, the leftward pull of
noncounter-rotating propellers is most
severe at low forward speed and
maximum power and will cause the
nose to swing to the left if the pilot
does not anticipate it. Sudden
application of power also commonly
causes a pitch-up, as does the gyroscopic moment of the propellers with
left yaw. Everything, in other words,
conspired to pull the King Air into a
spin departure to the left.
Third, the appropriate pitch
command in both a spin and a
developed spiral is nose-down, not
nose-up, regardless of what the PFD
chevrons may say. The mechanics of
stall recovery are familiar enough to all
pilots, but those of recovery from a
graveyard spiral are less so because
the characteristics of a fully developed
spiral cannot be simulated in training.
In the fnal moments of its dive, the
King Air was pulling suffcient G
probably at least fve, implying a bank
angle of around 80 degrees to break
off one wingtip. Obviously, a further
pitch-up command, as recommended
by the horizon-seeking PFD, wasnt
going to help. What was needed was
right roll to level the wings and a
pitch-down command to ease the
G-loading during the pullout. Lowering
the landing gear, regardless of gear

speed limitations, would also have
helped slow the airplane.
In a spiral, part of the pitch-up
correction from the horizontal
stabilizer is directed inward, toward
the center of the turn, rather than
upward, and so it does not tend to
reduce speed as much as it would if the
wings were level. At the same time, the
curved fight path tends to overcome
what lateral stability the airplane has
most have little or none to start with
and to steepen the bank. The
hallmarks of the spiral are ever-increasing speed, ever-increasing bank angle
and ever-increasing rate of descent.
The Air Force investigation of the
accident found its cause to be a
stall due to insuffcient airspeed. A
nonpilot reader or newspaper reporter
might conclude that such stalls occur
of their own accord and have nothing
to do with pilot actions. Three factors
were said to have contributed to the
stall. First, impeded visibility because
of IMC weather; this, however, ought
not to have been a factor for an
instrument-rated King Air pilot.
Second, the pilots inexperience in the
MC-12W; he had only 21 hours as PIC
in type, but, again, he was an Air
Force-trained pilot, and the basic
elements of speed control and
autopilot use are not substantially
different in a King Air from those in
other airplanes.
Finally, the report cited known
MC-12W program risks associated with
sustaining required combat capability
in theater. The risks arose from the
brief preparation time available for
pilots entering the program and the
lack of qualifed instructors at the
operating bases. The implication was
that things like this are bound to
happen now and then in a war zone.
The same could be said of aviation in
general, but that does not prevent us
from mentioning, from time to time,
the importance of attention to airspeed.
This article is based on the U.S. Air
Forces report of the accident and is
intended to bring the issues raised to
our readers attention. It is not intended
to judge or to reach any defnitive
conclusions about the ability or capacity
of any person, living or dead, or any
aircraft or accessory.
iF You EVER haVE a CLaiM,

WE Wont LEaVE You hanGinG.
For over 50 years, Avemco Insurance Company has earned a reputation for our
desire to resolve claims fairly and quickly, not our ability to wiggle out of
them. Well pay your covered claim even if its pilot error. Even if you violate an
FAR. Even if your medical, annual or fight review accidentally expires
mid-term. Call us. Well be here for you, now and always.
Call (800) 276 5206 or visit avemco.com/FLYinG

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vary based on local law requirements and the terms and conditions of the policy issued. The information described herein does not amend, or otherwise affect, the
terms and conditions of any insurance policy issued by Avemco . In the event that a policy is inconsistent with the information described herein, the language of the
policy will take precedence. Free hat offer not available in New Mexico.
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ON THE RECORD
F LY I N G s a f e ly
THe FOLLOwING Is AN
exCeRpT FROM AN NTsb RepORT
OF A GeNeRAL AvIATION ACCIdeNT
CESSNA A185F
Blanding, Utah/INJURIES: 3 Fatal
The pilot departed in the airplane

with his father and a fight instructor
who had extensive experience fying
in the local canyon areas. The intention was to perform a sightseeing
fight, with multiple stops at backcountry airstrips. The fight instructor
was carrying a personal locator
device, which transmitted position
data at 10-minute-intervals but no
altitude information. This data
revealed that the airplane landed at
three airstrips. Shortly after the airplane departed the third airstrip
about midafternoon, the instructors
personal locator began a series of
transmissions all from the same location, about 1.2 miles from an unused
airstrip. These transmissions continued from that location for about the
next 12 hours; however, no emergency or alert notifcations were
received from the personal locator or
the airplanes emergency locator
transmitter (ELT) during that period.
When the airplane had not returned
to the original departure airport by
nighttime, search and rescue efforts
were initiated.
The wreckage was located in the
early morning hours the next day on
the edge of a plateau in remote wilderness, at an elevation of 6,900 feet
mean sea level. The airplane wreckage
came to rest on an uphill slope and
was mostly consumed by postimpact
fre. The terrain north and east of the
accident site fell away to steep canyon
walls, which descended to a confuence of rivers 1,500 feet below. Area
weather conditions included low-level
thermal activity, wind gusts, and light
turbulence, which would have been
further exasperated at the accident
site due to the surrounding terrain.
The fight instructor and the aft seat
passenger were fatally injured on
impact; however, the pilot sustained
serious injuries and was able to extricate himself from the airplane.
However, he eventually succumbed to

his injuries before the airplane was
discovered. Although the airplane was
equipped with a 406-MHz ELT and
evidence suggests that it activated
during the accident, it had become
separated from the airplanes structure (and thus its antenna) during the
impact sequence, which limited its
transmission range. As a result, no
ELT transmissions were received by
search and rescue (SAR) satellites.
Had the ELT remained connected to
its antenna, it would have effectively
transmitted an alert signal, thereby
providing SAR personnel with a rapid
indication that an accident had
occurred. Under such circumstances,
the airplane would most likely have
been discovered earlier, possibly during daylight hours. The pilots injuries
fell within the severely injured category, and analysis of emergency
evacuation and trauma treatment
resources revealed that with prompt
ELT notifcation, medical response
would have been greatly augmented,
and he may have survived the accident. Furthermore, although a personal locator device survived the
accident intact, it was ejected from
the airplane during the accident
sequence and was not within easy
reach of the pilot.
PROBABLE CAUSE(S):
THe pILOTs FAILuRe TO MAINTAIN AIRpLANe

CONTROL duRING LOw-LeveL MANeuveRING
FLIGHT. CONTRIbuTING TO THe pILOTs
deATH wAs THe LACk OF A TIMeLY
eMeRGeNCY ResCue RespONse due TO THe
LACk OF eFFeCTIve eMeRGeNCY sIGNAL
TRANsMIssIONs FROM bOTH THe AIRpLANes
eMeRGeNCY LOCATOR TRANsMITTeR ANd
THe peRsONAL LOCATOR devICe, wHICH
weRe bOTH ejeCTed FROM THe wReCkAGe.
SKY KINGS
F LY I N G S A F E LY | B Y J O H N K I N G
after we had our

aCCIdent
A BIG WAKE-UP CALL PROMPTS NEW LESSONS
There is nothing like an accident to
make you think about changing your
fying ways. After Martha and I had
our accident, we urgently wanted to
avoid another one, but we didnt intuitively know what to do differently.
We did know that somehow our attitudes about risk-taking had to

change. It was pretty clear that we
should quit doing stupid stuff, but
those things never seem that stupid
when you are doing them.
NO-NONSENSE
RISK MITIGATION FOR
PILOTS LIKE US
As experienced pilots, we had

begun accumulating a long list of
things we werent going to do anymore. Each scary experience gave us a
new lesson. After our accident, we
felt especially lucky to have survived
that particular test in order to get the
lesson. The problem was that we
were learning a lot of individual lessons, but we kept putting ourselves at
risk to learn each new one. And even
a super-long list of things we werent
going to do anymore didnt prepare
us for something we hadnt thought
of or tried yet.
Our method clearly was not a good
one. Plus, as ground instructors on a
regular circuit, we were meeting
other pilots who were learning lessons the same way, and too many of
those pilots and their passengers
werent surviving the tests in order to get the lessons. The death of
one of these pilots in particular
prompted us to start thinking and
talking a lot about what could be
done to improve not only our own
risk management but also that of
other general aviation pilots.
A necessary frst step, in our view,
was for the GA community to start
admitting that there are risks associated with fying. Our philosophy was
that if we deny the risks of fying, we
probably wont do a very good job of
managing them.
We had for too long been telling
what Martha and I call the big lie.
A big lie is one that you have been
telling so long and so often that you
have come to believe it yourself. The
big lie in GA is, The most dangerous
part of the trip is the drive to the airport. It is a great saying, and it is
true for fying on the airlines. But
sadly, it isnt even close to being true
for general aviation. You are seven
times more likely per mile to be involved in a fatality in a GA airplane
than you are in a car. To get that fgure, compare the fatal accident rate
per mile for cars from the National
Highway Transportation Safety
S K Y K I N G S | F LY I N G S A F E LY
Administration to the fatal accident

rate per hour for airplanes from the
National Transportation Safety Board
and assume an average speed of 150
miles per hour for airplanes.
In March 2001, Flying magazine
courageously provided us a venue to
start a national dialog on this controversial subject via an article titled
Battling the Big Lie. This prompted
a letter from Jim Lauerman of Avemco
Insurance basically saying, OK, wiseguys, youve identifed the problem.
What are you going to do about it?
As a result of Jims encouragement,
we decided we should work to develop risk management tools that pilots would fnd practical and useful.
The important part was to use an
acceptable vocabulary and frame
things in a way that was insightful and
new to pilots. After all, as the Greek
philosopher Epictetus observed, It is
impossible for a man to learn what he
thinks he already knows.
The frst tool we, along with folks
from The Ohio State University and
the FAA, came up with was what we
called the PAVE checklist. The idea
was to help give pilots a way to systematically identify the risks associated with a fight by putting them
into the categories of Pilot, Aircraft,
enVironment and External pressures.
External pressures refers to those
things, such as the pressure to make
a schedule or to meet someone at the
destination, that tend to make a pilot
ignore all the other risk factors of the
fight. A pilots hard-wired tendency
to complete whatever goal he has set
for himself belongs in that category.
The idea behind the word external
is that these pressures originate from
things mostly outside of the fight.
Many pilots look at PAVE and the
other acronyms that we developed
and think, Give me a break. Do you
expect me to say PAVE out loud to
myself every time I go fying? The
answer is no, we dont. And Ill let
you in on a little secret. We dont say
it out loud every time either. What,
then, is the beneft of the acronym?
The process of learning about PAVE
makes you think about identifying
the risks of a fight. After that, when
you see a risk you think things like, I
am extremely tired tonight. That is a
pilot risk factor, and I need to fgure
out some way to mitigate that risk,

like departing in the morning instead
of tonight or taking another pilot
with me. So learning PAVE actually
helps you identify risks and makes
you more alert to them when they
occur even if you dont go around
muttering PAVE to yourself.
The same thing goes for the CARE
situational awareness scan. CARE
stands for Consequences, Alternatives, Reality and External pressures.
The idea is that as soon as you get
airborne, all the risk factors of a
fight start changing.
The pilot is getting progressively
more fatigued. The aircraft is getting
lower on fuel. The environment is
changing. You are fying over changing terrain and in changing weather,
you of the importance of identifying a

different alternative or landing early.
There is one acronym we do actually think about and use on every
fight, and that is the CHORRD
checklist. We use it in the run-up
area before takeoff. CHORRD stands
for Conditions, Hazards, Operational
changes required, Runway required
and available, Return procedure and
our Departure route and altitudes. It
is a great situational-awareness tool
that we use to help us remember to
take a fnal look just before takeoff at
current conditions and what will
happen next. It provides one fnal
opportunity to manage the risks of
takeoff and departure.
Now, does all of this make any
difference? Pilots have told us it
If rIsk management Is not a habIt

that Is developed durIng flIght
traInIng, pIlots are left to
develop It on theIr own afterward.
and it is getting later in the day and
closer to darkness.
Reality changes, but pilots often go
into denial when the changes interfere with their plans. Thats why we
had our accident. The R in CARE
reminds you to deal with reality instead of denying it.
And fnally, the external pressures
become more intense the closer you
get to your destination. It is much
harder to land short of the destination than it would have been to not
depart in the frst place.
The thought behind the CARE acronym is to remember to be aware of
your new situation when those
changes take place. Once again, we
dont keep muttering the word
CARE during a fight, but CARE
does come to mind when changes occur. For instance, when weather
changes begin to make an alternative
go away, the fact that you have
learned the CARE acronym reminds
does. Pilots have told us they and

their passengers are alive today because they used these tools. But in
order for them to work, risk identifcation, assessment and mitigation
have to be a habit, and they will
work best as a habit that is learned
and practiced from the very frst
fight lesson.
If risk management is not a habit
that is developed during fight training, pilots are left to develop it on
their own afterward. That is what
pilots have had to do in the past, and
it has not worked all that well. During the process of fight instruction,
instructors do a pretty good job of
managing the risks of fight, but they
are not yet doing as good a job of
passing those skills along. As soon as
a pilot leaves fight instruction and
goes out on his or her own, the likelihood of an accident jumps by almost
50 percent. We can do a whole lot
better than that.
TAKING WING
F LY i n g o p i n i o n | B Y S A M W E i G E L
TALES OF WHEN
FLYING, DISCOVERY
AND LIFE CONVERGE
WHEN MY FRIENDS AND I MOVE

ON TO THE MAJOR AIRLINES, WHO WILL
FLY THE REGIONAL JETS?
what shortage?
ITS KINDA, SORTA, MAYBE HERE
As an airline pilot, I generally try to
stay out of the newspapers. Finding
oneself on the front page of The New
York Times usually means youve bent
some metal, partied too hard on an
overnight or fnally lost patience with
the TSA and sucker punched one of its
goons while cellphone cameras rolled.
And yet lately, I have found myself the
subject of numerous articles in the various papers of record, and the news
has actually been quite good. According to these stories, I am in possession
of certain skills that are shortly to be in
high demand, and I can expect to be
rewarded accordingly. Excellent!
You would think that my fellow

crew members would share my enthusiasm for this serendipitous turn of
events, but their reactions tend to be
surprisingly cool: shrugs, eye rolls,
even scoffs. It seems I am fying with a
rather jaded lot, who, after years of
industry turbulence, is not quite ready
to accept that good times are just
around the corner. Perhaps they dont
want to jinx it. Perhaps they are natural pessimists. Perhaps theyve heard
it all before. When I waved a Wall
Street Journal article on the forthcoming pilot shortage at a doubting coworker, he dismissed it thusly: Yeah,
Ill bet they quote Kit Darby.

Well, yes, as a matter of fact, that
article like most on the subject
does quote the inexhaustible Mr.
Darby, who has been loudly proclaiming the imminent arrival of the pilot
shortage since the 1980s. Many of my
peers consider Darby something of a
snake-oil salesman, given his unceasing optimism in the face of industry
turmoil. But its not like Darby has
been making up pilot shortages out of
thin air. Hes been quoting many respectable sources and pointing to authoritative studies commissioned by
major industry players. And every one
of those studies would have been dead
accurate if industry conditions had
conformed to optimistic forecasts by
the FAA, airlines, aircraft manufacturers and others with a vested interest in
predicting never-ending, unbridled
industry growth. I dont know of a single forecast that accounted for the
dot-com bust, the 9/11 attacks, a prolonged spike in oil prices or the 2008
fnancial meltdown. Neither did anyone guess that senior pilots would
mount a successful challenge to the
Age 60 Rule, causing a fve-year pause
in retirements. And thus, the pilot
shortage failed to materialize.
Of course, the failure of past predictions does not mean the present forecasts are also wrong, and the evidence
for a big crunch in the U.S. pilot labor
supply is compelling. Retirements at
the major airlines will dramatically
increase over the next 10 years, peaking in 2023. By 2027, Delta, United and
American will have retired almost
24,000 pilots, or 64 percent of their
current workforce. UPS and FedEx face
only slightly lower retirement rates.
Nonlegacy carriers, such as Southwest
t a k i n g w i n g | F LY i n g o p i n i o n
and JetBlue, have a more even mix of

young and old pilots, and will see more
steady attrition. Such a large number
of retirements would not be concerning
if suffcient numbers of new pilots were
entering the industry to replace the
retirees, but alas, the number of new
entrants is trending in exactly the
wrong direction. The FAA issued fewer
commercial certifcates in the last three
years than any other period since the
early 80s. It turns out that 13 years of
furloughs, bankruptcies, pay cuts, outsourcing and other highly publicized
woes have made airline careers less
popular with Americas youth than
they once were. Who could have seen
that coming, right?
Mind you, the shortage will affect
some industry sectors more than others. The major airlines that are retiring
the most pilots will have no problem
recruiting their replacements. Besides
the trickle of sought-after military pilots leaving the service, the major airlines will be able to replenish their
ranks from the almost 22,000 pilots
currently fying for the regional airlines. Who will replace these pilots is
the real question. We saw the beginnings of a pilot shortage at the regionals from 2006 to 2008. At that time,
many regional airlines dropped their
hiring minimums to 250 hours and
offered large signing bonuses, and
they still couldnt fll new-hire classes.
The global recession and pause in retirements intervened before things got
too desperate.
Now, the shortage is picking up right
where it left off in 2008, and this time,
the 1,500-hour rule means that the
regionals dont have the option of hiring inexperienced pilots. At Great
Lakes Airlines, which pays its new frst
offcers fewer than $15,000 per year,
the results have been predictable:
empty classes, a workforce halved by
attrition and hundreds of fights canceled for lack of crew. Other regionals
are being more proactive; American
Eagle Airlines, for example, is offering
a $5,000 signing bonus and has, so far,
been able to meet its modest demand
for pilots. Its not like there arent any
experienced pilots out there. According
to FAA estimates, there are 134,374
active ATPs younger than 65 and another 111,562 commercial pilots, compared to about 80,000 pilots employed
by U.S. airlines. For now, the shortage

is primarily of qualifed pilots willing to
work for poor wages.
Common sense would dictate raising
pay to attract more pilots. Yet the regionals, squeezed by their major airline partners like never before, are
desperately trying to lower costs in
order to survive. The former Pinnacle
Airlines attempted to diversify by acquiring two smaller regionals but
botched the merger, went bankrupt
and was bought by Delta. It then used
bankruptcy to squeeze concessions out
of already low-paid employees. Meanwhile, pilots at PSA Airlines voluntarily
voted for lower pay to secure 76-seat
fying. ExpressJet pilots are voting on a
similar measure as I write this. And
now American Eagle, even as it offers
a blind eye to my modest proposal and

will instead fght the shortage piecemeal with limited success. The major
airlines will keep squeezing the regionals, and the regionals will keep squeezing their employees even while offering
signing bonuses to lure in new pilots.
When this fails, major and regional
airlines will work more closely to recruit pilots by offering them a defned
career path. Ultimately, I could see a
system where a pilot is hired by a major airline straight out of fight school
contingent on them going to a partner
regional at 1,500 hours and fying
there for a preset amount of time. As a
last resort, major airlines may have to
subsidize increases in regional pilot
pay or even sponsor ab-initio training,
as is done elsewhere in the world.
For now, the shortage is primarily

oF qualiFied pilots willing to
work For poverty-level wages.
$5,000 hiring bonuses, is telling its
pilots to accept concessions or see their
airline shut down. Perhaps the reason
my co-workers are so cynical about the
pilot shortage is that the airlines themselves are taking actions that will only
exacerbate it.
The reality is the regional airline
business model is dying. It was always
based on much lower costs than the
majors, but that gap no longer exists. A
visionary airline CEO could easily
solve the pilot shortage by bringing
regional fying in house. The mainline
unions would no doubt agree to competitive wages on regional airplanes in
exchange for adding so many pilots to
their ranks. Qualifed pilots would still
apply to the major airline, knowing
that their time on lower-paying equipment would be limited. Prospective
pilots would be much more inclined to
make the substantial investment in
pilot training if they knew they could
go straight to the likes of American or
United at 1,500 hours.
Alas, I expect management will turn
So while I do believe there is indeed

a pilot shortage in the offng, I must
concede that it probably will not make
any of us wildly rich in the near future.
That said, timing is everything in this
career, and many of my friends are very
well positioned to take full advantage
of the coming wave. Those who have
languished at the regional airlines for a
decade or more will fnd themselves
advancing very quickly at the major
airlines. Those who are qualifed to get
hired at a regional will have to contend
with continued instability in that sector but will advance to the majors
much more quickly than my generation
did. And those beginning fight training in the next few years should have
much smoother careers than most who
have gone before. I hope my fellow
regional pilots will resist saddling
these future aviators with substandard
contracts. Now, at the beginning of the
biggest pilot shortage in history, professional pilots ought to recognize the
value of our skills and not ask anyone
to fy for a penny less.
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info@blackhawk.aero
www.blackhawk.aero
BY STEPHEN POPE
QUEST KODIAK
WiTh MOre Than 100 airPLanes deLiVered, The
highLY CaPabLe KOdiaK is QuiCKLY CeMenTing
iTs rePuTaTiOn as a baCKCOunTrY Legend.
In 2010, I traveled to Haiti to deliver medical supplies in the aftermath of the powerful earthquake
that leveled much of the area in and around impoverished Port-au-Prince. It was no surprise that the
crew of a Quest Kodiak beat me there. After all, the
Kodiak was created to serve as a primary workhorse for missionary and humanitarian organizations in the harshest environments they fy. Its
been doing that job, and many others, exceptionally well in the more than six years since Quest
handed over the keys to the frst customer airplane.
by blending a rugged airframe with a

roomy interior, the kodiak represents
a superb mix of utility and comfort.
ven though Id been

hearing and reading
quite a lot about the Kodiak since it arrived on
the scene as a certifed
airplane, it still offered up a few surprises when I fnally got the chance to
fy it a couple of months ago. Among
the eye-openers was the rotation
speed I was quoted: 50 knots. In this
hulk of an airplane, I asked? Lynn
Thomas, Quest Aircrafts sales director, assured me the number was
correct. I knew the Kodiak had a penchant for getting in and out of some
impressively tight places, and even
though we were quite a bit lighter
than the Kodiaks max allowable
gross weight of 7,255 pounds, I was
still a little skeptical about a VR that
matched that of a stock Cessna 172.
With half fuel, no passengers and

our weight tipping the scale at around
5,000 pounds, Thomas noted wed be
rotating closer to 40 knots if we were
departing from a rough strip in some
inhospitable corner of the world
precisely where the STOL-minded
Kodiak was born to excel. Wow.
We had 6,000 feet of smooth, hardsurface runway ahead of us as I
swung the Kodiak onto the active at
Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport
(KFXE) in Florida in other words, I
wasnt sweating the takeoff. With a
healthy dose of right rudder trim dialed in and 20 degrees of faps, I advanced the throttle to takeoff power
and let her rip. The Kodiak catapulted
forward with impressive eagerness,
courtesy of the 750 shaft horsepower
Pratt & Whitney PT6A-34 bolted to
the front. I didnt even have the

chance to blink before the airspeed
was coming alive on the Garmin
G1000 display and spooling toward
the magic 50.
Pulling on the yoke, I noted its
heaviness in my hand. Just as Id suspected she wasnt quite ready to fy.
As quickly as that thought ricocheted
through my brain, our speed was passing through 60 then 70 and headed
for 80. We were climbing briskly, I
noted. I was pulling harder until we
were climbing sharply at 85 knots indicated. To my satisfaction, I noted
that the vertical speed readout showed
better than 1,500 fpm.
Before I even had a chance to decide whether I thought the control
feel was heavy or light, balanced or
not, wed reached our initial level-off
altitude, and I was swinging the Kodiak west to keep us away from
Miamis busy Class B airspace. It was a
gorgeous day for fying, with fat cumulus clouds casting big shadows
over the Everglades. There were a few
bumps, which the Kodiak soaked up
easily. The control feel, I fnally decided, was just right. This was a nice
airplane. Life was good.
Gone souTh
I couldnt help but recall the fun Id
had a day earlier swinging a snow
shovel like a pickax and chipping an
inch of black ice from my driveway
after a nasty winter storm clobbered
the Northeast. Now, I was sitting
comfortably in the Kodiaks left seat,
one hand gently cradling the leatherwrapped yoke as the Everglades inhospitable sawgrass marshes slid
underneath. Content with the knowledge that the alligators were down
there and I was up here, my only real
concern was where wed have lunch
once we got to Key West.
Heading to the Keys had been my
idea. After all, when somebody offers
you the left seat in a brand-new,
$2 million turboprop that youve been
itching to fy and asks where youd
like to go, youd better make it someplace good. The plan was to meet up
at the Kodiaks temporary home base
at the Banyan Air Service FBO at
KFXE early in the morning. Since we
didnt have any high-country airstrips
nearby what with the Bitterroot
Valley situated many thousands of
miles to the west Key-hopping
seemed like a perfect choice to put
the Kodiak through its paces.
Great, Thomas said when I suggested Key West. I was afraid youd
want to just go out over the Everglades and do steep turns and stalls.
Well, I wanted to do that too, but I
was eager to use the Kodiak in a way I
might if I owned one. The Kodiak is
not a common sight in the Keys just
yet (three different controllers needed help fguring out just what type of
airplane they were dealing with), but
its starting to become less rare as
more people realize this brawny single, an airplane that was created to
serve a higher calling, can make one
heck of a nice personal airplane too.
If youre unfamiliar with how
Quest Aircraft came into existence,

it is a pretty amazing story. It all
started with some back-of-the-napkintype conversations between Tom
Hamilton, co-founder of StoddardHamilton Aircraft (former maker of
the experimental Glasair and Glastar), and Dave Voetmann, a veteran
of missionary aviation. The pair felt
the world needed a modern turbinepowered airplane that could allow
missionary and humanitarian
organizations to perform their
demanding work. The Cessna 185,
de Havilland Beaver and Helio
Courier could all get the job done,
but with avgas growing scarcer and
costlier in remote places, PT6 turbine power just made sense. Thats
when they hatched a plan to develop
a clean-sheet airplane specifcally
suited for humanitarian duty.
with about 170 employees and is controlled by a not-for-proft trust.
Turboprop on a Mission
Lately, Kodiaks are also being
snapped up by entrepreneurs who are
using them as jump planes and foatplanes and for on-demand charter.
Governments have bought them for
special-mission use, and a number of
wealthy individuals have come to
view the Kodiak as an ideal aerial
SUV, equal parts workhorse and plaything. Thats long been a niche owned
by the Cessna Caravan and Pilatus
PC-12 but after fying the Kodiak, I
have to admit it can play in the dirt
just a little harder than its contemporaries from Kansas and Switzerland.
Besides offering shorter takeoff
and landing distances, the Kodiak is
BesIdes OFFeRING sHORteR tAkeOFF ANd

LANdING dIstANCes, tHe kOdIAk Is ALsO
stuBBIeR tHAN eItHeR tHe CARAvAN OR PC-12,
ALLOwING It tO tuRN AROuNd IN tIGHteR PLACes.
Quest Aircraft was founded in
2001 with investment money from
missionary organizations that agreed
to buy early airplanes. The fedgling
company soon built a 27,000-squarefoot factory at Sandpoint Municipal
Airport in Idaho and started work on
a prototype. Two years later to the
day, in October 2004, the Kodiak
made its frst fight. Just two and half
years after that milestone, in May
2007, the FAA certifed the airplane.
Six months later, Quest delivered the
frst customer Kodiak, an impressive
development timeline. Since then,
Kodiaks have operated across the
globe in places like New Guinea, Indonesia, Africa and elsewhere. The
airplane I few was on its way to its
new owner in Ecuador.
In keeping with its humanitarian
roots, every 10th Kodiak is sold at cost
to nonproft organizations that use
them the way Quests visionary founders intended. Headed by industry veteran Sam Hill, the companys new
CEO, Quest is a for-proft company
also stubbier than either the Caravan

or PC-12, allowing it to turn around in
tighter places. While it might resemble a Caravan, the Kodiak has a shorter fuselage and wingspan. In fact, the
Kodiak can land and turn around in
just about the same footprint as a
Cessna 206. Thats not a coincidence;
it was a key design parameter.
Its not surprising that some people
mistakenly assume there are similarities galore between the Kodiak and
the Caravan. After all, they each seat
10 in an unpressurized cabin, have a
high wing and strong tricycle gear, sit
at about the same ramp height and
get their power from a PT6A. But
rather than being a Caravan knockoff, Thomas says the Kodiak should
really be thought of more as a
modern-day de Havilland Beaver
the original heavy-hauling bush
plane. The Kodiak can do things a
Caravan was never designed to even
attempt, such as land on the side of a
mountain in a thin strip of cleared
jungle with a full load of supplies.
with its powerful pt6 and stol wing,

the kodiak can take off at full gross
weight in fewer than 1,000 feet.
Thats not an indictment of the Caravan which is in some ways a more

capable humanitarian airplane because it has the room inside to carry
more but rather a testimony to the
Kodiaks versatility.
Once we were well out over the
Everglades and had climbed high
enough, it was time to try some maneuvers. I started with left and right
steep turns to get a feel for the airplane, which I noted had a satisfyingly heavy feel while still being quite
responsive, without a hint of adverse
yaw. The Kodiak comes equipped
with an S-Tec 55X autopilot, but we
didnt use it much. Except for a brief
few minutes turning it on just so I
could say I did, I never touched it
again. The more I hand-few the Kodiak, the more I realized what a pilots airplane it really is.
Power-off stalls in the Kodiak were
truly impressive. The airplane incorporates a cuffed wing similar to the
design on a Cirrus as angle of
attack increases and the burble of air

migrates outward, full aileron control
is maintained deep into the stall. At
max gross weight, the Kodiak stalls at
48 knots indicated. We were reasonably light, and so the stall didnt
break until the low 40s. A wing
dropped and the nose fell through
the horizon, but thats about as dramatic as it got before I recovered. On
the next stall, Thomas suggested I
hold the airplane in the stall and try
some shallow turns. With a rate of
descent of around 700 fpm, I was
able to walk the Kodiak left and right
with the stall-warning horn blaring.
Talk about a confdence booster.
Once we fnished playing over the
Everglades, I pointed us south toward
the Keys. We joined up with the chain
around Islamorada, showing 168
knots true along the way at our relatively low altitude, and then hung a
right turn to follow the string of islands that connects the mainland
with the Conch Republic. We
scanned the turquoise water for manatees but didnt spot anything other
than the occasional sailboat. It was
hard to say who was having a better
time, but lets be honest it was us.
Cheeseburgers in Paradise
Approaching bustling Key West, we
swung south out over the water to
avoid the Class D airspace surrounding the Naval Air Station Key West on
nearby Boca Chica Key. I reduced
power to bring us to 110 knots for
the downwind and then turned base,
putting in a notch of faps and slowing to 90 knots. Final was fown at 75
knots, a speed that seemed more
suitable for a Cessna Skylane than a
big, bulky turboprop. Perhaps I forgot what a long-legged airplane I
was fying, because the fare didnt
last long before the mains touched.
At least we didnt bounce.
With a fstful of beta thrust and
light braking, I turned us off the
PHOTOS BY STEPHEN POPE (RIGHT)
runway and headed for parking at

the FBO, where we grabbed a cab
and headed over to Duval Street for
cheeseburgers. We shared a ride with
three gentlemen whod own to Key
West from France in their TBM 700
all they wanted to talk about on
the way was the Kodiak. What speed
did Thomas usually ight plan for?
One hundred seventy-ve knots.
What was the fuel burn? About 40
gallons an hour. What was the takeoff ground roll? Today, probably
about 600 feet. They seemed impressed, as were we with their epic
journey. In the end, we all agreed
both the TBM 700 and the Kodiak are
really cool airplanes.
After grabbing lunch and iced teas
at the Rum Barrel Bar and Grill and
taking in some of the sights, we
headed back to the airport and prepared to depart. During the preight,
I had a chance to explore some features of the Kodiak Id missed back in
Fort Lauderdale. It was easy to understand why aviation mission iers,
humanitarian organizations, doctors
and others love this airplane. The
cabin is essentially a big aluminumwrapped box measuring 54 inches
wide, 57 inches high and almost 16
feet long. Theres room for eight
passengers in back in the midlevel
Timberline interior installed in the
airplane I ew. The utility interior is
the Tundra, which is designed for
light weight and durability. There is
also an executive interior called the
Summit package, which includes a
club-seating layout.
Entry and exit is a cinch thanks to
the Kodiaks three big doors one
for the pilot, one for the copilot (or
nonying passenger) and a large
clamshell door in back for passengers and cargo loading. The rear
door includes automatically retracting and extending steps built into
the lower section. Another hallmark
of the Kodiak is the cabin oor track
system that allows for quick reconguration of the seats, which can be
removed swiftly and stowed, allowing for a variety of layouts. Once the
seats are out (a process that takes
one person about 10 minutes to
complete), the oor panels can be
lifted to reveal all the mechanical
and electrical components that
might need attention. From an
THE LARGE CARGO

POD ATTACHED TO THE
KODIAKS BELLY PROVIDES
AN ADDITIONAL 63 SQUARE
FEET OF STORAGE SPACE.
DESIGNED TO BE EASY
TO WORK ON IN THE BUSH,
THE KODIAK SHOWS THE
CONSIDERABLE THOUGHT
THAT HAS BEEN GIVEN TO
ACCESSING MECHANICAL
ITEMS THAT MIGHT NEED
ATTENTION.
THE KODIAKS CUFFED

WING ENSURES AILERON
EFFECTIVENESS IS
MAINTAINED EVEN AFTER
THE WING ROOTS HAVE
STALLED.
SIMPLICITY IS
A HALLMARK OF THE
KODIAK, AN AIRPANE
DESIGNED TO BE
FLOWN AT THE RAGGED
EDGES OFTEN BY
NONPROFESSIONALS.
2014 Quest KodiaK
The Quest Kodiak we few for this report featured a Garmin G1000
avionics system with synthetic vision technology, TAWS, traffc,
GWX 68 weather radar and an S-Tec 55X autopilot. Additional options
include a 10-seat Timberline leather interior, TKS ice protection,
air conditioning and more.
Price as flown and tyPically
equiPPed
$1.975 million
standard full fuel Payload

1,391 pounds
seats
10
wing loading
28 pounds/square foot
engine
Pratt & Whitney PT6A-34
Power loading
9 pounds/hp
thrust
750 shp takeoff, 700 shp continuous
Max useable fuel

320 gallons/2,144 pounds
ProPeller
Hartzell 96-inch diameter four-blade,
full-feathering, reversible
Max rate of cliMb, sea level

1,371 fpm
length
34.2 feet
certified ceiling
25,000 feet
height
15.25 feet
takeoff ground roll

934 feet
wingsPan
45 feet
takeoff over 50-foot

obstacle
1,212 feet
wing area
240 square feet
landing ground roll (no

reverse)
915 feet
Max raMP weight

7,305 pounds
landing over 50-foot

obstacle
1,681 feet
Max takeoff weight

7,255 pounds
high-sPeed cruise
185 knots
standard eMPty weight

3,770 pounds
range (12,000 feet,

75 Percent Power)
1,005 nm
Max landing weight

7,225 pounds
stall sPeed, clean

77 knots
Max useful load

3,535 pounds
stall sPeed, full flaPs

60 knots
ease-of-maintenance standpoint, it is
abundantly clear that the Kodiak was
designed by pilots and mechanics
who had spent considerable time living with their airplanes in the bush.
Starting the Kodiaks PT6 is a simple and straightforward affair. The
normal procedure involves switching
on the master and aux fuel pump,
hitting the igniter and introducing
fuel at 14 percent N1. You keep the
starter engaged until reaching 50
percent and then switch off the igniter and aux fuel pump and turn the
generator and alternator on, all
while monitoring the gauges. On the
way out, we taxied past a Key West
Seaplanes Stationair on foats. I
couldnt help but imagine a couple of
Kodiaks on foats serving as great
additions to the feet. (Quest offers
Wipline 7000 foats to buyers, and an
the kodiaks cockpit is utilitarian without feeling

unrefined. controls and switches fall easily to hand
amid the big, bright garmin g1000 flight displays.
additional foat option is coming

soon, Thomas says.)
We took off to the east, retracing
our path until we reached Marathon
Key, the location of the only other
public-use airport in the Keys. From
there, we headed north toward
Florida Bay, climbing over some
showers that had moved into the
area. The Kodiak, by the way, loves
to climb. We went as high as 9,500
feet, a touch lower than the altitude
where the airplane normally cruises.
Though its certifed to a ceiling of
25,000 feet, the low teens are more
typical. Negotiating the Florida airspace as we approached Miami was
no trouble thanks to the G1000,
which in the Kodiak comes standard
with synthetic vision, electronic
checklists, TAWS and available options, including Jeppesen charts,
traffc and XM weather, plus Garmin

weather radar, icing protection and
air conditioning.
QuesTs ChallenGe
On the way back into Fort Lauderdale, I shot the ILS to Runway 8 with
a 10-knot wind right down the pike.
At our light weight, Thomas suggested a power setting of 420 footpounds of torque to put us at 72
knots indicated inside the marker.
This would be a simulated short-feld
landing, and Id be using the numbers as my imaginary touchdown
point. By now, I was much more accustomed to sight view in the fare.
We touched down right on the centerline after minimal foat, and I exited the runway at the second
turnoff, again using braking and beta
thrust to shorten the ground roll.

Quests biggest challenge now will
be in continuing the good thing it
started with the highly capable Kodiak. I wondered if that might mean
introducing another airplane at some
point (maybe a twin?), but that discussion has barely started, Thomas
insists. Quest is simply too busy at the
moment delivering on its promise of
building a reliable, simple, powerful
and good-fying bush plane that is as
equally adept at carrying a load of
doctors and medicine into a disaster
zone as it is alighting on a fun quest
for a cheeseburger in paradise. With
additional options and refnements
on the way and more capability
being added to the Garmin cockpit
with each new software release
the Kodiak will remain a potent
performer for years to come.
B
a how-To guide for visiTiNg

NeighBoriNg couNTries.
By pia BergQvisT
The Basic Needs

As an international fier, the frst
thing you need to do is dig out your
passport and make sure it is valid for
the duration of your trip. Depending
on your nationality, you or your passengers may need a visa to enter the
destination country and return to the
United States. Visa applications can
take time, so you may need to plan
ahead. The rules are different for
each country, but as a U.S. citizen,
you dont need a visa to visit our
neighboring countries.
You also need to get a U.S.
Customs Service decal for your airplane. In the past, you were able to
purchase this decal at airports of
entry, but now you must buy one
through the Decal/Transponder Online Procurement System. In this
simple online process, you pay a
$27.50 user fee that covers the airplane for one calendar year. It may
take awhile to get the sticker in the

mail, so if you havent received it by
the time you plan to depart, you can
simply bring your receipt as proof
that you paid the user fee.
In most cases, your aircraft insurance will cover you across the border. Many pilots believe that Mexico
requires additional liability insurance. However, this is not necessarily
the case. According to AOPA, as long
as your liability coverage is equal
to or greater than $300,000 and
Mexico is included in your area of
coverage, you are good to go. But
regardless of the country you are
about to visit, check with your
insurance carrier to make sure you
are covered.
There is also a list of documents
and equipment required for airplanes
traveling internationally, some of
which you should already have in
your airplane. See the sidebar on the
next page for more information.
One basic requirement that applies
to all international fights is an IFR
or VFR fight plan or a defense visual
fight rules fight plan if you are
crossing an air defense identifcation
zone. Remember to open and close
the fight plan. Many countries also
require you to be on a fight plan
Photo courtesy of tobias alt (left);

Pia bergqvist (right)
ou may be intimidated
by the thought of international fying, particularly with the U.S.
Customs and Border
Protections Electronic
Advance Passenger
Information System eAPIS which
was implemented in 2009. While you
are subjected to major fnes if you dont
comply, it is not a very complicated
system. It simply involves an online
portal process, and the compliance
rate for eAPIS is greater than 99 percent for general aviation pilots, according to Tom Zecha, Aircraft Owners and
Pilots Associations manager of aviation security. Zecha is aware of only a
handful of fnes that have been levied,
and those were in cases where there
was blatant disregard for the law.
But eAPIS is only one step in the
process of crossing our borders, and a
fair amount of planning is defnitely
required. For some, the prefight planning is part of the fun and excitement
of international fying. Others would
rather have someone else handle the
process. After youve completed your
frst international fight, you will likely fnd that it is not that complicated,
and subsequent trips will be even easier since you know the procedures.
visiT our frieNdly

NorTherN NeighBor To
discover BeauTiful
mouNTaiNs aNd prisTiNe
glacial lakes.
The wesT coasT of

mexico offers maNy
exciTiNg airporTs, wiTh
greaT whale waTchiNg
aNd fishiNg NearBy.
while fying within their borders,
and some countries prohibit VFR
fight at night. When crossing the
border, you will also need to squawk
a discreet code, and as always, its
best to communicate with air traffc
control whenever you can.
A minimum of one hour before
your airplane leaves the ground
when departing or arriving in the
United States, you need to fle an
electronic eAPIS report. While it
takes some time, the sign-up and
activation processes and data entry
for eAPIS are very straightforward
for anyone who has used a computer
and email. The information is stored,
so planning subsequent trips will be
much quicker.
Once your information has been
loaded into the system, you can fle
either a notice of departure or notice
of arrival. If you are unsure of the
Internet accessibility at your destination, you can manifest both your
departure from and return to the

United States at the same time.
About one minute after you fle your
manifest, you should receive an
email with instructions for your
fight. Make sure you bring this email
on the trip either in a printed or an
electronic format.
In addition to these basic requirements, there may be a list of things
that need to be addressed depending
on what you are bringing, the type of
airplane you fy and which country
you choose to visit. Make sure you do
your research before you go. Here
are some basic tips on how to visit
our neighbors to the north, south
and southeast.
caNada
Canada is a paradise for outdoorsmen, with its vast forests and stunning
mountains offering ample opportunities for hiking or hunting and oceans
and rivers providing excellent boating
and fshing. Canada also has a rich
native cultural heritage, and a wide
range of cultural exploration and
unique shopping opportunities are
available in Canadas big cities.
Our neighbors to the north are
known for being a friendly bunch
Documents RequiReD
foR inteRnational
flights
Pilot Documents:
. Passport for each occupant

. Pilot certifcate (with English
profciency endorsement)
. Medical certifcate
. Restricted radiotelephone operator
permit
aiRcRaft Documents:
. Airworthiness certifcate
. Aircraft registration (no pink slips)
. Operating limitations
. Weight and balance documents
. Radio station license (for the airplane)
. U.S. Customs Service decal
. Insurance documents
. 12-inch registration numbers
(if crossing ADIZ)
. General declaration form
equiPment:
. 121.5 MHz and/or 406 MHz ELT
(varies with country)

. Mode C transponder
. Two-way radio
. Survival gear (requirement varies)
. Navigation charts
. Cash (some airports dont accept
credit cards for fees or fuel)
and so is the countrys Canadian

Border Services Agency. You do need
to bring the basic documents listed
on the previous page; plan to fy to a
CBSA airport of entry and alert CBSA
via telephone between two and 48
hours before your arrival. In this
case, the CBSA, unlike agencies in
most countries, wants the pilot, not a
representative, to call directly.
Once you arrive, you will likely be
greeted by a CBSA agent who will
ask some questions and look at your
documents. In some cases, however,
your representative might not be
around even if you arrive at your
ETA. In this case, call the CBSA
phone number again, and you may
be cleared to enter over the phone.
If you plan to travel regularly to
Canada, you can get what is called a
CANPASS, which allows you to land
outside of CBSA offce hours and at
CANPASS airports that are not regular airports of entry. The application
process takes four to six weeks, according to the CBSA website, and
the CANPASS is valid for fve years.
Canada does recognize the U.S.
Sport Pilot license. However, a
medical certifcate is still required for

light-sport aircraft pilots. You should
also be aware that if you are bringing
a child into the country and both
parents are not on board, a notarized
letter from the nonpresent parent or
parents is required. In addition, special equipment, such as shelter, signaling equipment and the means to
make a fre, must be carried in the
aircraft in some areas of Canada during certain times of the year.
mexico
Mexico is a big, multifaceted country
with plenty to offer. Whether you
want to get away from it all on a remote beach, hang out at a luxury resort, visit ancient ruins at one of
several UNESCO World Heritage sites
or take in the hustle and bustle of a big
city, there is something for everyone.
On Dec. 31, 2013, Mexico implemented its new Advance Passenger
Information system, its version of the
data collection of crew, passengers
and fight information for aircraft
entering its borders that many countries, including the United States with
its eAPIS, have introduced.
The Mexican government has contracted with communications giant
ARINC as the sole provider of its API
system. This makes Mexico the frst
country in the world without a public portal, according to Rick Gardner
of Caribbean Sky Tours. An ARINC
Photo courtesy of neil glazer
The islaNds off our

souTheasT coasT have
maNy sceNic Beach-side
airporTs, such as
sTaNiel cay airporT
iN The Bahamas.
subscription runs in the hundreds of

dollars a month, so you will most
likely go through a third-party
fight-planning provider. Several
companies are already offering this
service, including ftplan.com, Universal, National Business Aviation
Association and several international travel companies (see Get Help
on the next page). Jeppesen says it is
in the process of developing a system separate from ARINCs.
The implementation of the new
system was fraught with confusion
and misinterpretations, and it was
initially not clear whether the rules
applied to private aviation. The reason for this was that some rules
dont make sense for smaller airplanes. For example, data must be
sent electronically to the Mexican
government after the doors of the
aircraft have been closed. Regardless, it does appear that the system
applies to all aircraft. Some airports
may not yet be enforcing the system, but the Mexican government
can come after you later, according
to several sources. A one-time entry
can be bought for $35 or less if you
have a subscription with a flightplanning provider. That is money
well spent since fines for noncompliance can be steep.
In addition to complying with the
API requirements, several documents
need to be in the airplane. According
to Gardner, you will need a private
pilot certifcate or higher since a Sport
Pilot certifcate will not be accepted.
You can enter Mexico at any airport of entry (be aware that if you
are arriving from a country other
than the United States, other rules
may apply), where you can expect to
be greeted by army fatigue-clad
guards with machine guns. They
may look intimidating but are generally very friendly.
Once you enter the immigration
offce, you will pay for an entry permit, which is good for 180 days. The
price for a single-entry and a multipleentry permit, which allows for unlimited border crossings for the year,
is the same. Depending on the airport, the immigration process can be
a bit of a song and dance, with several desks to visit and possibly a few
additional fees to pay. According to
Gardner, there are three different
types of airports in Mexico: private,

government-run and governmentowned but privately operated. While
the government-owned airports
have standard fee structures, the
privately owned airports can set
their own fees.
Some pilots are reluctant to fy to
Mexico because they fear losing or
having damage done to their airplanes. Gardner, who has fown extensively in Mexico for decades, says
that airports where the Mexican military is present provide the best security. If the military is not present,
then you should verify what kind of
security is offered, Gardner says.
your homework. You could even

save yourself some money by doing
a little extra research. For example,
Air Journey founder Thierry Pouille
says that recently the Bahamas implemented a $50 arrival fee and a
$25 departure fee, making a lunch
visit quite costly. However, the Bahamas Out Island Promotion Board is
running a promotion through the
end of April where pilots receive a
$150 fuel credit if they stay two
nights at certain hotels and visit two
islands or a $300 fuel credit for four
nights or more. Similar promotions
may be available in the future there
and in other countries.
The islaNds
comiNg home
You cant beat the turquoise water,

sandy beaches and subtropical temperatures of the Bahamas and Caribbean islands. Besides enjoying the
great food and drinks, you can snorkel or scuba dive to a shipwreck, go
zip lining, or take a nice, relaxing
walk on the soft sand. Animal lovers
can swim with dolphins, ride horses
on the beach or share some bananas
with a few monkeys. Shopaholics
can also get their fx on some of the
islands with local arts and crafts and
great duty-free shopping.
Regardless of which island you fy
to, you need Coast Guard-approved
life jackets for the pilot and each
passenger. You can rent life jackets
and rafts, which are recommended,
at several FBOs in Florida.
Since the islands constitute different countries, the rules and fees
vary signifcantly. Familiarize yourself with them when you plan your
fight. In general, countries will require several copies of a general declarations form related to the fight.
You can expedite your time at the
customs offce by flling these out at
home before you depart. In addition
to the general declarations forms,
the Bahamas require a C7A form for
pilots planning to fy to more than
one island. Some Caribbean countries require a Caricom eAPIS manifest to be submitted prior to arrival,
departure or travel between those
countries.
Again, things are always changing, and while the rules are never
complicated, it is important to do
When returning to the United States,

the rules are different depending on
where you are arriving from. When
arriving from Canada, you may proceed to any airport of entry. However, Zecha recommends landing
near the border in case something
happens en route, such as a weather
or bathroom diversion. You can alert
CBP via fight service en route if
your plans change, but it may be less
of a hassle to simply plan on landing
close to the border.
When arriving from Mexico or the
Caribbean, you must land at the frst
airport of entry along your route of
fight. There is, however, a way
around this by applying for an overfight exemption.
You need to call the customs offce
at your airport of entry and inform
them of your arrival. Note the name
of the agent you speak with in case
there are questions when you arrive.
You need to arrive within 15 minutes of your recorded ETA. If your
ETA changes, alert CBP via fight
service en route. Upon arrival, you
need to stay inside the airplane until
approached by a customs offcer.
Pouille says you can expect to have
to unload the airplane.
Before you have taken your frst
trip across the border, fying internationally may seem like an onerous
task. But once you have tried it, you
will fnd that it is not that diffcult.
You may even become addicted to
the fun and adventure that fying
across our borders in your own airplane provides.
Get Help
When it comes to crossing our borders,
dont rely on friends past experiences.
Rules and regulations can change, and
fnes can be steep if you make serious
mistakes. There are several companies
that specialize in helping pilots fy internationally. And if you want to make
your border crossing stress-free, you
can join a group fight organized by a
professional organization.
The Aircraft Owners and Pilots
Association has good information
about crossing our borders on its
member website, including some video
tutorials. aopa.org
The National Business Aviation Association ofers its members a portal
shared with ARINC that allows for electronic data submission for entry into
many countries, including Mexico.
nbaa.org
Air Journey organizes group trips to
destinations around the globe but can
also provide individual advice to those
who want to travel alone. The company also provides low-cost eAPIS
services.
airjourney.com
Bahamas & Caribbean Pilots Guide is a

printed resource for pilots wanting to
travel to the islands. It includes detailed
information for public airports, including images and frequencies.
pilotpub.com
Caribbean Sky Tours is a membership
association that assists with private
fights to Mexico, Central America, the
Bahamas and the Caribbean islands.
Mexican API services are also available.
caribbeanskytours.com
Bush Pilots International, formerly
known as Baja Bush Pilots, ofers international travel assistance services and
guide books and plans group trips,
mostly south of the border.
bushpilotsinternational.com
Fltplan.com, Jeppesen and Universal
provide assistance with fight planning
and are all set up with the new Mexican
API system. These companies ofer
various levels of services, generally
through subscriptions.
ftplan.com, jeppesen.com,
universalweather.com
THUNDERSTORMS
AND THE
DRY LINE
DRY LINES SpAwN TORNADOES AND TREACHEROUS UpDRAfTS AND
DOwNDRAfTS. HERES HOw TO SpOT AND SURvIvE THEM.
bY MARgARET w. LAMb ILLUSTRATIONS bY MATTHEw LAzNICkA
layton, New Mexico way

east of the Rocky Mountains,
out on the Great Plains. A
humid June afternoon. We
had fnished up in court and were
sitting around in the judges offce.
The phone rang. The judge handed
it to me. My friend, the airport
weather forecaster, spoke abruptly:
Margaret, if youre gonna go, youd
better git! So after a quick weather
briefng scattered thunderstorms
I prefighted my Navion and took
off on the 160-mile fight west to Taos.
I few regularly from Taos to Clayton for a days work. Taos, at 7,095
feet above sea level, is bordered on
the east by the Sangre de Cristo
Mountains, which rise to 13,161 feet
at Wheeler Peak. I usually few over
a lower part of the range before settling down to 7,500 feet along the
treeless prairies east of the mountains. Flying to Clayton meant descending to 4,965 feet a few miles
from the Texas/Oklahoma border.
On the plains, the only airport along
the route was in Springer, New
Mexico, about 85 miles from Clayton.
So when I took off from Clayton
that afternoon, I was fying over
terrain that was very well known to
me. I was familiar with the occasional working windmills that gave me
surface winds, with the various
abandoned ranch houses, with the

little volcanic hills that speckled the
plains. I was familiar, even, with
where to look for the white rumps of
grazing antelope.
And now in the air, a line of huge
cumulus buildups loomed right and
left of course, but there was plenty
a small funnel
cloud drooped out
of the cumulus,
twisting down
in a spidery, gray
thread then
retreating.
of open sky between them. Thats
what scattered meant to me. If I
needed to turn away, I had a straight
shot 90 miles south to Tucumcari.
And to the northwest appeared an
avenue of clear air beyond the mesas, 85 miles up to Trinidad, Colorado. These were safe airport
havens. Flying toward a wide space
ahead, I could see far distant to the
western plains at the base of the
mountains beyond the line of clouds.
Leveling off at 8,500 feet, I
checked the panel: 21 inches manifold pressure, 2,150 rpm, fuel
pressure 13 psi, oil pressure and

temperature normal, EGT and CHT
where I wanted them, ammeter
showing a slight charge. Everything
was good.
When I looked up, those cumulus
clouds towering on both sides surprised me. They seemed to be meshing together high above me. I was
too close to view the tops. Columns
of rain had formed and were falling
some miles off to the south and
north. So I dropped down closer to
the ground, where I could still see
farther west, tightened the strap on
the mountaineering helmet that I
always wore while mountain fying
and persevered.
Slogging along, I studied the turbulent, massed clouds closely. Above
to my right, a small funnel cloud
drooped out of the cumulus, twisting
down in a spidery, gray thread then
retreating. Id never seen a funnel
cloud before. My escape route to the
southeast toward Tucumcari was still
open, so I motored on, peering at the
writhing patterns in the cumulus
ahead. Next time I looked back, the
escape route behind me was blocked.
All too gradually I realized that I
was approaching the outer edge of a
huge circle of cloud, a great, dark
vault that rose overhead. Thunderstorms and virga columns of
precipitation that dont reach the

ground fanked the sides of my
route. The airplane engine droned
steadily on, and I few under the
eastern rim of the dome. The air was
nice and clear under there inviting, opening a course westward beyond the far rim out on to the sundappled plains. The needle on the
rate of climb indicator twitched and
rose to 500 fpm. Intending to stay
level, I trimmed nose down. The air
was perfectly smooth.
The vertical speed indicator continued to rise: 1,000 feet per minute.
Now I was really going up. I glanced
at the height of the arch overhead
evil-looking lemon gray, slightly
roiled by wind. Now the far border of
the dome in front of me was lower
than my fight path.
It was too late to turn around. The
air was still smooth as stainless steel,
but the airplane was ascending
steadily and peaceably at 1,000 fpm
up into the center of the canopy of
cloud. Suddenly, I saw that my shiny
Navion, and I with it, was being siphoned up into the maw of a
thunderstorm.
Quickly, I reduced power to idle
and pointed the nose down. Soon I
was at VNE, 195 mph, with the nose
slanted down and the throttle all the
way back, but I was nonetheless
rocketing up toward the height of
the dome. I didnt lower gear or faps
to slow down because gear-down
speed is 100 mph. That tough Navion
airplane structure, designed like its
ancestor the P-51, could withstand
exceeding VNE.
I just concentrated on the dive and
watched the approach of the black
rim of cloud on the far side of the
dome as I plunged forward. But I
wasnt losing any altitude. I was knifing down the updraft, edging into
the thunderstorm on its side.
Below, I could now see sunlight on
the ground and blowing dust whirled
up by the storm. Finally, I reached
the edge of the updraft and started
actually descending, hurtling toward
safety and the Earth.
And without warning, the airplane
was snatched from its smooth dive,
torn like a leaf from a branch,
fogged this way and that, tumbling
left to right. It was uncontrollable. I
gripped the seat pan with both
hands, braced myself between the

rudder pedals and seat back, and
scrunched my body into its smallest
possible shape but was still thrown
violently against the side of the
cockpit and the roof. My hard hat
whacked against the Plexiglas window and the aluminum windshield
pillar. In between lurches, I leveled
the wings with rudder as gently as I
could, and when I could fnally
grasp the throttle, I added power.
Refuge lay in that sliver of air close
to Earth. The air smoothed out. Perhaps 200 feet above the grasslands,
my small silver airplane bumped
along over the whorls of dust and
then in bright sunshine fnally relaxed into its normal rhythm.
Picking the microphone up off the
foor, I radioed Albuquerque Center
finally, i reached
the edge of the
updraft and
started actually
descending,
hurtling toward
safety and the
earth.
and asked if they were painting a
thunderstorm east of Springer.
Yes, they replied.
Tops? I asked.
Tops are at 48,000.
Thanks and good day, I said.
There, ahead in the late afternoon
sunlight, were the two mesas I used
as guidelines for my route across the
mountains. I climbed up to 10,500
feet and skimmed across the ranges
toward home.
So that was a dry line thunderstorm.
The Great Plains dry line is a surface boundary, aligned north/south,
between two different air masses:
dry air, heated as it rides east downhill from the high terrain of the
Rocky Mountains, rumbling into
moist, cooler air trending up to the
west from Kansas, Oklahoma and
Texas. The atmospheric pressures,
wind directions and humidities of
the air masses are different. Where
they meet, powerful convection is

forced by mixing, and the result is
a line of huge powerful thunderstorms. Storm chasers revel in the
dry line as it is the source of supercell thunderstorms.
The dry line is not called a front
because the general weather doesnt
change essentially on either side of
the line. The dry line retreats toward
the mountains at the end of the day,
and later the next morning, it fows

east again toward lower terrain as
the atmosphere heats up and the
warm air slides down along the
plains. So the dry line sloshes, as it
were, back and forth across the eastern plains of Colorado, New Mexico
and west Texas. It is most prevalent
in late spring and early summer. Because no terrain feature exists to interrupt the fows, thunderstorms
continue building along the dry line,

fed by the collision of the differing
air masses.
You can fnd the dry line forecast
on aviationweather.gov under the
heading Forecasts, then Prog
Charts, then Surface, which will
bring up fve panels reaching out 48
hours. The dry line, if one exists and
is forecast, is depicted on the prog
charts as an orange line with orange
all along this line, fight routes to

Casper, Cheyenne, Denver, Colorado
Springs, Albuquerque and El Paso
might be hazardous or blocked. In
addition, this particular dry line
showed a prominent bulge over eastern Colorado. Research indicates
that higher altitude westerly winds
initiate the bulge. To put a very complicated process simply: The wind
shear involved in a dry line bulge
may cause its burgeoning storms to
lean over, twist and hatch tornadoes.
If your weather briefng mentions
scattered thunderstorms in the forecast for the Great Plains, you should
check for a dry line. Scattered thunderstorms, according to the National Weather Service Glossary, means
an area coverage of convective
weather affecting 30 percent to 50
percent of a forecast zone. So it is
tempting to take off toward scattered
thunderstorms because you imagine
a dry line
implies much
more hazardous
circumstances
than mere
scattered
or isolated
thunderstorms.
scallops on the eastern side. If you

are fying across the Great Plains in
spring or early summer, you should
always check the progs for the dry line.
Take, for example, the prog chart
for June 20, 2013. It showed an extensive dry line plotted all the way
from the plains of Wyoming south
across eastern Colorado and eastern
New Mexico down to southwest Texas. Assuming thunderstorms formed
your route might be available over

half the terrain. A dry line implies
much more hazardous circumstances
than mere scattered or isolated thunderstorms. If on the way you are talking with Flight Watch and observe a
bulwark of building cumulus, ask if
theres a dry line and if severe thunderstorms are forecast. If thats the
case, retreat.
Dry line thunderstorms metastasize unbelievably fast. We all know
about not fying through the beautiful blue of a sucker hole. Usually, we
think of sucker holes as something
rather small that might wrap you fast
in gauzy, bumpy clouds. In the case
of storms coalescing along the dry
line, a nice, miles-wide sucker hole
will grab you quickly with lethal
updrafts, downdrafts and extreme
turbulence. Sometimes, if you are

fying west in a moist air mass toward a dry line, you will not be able
to see the buildups because of poor
visibility in the damp air mass.
An early sign of a severe thunderstorm is virga, curtains of rain or
snow sinking toward, but not hitting,
the ground. Not many pilots are acquainted with virga. Virga mark skies
that are very hazardous. The descending columns of precipitation
are cold and therefore heavy. Virga
displaces air, so right next to the
downdraft is an updraft. The shear
between downdraft and accompanying updraft really tosses you around.
Rainy virga is usually gray, and snow,
white. In snow virga, you have no forward visibility at all. Often, lightning
fashes along the shafts of virga.
In thunderstorm weather, if airports are few and far between, you
may have no other option but to fy
under virga. Sometimes, the least
rough air is a few hundred feet
above the ground, but to fy low, you
must be familiar with the terrain and
watch out for antennas and towers
that may have sprouted in uninhabited places.
When youre fying in turbulence
near virga, dont fail with aileron
against a wing drop. Level the wings
gently with rudder, or if youre
thrown into a steep bank, use coordinated controls to regain level fight.
You steer with your feet, not the
yoke, remember? And when you are
approaching an airport threatened
by thunderstorms and you have
no other place to land keep one
radio tuned to the AWOS, and each
cycle, listen for wind and pressure
changes. Depending on the circumstances, you may need to select a
different runway at the last minute.
So what are the major signs of dry
line thunderstorms to look out for?
During the prefight, check the dry
line forecast and search for high dew
points in airports east of the dry line.
In the air, be on alert for nasty-looking virga streaming below cumulus
clouds that are bulking up in all vectors ahead. Lightning and funnel
clouds should also serve as warnings
that its time to turn around, land in a
hospitable Great Plains town and
look forward to taking off in benign
skies early the next morning.
Android
Apps in the
CoCkpit
Taking a BiTe ouT of The Big apple.
by robert goyer
When I set out to WrIte a roundup of the androId apps avaIlable for avIatIon, I Was ready for a
quIck assIgnment, as the Words androId and avIatIon have not, up to noW, been closely
assocIated. happIly, thIs Is changIng. today, there are several avIatIon apps WIth IndIvIdual
features that approach or, In some cases, match those of the best apps buIlt for ios.
There are good reasons why the leading aviation apps are built to run on
Apples iOS mobile operating system.
The ubiquitous software from the Californian personal computer giant is
stable, widely available, controlled by
one company instead of dozens and
free with the purchase of an Apple
device. The biggest reason for Apples
aviation dominance is even simpler
than that. It is due to the wide popularity of the iPad itself. Introduced in
2010, the iPad took the computing
world by storm, offering consumers a
big-screen, touch-controlled tablet
that worked easily out of the box.
With hundreds of thousands of these
mobile tablets out in the world, the
environment was ripe for aviation app
developers to do their thing, and they
did just that, coming out with a range
of aviation apps that turned an everyday tablet into a powerful in-cockpit
aviation tool.
Some of those app developers, such
as ForeFlight, focused exclusively on
devices that run on Apples iOS platform, which, for all intents and purposes, are iPhones and iPads. Others,
such as Seattle Avionics, Garmin and
Hilton Software, created apps or
had pre-existing programs for other operating systems. Those applications, for good or for ill, have taken a
back (way, way far back) seat to those
companies iOS products. One follows
the money, and the money follows the
marketplace.
Another issue facing developers is
the lack of commonality in the Android operating system itself. Many
Android devices, even brand-new
ones on store shelves, have versions of
the operating system that are a couple
of generations old. So when creating
and supporting apps for Android devices, developers need to take into
consideration not only the latest version of the OS but older versions too.
Of course, this is also true for iOS devices, but there are far fewer versions
and devices with which to be concerned. On top of that, backward
compatibility (meaning that older

devices will run current apps) is better
with Apple. The hardware can also
be a hindrance. In this case, its that
Android-powered gadgets tend to
have a variety of hardware interfaces,
as opposed to the common interface
(with a few connector/interface
changes) on Apple products.
android edge
While Apple remains a dominant force
in the market, consumers have numerous other options, with Android-based
devices making up the most common
ones. Analysts say Android devices
already rival iPads in global sales,
though that share is divided up
the androId galaxy

of avIatIon apps
Is small but has
some real stars.
among dozens (if not hundreds) of
manufacturers. The leaders are wellknown companies, including phone
giant Samsung, whose numerous Galaxy phones and tablets are the biggest
challengers to Apples dominance.
Other major players include Asus,
which offers a variety of tablets ranging in size from handhelds to large
convertible devices with detachable
keyboards. Internet mammoth Amazon has its Kindle Fire, which boasts
one of the best displays in the tablet
world. In addition to these and other
major makers with high-quality Android tablets, there are numerous import options available, including some
surprisingly high-quality ones and
others that arent worth the postage
required to import them.
The tablets we used for this story
were the Nexus 7 (an iPad mini
competitor) and the 2014 Samsung

Galaxy Note 10.1-inch model. Both
tablets are capable, attractive, lightweight models with good battery life
and fne displays. The Nexus 7 is a
close rival to the iPad mini, with
largely the same capabilities and performance. It has a better screen and
lesser cameras than the original mini
but not as nice of a display as the latest mini with Retina display.
The Galaxy Note 10.1 is also a worthy rival to the latest iPad. It is very
light, though slightly heavier than the
iPad Air, has a comparably great battery life, a terrifc display that can
be dimmed very low, excellent front
and back cameras and nice little builtin speakers. It comes with built-in
WiFi and Bluetooth and has one feature lacking on any iPad: a slot for a
microSD card to allow for additional
storage, which is great for those giant
aviation databases. In addition, the
Galaxy Note has the ability to run two
apps at once, a feature that is surprisingly useful when prefight planning,
as you can call up two different
weather or fight-planning sites.
The Android galaxy of aviation apps
is small but has some real stars. There
are numerous aviation weather apps
available on Android, and you can, of
course, access the Internet. Like iPads,
some Android tabs are WiFi-only and
some offer a cellular data connection,
for which you must pay a phone company a monthly fee.
navigation apps
There are a few apps really worth taking a look at, including a couple
youve probably heard of and a couple
more you might not know. A general
disclaimer: While the results of our
tests are good for the versions of the
apps (the latest available at the time
of this writing) and the devices we
used, your experience might vary.
Here are some of the most popular
Android aviation navigation apps
available in the Google Play store.
Fltplan.com
Cost to buy
Free!
Key Features
Moving map, fight-plan info through
ftplan.com (free subscription required),
fuel prices, fight tracking, weight and
balance, FBO information, airport/facility
directory, predeparture clearances
Geo-reFerenCed Charts
No
Fltplan.coms Android app works very

well. Its relatively fast, theres a lot of
data available, including charts for
Canada and the Caribbean, and it has
a slick interface for importing your
ftplan.com fight plans into the app.

You can get in-depth weather briefngs,
import airplane-specifc performance
specs they had not only the SR22
but also the Turbo model and add
waypoints to your route with a touch.
The downside is the map part of the
app, which is what most pilots look
for in these products, is not very fullfeatured or well-integrated. Its graphical planning capabilities are slow and a
bit clunky, its fight-planning interface
is not particularly user-friendly, and its
learning curve is steep.
That said, its strengths recommend
taking a look. Fltplan.com offers users
access to world-class fight-planning
and weather data, including international fling and briefngs. You get
fight tracking, an electronic logbook,
free charts and even high-end features,
such as predeparture clearances. The
cost its free with registration on
ftplan.com is unbeatable, but there
are some items youll miss, such as georeferenced charts and the ability to
interface with automatic dependent
surveillance-broadcast receivers.
Avilution Aviation Maps

The surprise star of the Android
world, Avilutions Aviation Maps app
is a very slick package. For less than
youd pay for top-tier navigation apps
like ForeFlight (available exclusively
on iOS devices) and Garmin Pilot,
Avilutions all-in-one pilot app offers
a comparably impressive feature set
with excellent usability.
You get downloadable charts (georeferenced with the premium version),
fight planning and fight-plan fling,
automatic dependent surveillancebroadcast connectivity with slick onscreen weather through SkyRadar
and Dual receivers (among others),
and nicely implemented split screen
displays so you can display charts
or nearest airports or weather updates or whatever else your heart
desires alongside the map. Screen
refreshes are a snap, charts are sharp
and quickly zoom-able, and on-map
rubber band FliGht

No
FliGht-plan FilinG
Yes
ads-b Compatibility
No
split sCreen
No
panel emulation
No
Features were current as of evaluation date. Not all
features were listed.
Naviator
banding fight-plan modifcation.
Map interactivity is limited. On other
apps, touch a waypoint, an airport
for example, and you get a wealth of
information (Garmin Pilot is the Android leader in map interactivity).
The charts are relatively quick to
download but lack the sharpness at
close zooms that other apps have.
There are some cool extras, including
a vertical nav calculator, outputting
of your GPS track for playback on
Google Earth and integration with
Lockheed Martins fight-plan system
for direct fling of fight plans
through the app. Naviator is a bit
complicated to set up, with a few
tiers of subscription required, but the
pricing is very competitive. Like all
the other apps here, theres a generous trial period during which you get
most of the features of the app.
A relative newcomer to the mapping
scene, Naviator is a basic app that
features scanned charts. Georeferencing for approach charts is
available through a separate annual
subscription of $35. The interface
takes some study the learning
curve is moderately steep but once

you are comfortable with it, there
are some great features, including
automatic dependent surveillancebroadcast weather display, traffc
through Zaons PCAS XRX sensor,
split screen and very good rubber
trial period
30-day free trial
fight planning is quirky but quick

once you get the idea. Note to developers: Users want true rubber banding so they can drag and modify
the course line without a second
thought. That said, Avilution has an
exceptionally handy Victor airway
routing feature that prompts you to
add a new waypoint if it is along an
existing airway as part of an airway
routing, potentially saving dozens of
subsequent inputs. Nice.
There are few downsides. The biggest in my mind is stability. I had a few
crashes on each of my Android test
platforms. This is an issue that might
get solved quickly, but part of the Android dilemma is having to fx bugs for
numerous software builds and devices. Still, for those looking for a fullfeatured app for Android that does
just about everything the big boys do,
Avilution is defnitely worth a look.
Cost to buy
$54.95 per year, standard
$144.95 per year, premium
Key Features
Moving map, terminal charts, data storage
on SD card, DUATS support, search-andrescue patterns, approach charts, Nexrad,
metars, TAFs, icing, notams, progressive
briefng strip and much more
trial period
30-day free trial
Cost to buy
$34.99 per year or $4.99 per month
$14.95 one-time fee
Key Features
Moving map, Nexrad, animated weather,
airmets, sigmets, graphical metars,
winds aloft, terminal charts, terrain database, altitude optimizer for winds aloft,
bring-your-own-charts feature, fight
recording, Google Earth integration
Yes (purchased through Seattle
Avionics)
rubber band FliGht
Yes
FliGht-plan FilinG
Yes
Yes (with premium subscription)
ads-b Compatibility
Yes (Dual XGS170, iLevil and others)
rubber band FliGht

Yes
split sCreen
Yes
FliGht-plan FilinG
Yes
panel emulation
Limited, HSI emulation
ads-b Compatibility
Yes (SkyRadar, Dual XGPS170 and others)
split sCreen
Yes
panel emulation
No

Garmin Pilot
For those who want the counterculture appeal of Android tablet
computing along with the proven
performance of an industry leader,
theres only one app at this point that
fts the bill: Garmin Pilot. This app
from the successful general aviation
avionics manufacturer is very similar
in nearly every regard to the companys iPad app of the same name.
There are a few features missing on
the Android version, though Garmins developers have been working
quickly to bring its Android offering
up to the current state of the iOS art.
Today, this means that Garmin Pilot
on the 2014 Samsung Galaxy Note
10.1 tablet has geo-referenced charts,
fight-plan fling, automatic dependent
surveillance-broadcast connectivity
through the Garmin GDL 39, split
screen capability, panel display and
trial period
30-day free trial
Cost to buy
$9.99 per month
Key Features
Moving map, fight planning, dynamic
fight-plan editing, dynamic waypoint
info, terrain database, geo-referenced
weather through Internet or in cockpit,
animated radar, winds aloft, safe taxi,
terminal charts, en route charts, fuel
prices and much more
Yes
rubber band FliGht
Yes
FliGht-plan FilinG
Yes
ads-b Compatibility
Yes (Garmin GDL 39)
split sCreen
Yes
panel emulation
Yes
the ability to upload fight plans from

the app to the Garmin D2 pilot watch.
The iOS app at this point can display
images from the Garmin VIRB, the
companys terrifc high-defnition action cam, and can also control multiple
cams though the software. Its a great
feature, but unless you have a VIRB, its
not something youll miss. We wouldnt
be surprised to see that capability migrate to the Android app soon.
The bottom line is that Garmin Pilot
on the Android platform offers a worldclass navigation experience with all of
the bells and whistles youve come to
expect from the best aviation apps.
Other Options
There are other options in the Android universe, though we did not thoroughly test them. Among them are Avare and Anywhere Map, and there are
apps specifcally designed for European users, such as Sky-Map. Additionally, you can get cheap or free apps for downloading weather, checking runway conditions, viewing charts or completing aviation-specifc calculations.
Is Android for You?

The question is with the availability of great all-in-one navigation apps on
Apple devices from the likes of ForeFlight, Garmin, Jeppesen, Hilton Software and BendixKing why would anyone choose Android? The answers are
both obvious and a lot more complicated than you might imagine.
First, theres cost. Apple has historically charged a premium for its products, asking almost twice as much for its computers as its major-player PC
and Android competitors ask for their products. The truth is with an Android tablet you can get a lot more device for the same money or the same
basic device for a lot less. The Nexus 7 made by Asus on which we ran these
tests costs around $300 with 4G cellular connectivity and 16 GB of storage
(memory on most Android tabs is expandable, unlike the fxed-memory
Apple products). Thats almost $250 less than the competing iPad mini with
Retina display. The larger 10-inch class Android devices from Samsung,
Asus and others typically go for 20 to 30 percent less than Apples iPad Air
with comparable specs. So if price is an issue, Androids rule.
The other factor is one of brand choice. For many pilots, Apple represents
a safe, industry-leading company that makes great hardware and gets an
arguably fair price for it. For others, Apple is the big company charging a
premium and attracting fans for the brand name as much as for the product.
For many of those anti-bandwagon types, Android (despite being digital
mega-player Googles initiative) represents the best alternative.
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UNUSUAL ATTITUDES
F lY i n G O p i n i O n | B Y M A R T H A L U n K E n
A NO-HOLDS-BARRED
LOOK AT PILOTS, PLANES
AND LIFE IN THE AIR
ROLLING THE DICE WITH FUEL

MANAGEMENT WORKS JUST FINE -
UNTIL IT DOESNT.
aM i My broThers keeper?
DONT BE AFRAID TO SPEAK UP WHEN YOURE
CONCERNED ABOUT A FELLOW PILOT
My friend Justin is a superb fight instructor with considerable experience
in real-world fying and is charmingly
full of himself. He amuses me by constantly working deals that involve
fying really nice airplanes to major
league games, rock concerts, ski resorts, airshows, Mardi Gras festivals,
NASCAR races and weekends at somebodys oceanfront condo. Last week, I
stuck my head in his offce at the fight
school as he was about to leave in a
Cirrus, fying with somebody to a bowl
game in the Carolinas; he couldnt remember if it was North or South.
When I checked aviation weather
that evening (a nightly habit), conditions looked pretty grim between
southern Ohio and the Carolinas. Its
at the end of December when low

clouds, precipitation, cold temperatures and mountains can spell trouble
for small airplanes. So I texted Justin
to see if they were back or had stayed
over and was relieved when he called
to report they got out early enough
to escape the bad stuff and made the
fight home under a high overcast.
Which got me thinking about my
brothers keeper syndrome
On a beautiful Sunday morning in
May, an experienced pilot and fight
instructor made an uneventful fight
back to southern Ohio in a Cessna 210
with three friends on board after a
weekend in Myrtle Beach, South
Carolina. Another airplane, a Piper
PA-28 Archer, was along on this anF LY I N G M A G . C O M / 7 0 / M A R C H 2 0 1 4
nual trip with the two co-owner pilots

up front and two passengers in the
back. Home base for both airplanes
was a small country airport, and the
guy fying the Archer was a former
student of the guy fying the faster,
more powerful Cessna. But the PA28 didnt leave Myrtle Beach with the
Cessna that morning. Opting to stay at
the beach as long as possible, they departed in the late afternoon, crossed
some rough mountainous terrain after
nightfall and arrived back in Ohio late
in the evening. The Piper owner/pilot
had been licensed for several years,
but it was common knowledge that he
rarely few; in fact, hed logged little,
if any, time since making the same trip
to South Carolina the year before.
Everybody in the Cessna had gone
their separate ways after getting home
that afternoon. The weather en route
had been good, and nobody was concerned about the Archer. Some people
in the sparsely populated area around
their destination later reported hearing a loud noise that night. But it
wasnt until early the next morning
that a farmer spotted the wreckage:
an airplane lying upside down in a
feld about a half-mile from the airport. Emergency responders found
the pilot and two occupants dead, but
one back-seat passenger was still alive
barely. Unconscious, he had hung
upside down from his lap belt through
the night. Without fight following or
a fight plan and an ELT that either
malfunctioned or was damaged, nobody realized they were missing.
The National Transportation Safety
Boards report: Two private-rated pilots and two passengers departed Myrtle
Beach at approximately 1800. Their
destination was approximately 415 nm,
and the magnetic heading was approximately 324 degrees. The winds aloft at
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U n U s U a l a t t i t U d e s | F lY i n G O p i n i O n
the cruise altitude of 8,500 feet were

290 degrees at 25 knots. The calculated
groundspeed was 83 knots. The airplane departed with 50 gallons of fuel.
The accident occurred at approximately
2220, about .5 miles from the destination airport. Post crash examination of
the wreckage revealed 10 ounces of fuel
in each wing tank.
The NTSBs probable cause: The
failure of the pilot to assure an adequate fuel supply and his failure to refuel en route.
But theres a little more to the story
than an isolated case of poor judgment. As mentioned before, the pilots lack of experience and currency
were no secret around this small
country airport. True, the year before
he made the same fight in the same
airplane and successfully got back
nonstop. Maybe the winds aloft were
more favorable or maybe he leaned a
little more aggressively because while
he got the Archer on the ground, he
had to be towed off the runway to the
gas pump the tanks were bone-dry.
A 40-year-old fight instructor was

friends with a young man serving as
chief pilot for an air freight outft fying
a Beech 18, a Piper Aztec and a Beech
BE58 Baron. This CFI was anxious to
get beyond instructing and move up
into the more glamorous world of fying night freight in the Baron. His chief
pilot friend agreed to let him come
along on night runs, fying the Part 91
legs and logging it as training. After a
month and maybe four or fve fights,
the chief pilot signed the CFI off as
having completed the required training
and passed him on Part 135 profciency, competency and route checks.
On his second single-pilot night run
in the BE58, the new freight dog
was carrying a load of canceled checks
from Cincinnati to Cleveland and had a
deadheading passenger who was chief
pilot for a large Part 135/121 carrier.
(Carrying another certifcated aircarrier pilot is legitimate and not uncommon). This passenger later remarked how uncomfortable [and]
quite nervous he felt during the fight
because, even though the weather was
fne, the pilot was thoroughly saturated with the Baron. The pilot explained
that this was only his second fight for

the company his frst had been the
night before and that he had about
30 to 25 hours total multiengine time.
When his passenger, who was intimately familiar with Part 135 requirements, expressed surprise, the pilot
said he was lucky and had the job because he got to know the chief pilot.
A few nights later, that same passenger saw the pilot at the FBO in Cleveland after he had landed in the Baron.
The weather that January night was
IFR and very cold, but he said the pilot
was soaked in sweat.
The new guy left Cincinnatis Lunken Airport for Cleveland again the
following night on his fourth or ffth
single-pilot Part 135 fight. The Baron
had 155 pounds of canceled checks
in 23 bags, there were no squawks
of the departure runway. The angle of

the cuts in the trees on initial impact
showed the right wing was down almost 45 degrees, and the fnal impact
in the feld indicated a nose-down attitude of about 30 degrees. You can
imagine the devastation I saw that
night at the accident scene.
The NTSBs probable cause(s): Failure of the pilot to maintain control of
the aircraft after becoming spatially
disorientated in night instrument meteorological conditions (IMC). Factors
related to the accident were: the pilots
lack of experience in the type of operation, his lack of recent instrument experience and inadequate surveillance
of the operation by the chief pilot/company management.
FAA and NTSB investigations revealed signifcant unexplained
The weaTher ThaT nighT was iFr

and very cold, buT he said The
piloT was soaked in sweaT.
or deferred maintenance items, and
the airplane had been refueled in
Cleveland the previous night. Lunken
weather was 1,700 overcast with
8 miles visibility and the wind from
030 at 11 knots.
At 10 p.m. EST after taking off to
the northeast, he contacted Cincinnati Departure Control at 2,300 feet
and, after a short vector, was cleared
to resume own navigation, climb to
and maintain 9,000. Acknowledging
the transmission, he climbed 300 feet,
made a slight turn in the wrong direction and in the next 14 seconds descended 1,400 feet at a rate of nearly
4,000 fpm and deviated 52 degrees
to the right. Cincinnati lost radar contact and voice communications about
one minute after the pilots initial call.
Three minutes later the FAA got the
frst report that an airplane had crashed
near Newtown, Ohio. There had been
no distress calls from the pilot.
The Baron hit trees and impacted a
soft, muddy feld about 3 miles north
of Lunken and along the centerline
discrepancies between the pilots

company resume, his personal logs
and company records. As of three
months before the accident, the pilots
logbooks showed a total of 32 hours
multiengine time and 66 hours of instrument time. The chief pilot, his
good friend, had documented fight
experience, which was not consistent
with the pilots personal logbook or
the verbal comments the pilot made
six days before the accident.
Pilots value the freedom and independence that go along with fying
airplanes. So its risky to pipe up when
you think somebodys making a bad
decision about making a risky fight,
and maybe that risk is more about his
capabilities, attitude and currency
than about weather. But were traditionally a band of brothers and each of us
certainly instructors, chief pilots and
check airmen has some responsibility as his brothers keeper. Both of these
accidents could have been prevented by
advice from wiser heads; I will always
wonder if they sleep soundly at night.
Its the planes that bring you here.

Its the people that bring you back.
Reignite your passion.
Oshkoshyou gotta be here!
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GEAR UP
F LY I N G O p i n i O n | B Y d i c k k a r l
FROM tHe
OpeRAtING ROOM
tO FLIGHt Ops: A
suRGeONs jOuRNeY
InItIal OperatIng
experIence
jetsuItes Cj3s ANd pHeNOMs ARe

kNOwN As Red stRIpe - NOt tO be
CONFused wItH tHe beeR - ON AIR
tRAFFIC CONtROL FRequeNCIes.
Driving from Tampa, Florida, to KPBI

for class at JetSuites Palm Beach base,
Phil Smith and I are reunited for one
last time. Indoc and sim partners for
almost a month, we are both about to
fy as frst offcers for the frst time;
each of us has been assigned to a B
captain for our initial operating experience. It is about to start in earnest.
Capt. Fred Pollino and I are going to
Dayton, Ohio; Phil is heading to Boston. It is a slow start for me but not for
Phil. Fred and I airline to Dayton and
check into a Holiday Inn Express. Phil
sends me a photo of himself in the left
seat of a CJ3 at Flight Level 450 taken
earlier on the same day. Fred senses
my frustration and takes me to our
airplane. We practice removing and
replacing the engine and pitot covers,
prefighting the airplane and then
engine starts. With no trip on for today, we are released and repair to
a local Hooters where I mistakenly
and I learn a lot from him, not just

about the airplane but also about airspace. Returning to Florida from the
Bahamas, he notes that Miami has us
on radar and has acknowledged us but
hasnt given us a clearance. I fret about
this, as there are thunderstorms
about, but Fred reassures me. Hes
got us, but by delaying our clearance,
we can maneuver at 16,500 feet, stay
clear of the clouds and still enjoy the
controllers fight following.
We land at KPBI at dusk, go through
customs and prepare for a leg to JFK in
New York. I am exhausted and am secretly pleased when fow delays into
New York put us out of duty time and
we agree to fy the JFK leg frst thing
in the morning. I sleep soundly, which
is a good thing as we have a 4 a.m.
show for a 5 a.m. trip to JFK.
It is my leg to Kennedy. We climb
right up to Flight Level 450. Fred hears
a noise, but I dont. I dont know the
Flying For real For the First time
order a martini not Hooters forte.

The next morning, we reposition to
Cincinnatis Lunken Airport for the
next days trip. I am in the left seat for
the 20-minute fight, most of which
goes by in a surreal blur as Fred holds
my hand. The landing is remarkably
soft given my innocence. I will soon
learn to love the trailing link gear.
Day three brings some real fying.
We carry a family of fve to Florida
Fred fies. A reposition leg to Miamis
Opa-Locka Executive is mine, and I do
well enough with a ton of help that
Fred tells me it is my leg to North
Eleuthera in the Bahamas with clients
on board. JetSuite is great about getting everybody experience. The company hires relatively high-time pilots
with an average of about 8,000
hours each and expects everybody
to be current and profcient. Every
captain is generous with fight time.
Fred is a former air traffc controller,
G e a r u p | F LY I N G O p i n i O n
airplane anywhere near as well as he

does. Concerned that there might be a
pressurization problem, he has me
don an oxygen mask. The noise dissipates as we climb, and after 20 minutes in the AFM, Fred makes the
diagnosis. No harm, no foul. As the
sun rises over the Atlantic, I marvel at
our altitude, the sight and my good
fortune. I have always dreamed of
this, and here I am. Were fying to
Kennedy, no less.
Kennedy is advertising ILS to 4L,
and we join the early morning parade.
There is a crosswind of 10 knots that
seems to be of no concern to Fred, to
the tower controller or the airplane. It
is easy to land. We taxi to Signature
and wait for our passenger. I grew up
in New York and have always had an
emotional and admittedly grandiose
connection to this pavement that
launches airplanes to Beijing and Moscow. Now, I am here with the big boys.
Loaded up, we are just in front of an
Air China 747-400 on the taxi out.
Were going to Bedford, Massachusetts, and a delay in our departure
from New York means that we will
have to hurry after landing to get back
to White Plains, New York, in time to
take a famous professional baseball
player and his family to Baltimore.
Now we are hustling, and Fred is essentially on his own as the Rockwell
Collins Pro Line 21 has me befuddled.
After landing in Baltimore with its
three-quarter-mile visibility and low
ceilings, we turn around to White
Plains. Once weve landed, I help clean
the airplane and try to look like I know
what Im doing. The airplane is headed
to Nassau in the Bahamas with another
crew. It works even harder than we do.
A car service takes us from White
Plains to Teterboro Airport in New Jersey. Even though it is the peak of afternoon rush hour, our driver takes us
into New York City and back out via
the George Washington Bridge. Our
protestations go unheeded, as we dont
speak Korean and the driver doesnt
speak English. The trip a distance of
33 miles takes close to two hours.
Day fve features a bouncy trip from
KTEB to New Haven, Connecticut, to
pick up a passenger bound for Baltimore. The KTEB to KHVN has me busy;
it is rough, and heading/altitude and
speed instructions come blisteringly
fast. There is a big crosswind at New

Haven, but again, I am lucky.
Our passenger is delightful and asks
for a Coke Zero, which we dont have.
Fred makes a note of this in the JetSuite computer program that we update after each fight. Two months
later, I see her name on the manifest
again and persuade an FBO attendant
in Syracuse, New York, to take me to a
grocery store to get Coke Zero. When
we get to New Haven later that night,
our passenger is thrilled.
I am a little high on the approach to
Baltimore and kick off the autopilot. It
is easier for me to hand-fy than to input
the correct heading and altitude commands. Fred reminds me that the aim is
to use the automation but not to lose
stick and rudder skills. After landing,
we both race to catch a fight home.
to Charlottesville, Virginia, a remarkable trip in a CJ3 that is possible only

with a modest tailwind. Our company
policy is to land with 600 pounds of
fuel. Most captains, I now know, think
1,000 pounds is prudent in most instances. The airplane holds 4,710
pounds. Jets are different because you
can get to an alternate a lot quicker
than in the Cheyenne that I am used to.
As night settles around us, we cruise
over St. Louis at Flight Level 450. I
spent six great years down there; I can
see KSUS, my old airport. The tailwinds have materialized, and our MFD
suggests that well be fat, more than
1,000 pounds, upon landing. We are
on time and safely in by 10 p.m. We
have tomorrow off and plan to take
the same passengers back to Oakland
on Sunday. Fred sends a message to
as the sun rIses Over the atlantIc,

I marvel at Our altItude, the
sIght and my gOOd fOrtune.
A week later, Fred and I meet up in
Palm Beach again. This time I will be in
his hair for nine days. Sixty hours
from now, you will call me and say this
is easy, Fred reassures me. Getting
from here to there will be interesting.
We launch for Muncie, Indiana, and
then take folks to Louisville, Kentucky.
From there, we fy into a setting sun to
Denvers Centennial Airport. These are
all my legs. I have a hard time picking
out the airport in Colorado, but Freds
been here many times. The FBO has
free liquor, and I am tempted. It has
been a long day. Instead, we opt for the
free dinner at the DoubleTree. I look
longingly at the Flemings Steakhouse
next door. Tomorrow we head west
then east.
The takeoff from Centennial is arresting because of the beauty of the
Rockies; though it is only October,
snow tops most peaks. After climbing
to Flight Level 430, we settle in for the
morning trip to Oakland, California.
The weather is gorgeous. The United
States is huge, even at 410 knots.
We pick up a family of four and head
the chief pilots and check airmen. I am

signed off to fy the line.
The University of Virginia is playing
Georgia Tech, and it is homecoming
weekend. We are quartered in a hotel
that caters to the visiting team. Fred and
I are on standby until 5:30 p.m., so we
spend a pleasant day enjoying the college scene. It is almost enough to make
you want to go back to college. We go
to bed early though we dont leave for
Oakland until 4 p.m. tomorrow.
The next day while waiting for our
passengers, we chat with other crews
who are doing the same thing. A pilot
for PlaneSense has his Pilatus parked
next to our CJ3. I ask him to say hello
to Chris Loprinze, the amazing chief
pilot at PlaneSense who was instrumental in getting me an interview for
a job there. I never made it to the interview, as I had taken the offer from
JetSuite. After contemplating all this,
the pilot looks carefully at the big blue
turboprop and the sleek white Citation
with the red stripe and says, Well, I
guess it sure worked out for you.
I should say it has.
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F LY I N G o p i n i o n | B Y p e t e r g a r r i s o n
Bent-Wing Birds
EnginEEring history is madE to bE forgottEn

The inverted gull wing, bent downward to keep the gear legs short and
the huge prop clear of the ground,
made the F4U Corsair instantly recognizable. Other airplanes, however,
had used this feature before the
Corsair, particularly during the era
of fxed gears enveloped in voluminous fairings or pants. An early example was the Ha 137. Ha stands for
Hamburger Flugzeugbau Hamburg
Airplane Factory a subsidiary of the
great German shipbuilding frm of
Blohm & Voss. A dark horse in a Luftwaffe dive bomber competition, the
sleek 137 lost out to the famous
Junkers Stuka, which also had an inverted gull wing as well as its own
built-in air-raid siren and the ability
to dive perfectly vertically.
The designer of the Ha 137 was
named Richard Vogt. A protg of
Claudius Dornier, whose designs
were manufactured under license by
Kawasaki, Vogt worked in Japan in

the 1920s, then returned to Germany
in 1933 to become head of aircraft
design for Blohm & Voss. He remained
there until the end of the war.
Vogts name is little known today,
but he was a designer of great originality whose work spanned eras from
the biplane to the cruise missile. An
unusual design of his that still pops up
from time to time is the BV 141; in
fact, it popped up in this column a few
months ago. A proposed reconnaissance plane, the 141 was dramatically
asymmetrical, with a single-engine
fuselage offset to the left of center and
a glass-enclosed gondola to the right.
The horizontal tail projected entirely
to the left of the fn to give the gunner
in the rear of the gondola a wider feld
of fre. The oddity of the design caused
much merriment at the time but also
made the airplane unforgettable.
Many of Vogts designs were
CuttING tHROuGH
tHe MYtHs tO Get tO
tHe FACts OF FLIGHt
tHe FeRtILe bRAIN OF RICHARd

VOGt pROduCed MANY OddItIes. tHe
bV 141 wAs tHe Oddest OF ALL.
foatplanes or fying boats. One of

these, the three-engine Ha (later BV)
138, started life with another gull
wing, right side up this time, intended to get the propellers as high as
possible above the water. Twin booms
emerged at the dihedral breaks to
support the empennage, and the third
600 hp Jumo engine sat atop a pylon
in the V formed by the slanted inner
panels of the wings. This arrangement turned out to have bad stalling
qualities, and a second version of the
design used a straight wing, a deeper
hull and a central nacelle towering
above the rest. I fnd the result rather
rakish looking, but the British magazine Aeroplane scoffed:
Richard Vogt, that original man,
Turns out aeroplanes uglier than
Most any other designer can.
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T E C H N I C A L I T I E S | F LY I N G o p i n i o n
This design was followed by a fourengine, long-range mail plane, the Ha

139, which returned to the inverted
gull wing, this time on foats. Three
were built. Catapult-launched from
ships and cruising at 130 knots, they
crisscrossed the South Atlantic in the
prewar years carrying mail and cargo
for Lufthansa. They were followed by

the BV 222 Viking, a six-engine fying
boat of 150-foot span and 4,000-mile
range intended as a transatlantic passenger carrier, also for Lufthansa.
A structural peculiarity common to
most Vogt designs was a tubular wing
spar welded of rolled steel sheet. He
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brought the idea with him from Japan and applied it to larger and larger
airplanes; by the time it got to the
Viking, the tube was almost 6 feet in
diameter. A tube is not quite so effcient at handling bending stresses as
the more usual I- or box-beam, but
tubular spars carried twisting loads
very well, doubled as fuel tanks, and
they lent themselves to simple, standardized fttings for attaching engines, fuselages and so on.
In the 1930s, the fying boat was
widely considered the logical type for
transoceanic travel, not only for safety
but also because there existed few runways suitable for such heavy airplanes.
A still larger model, the BV 238, succeeded the Viking. It was the heaviest
airplane in the world, with a gross
weight of over 200,000 pounds, a
wingspan of almost 200 feet and six
liquid-cooled 12-cylinder engines of
2,000 takeoff horsepower each. The
238, like the Viking, had a straight
wing and relied on a very tall, narrow
fuselage to keep the propellers away
from the water.
These airplanes were conceived in
a Germany confdent of victory. With
postwar civilian travel in mind, Vogt
sketched an even larger fying boat
similar in scale to the Hughes Spruce
Goose: the P 200 P stood for
Projekt with eight 4,000 hp engines, a 280-foot wingspan, a threestory fuselage resembling a miniature
ocean liner and a takeoff weight of
450,000 pounds. Hermann Pohlmann, the designer of the Stuka, who
later wrote a history of the aeronautical activities of Blohm & Voss in the
Vogt years, noted that the P 200, with
its emphasis on spaciousness, comfort
and elegance, refected a mistaken
conception of the postwar travel market. As the pragmatic American manufacturers of what would become the
DC-6 and Constellation had already
perceived, speed makes comfort superfuous. We continue to suffer the
consequences of that insight today.
In March 1944, with the factory a
likely target for enemy bombers, the
BV 238 prototype few to a lake near
Lbeck for testing. By then, fotillas of
Allied night bombers were reducing
cities to ashes while, by day, fghters
roamed the countryside strafng targets
of opportunity. Inevitably, but rather
T E C H N I C A L I T I E S | F LY I N G o p i n i o n
sadly, the giant fying boat, moored in

the Schaalsee under heavy camoufage,
was spotted, strafed and sunk.
When Germany found itself on the
defensive on both western and eastern
fronts, increasingly bizarre and inventive designs fowed from Vogts pen.
There were slender-winged glider
bombs that resembled sailplanes
packed with high explosive and a
weird machine, the P 163, whose crew
of four occupied two gondolas at the
tips of the wing. The P 170 was a fast
bomber with three big radial engines, two of them way out at the
wingtips. The crew sat at the extreme
tail of the central fuselage where, despite the asymmetric-thrust issues
raised by the wingtip engines, there
was no vertical fn at all.
Vogt designed a small engineless
interceptor whose prone pilots, towed
into the stratosphere by Me 109 fghters,
were supposed to dive into bomber
formations, ramming their tails a
suicidal style of combat that to Stuka

designer Pohlmann seemed more appropriate to Japanese culture than to
German. There was a series of tailless
fying wings, mostly single and twin
establishment, he worked in comparative anonymity. In Germany, he

had been more of a fgure, and in old
photographs one sees him, short in
stature but lean and good-looking,
increasingly Bizarre and inventive

designs floWed from vogts pen.
jets, with stabilizing surfaces offset
aft from the wingtips on small pylons.
Time was running out for the Third
Reich, but Hitlers appetite for novel
reprisal weapons was undiminished.
After the war, Vogt, along with
many other German scientists and
technicians, was brought to the U.S.,
where he enjoyed a career with American aerospace frms, including Boeing. In the vast American aerospace
laughing with the test pilot Hanna

Reitsch or showing der Fhrer around
the Blohm & Voss plant. Richard Vogt
died in 1979 in Santa Barbara, California, at the age of 84. Most of what he
produced is forgotten today. It is the
curse of engineering, unlike the other
creative arts, that the constant evolution of technology leads us not only to
discard obsolete productions but also
to wipe them from our memory.
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F LY I N G O P I N I O N | B Y L E S A B E N D
aIrLIne CaPtaIns: are

they a dyIng breed?
THE EROSION OF CAPTAINS AUTHORITY
Its probably not surprising that author Ernie Gann, a former captain for
my airline, is one of my heroes. His
poetic words epitomized the very
beginning of commercial air travel
when it was romantic to fy. Captains were given the ultimate authority over nearly every aspect of their
fights. But interestingly enough, he
challenged that authority in his
screenplay of The High and the
Mighty. The 1954 flm was the frst in
a series of airline disaster movies. If
you are a connoisseur of the classics,
the scene of First Offcer John Wayne
slapping Capt. Robert Stack in the
cockpit of a DC-4 is a trademark. Why
the insubordinate slap?
As background, the airplane had
departed Honolulu destined for
San Francisco. One of the engines

loses a propeller past the infamous
point-of-no-return. The ensuing fre
creates a fuel leak that places the
fight in jeopardy of making landfall.
The story line leads us to believe that
the mounting stress of command
causes the captain to panic. He makes
the decision to ditch instead of continuing toward SFO. John Wayne, our
well-seasoned and PTSD-inficted
copilot, slaps sense into his captain.
It seems to me the prudent decision would have been to perform a
planned ditching. The Coast Guard
had already launched a search-andrescue operation. Besides, a remark
in the script at the end of the flm
indicated that just 30 gallons remained in the DC-4s fuel tanks. A
FLYING THE
HEAVY METAL WITH
AN AIRLINE CAPTAIN
documented successful planned

ditching occurred in 1956 aboard a
Pan Am B-377. All passengers survived. Sounds to me like John Wayne
was being a little reckless, but hey,
its the movies. Could this corny flm
have heralded the erosion of captains authority?
A few years back, my schedule assignment was a 757 trip from Miami
to San Francisco. I arrived at the gate
with the frst offcer. We began our
prefight preparations. During the
process, I was unoffcially informed
by a fight attendant that one of the
passengers about to be boarded had
arrived from Guatemala City with a
health condition that had forced the
crew of that fight to declare a medical emergency.
The passenger had been treated by
airport paramedics in Miami and sent
on his merry way despite an appearance that didnt quite scream miraculous recovery. What was the medical
condition? Symptoms of a heart attack. Uh huh.
With a roll of my eyes, I marched
off the airplane and had a conversation with the gate agent. Among other facts, I discovered our on-site
medical department hadnt examined
the passenger. Understanding my resistance to board this passenger, the
gate agent indicated that it wasnt our
call. Excuse me? Yep, I was to take my
concerns up with our customer resolution department. I picked up the
gate phone and dialed the number.
My rational argument that it would
probably be in everyones best interests if the passenger was delayed at
least one day for observation was not
met with the logic I anticipated. Instead, I was told that we had no valid
reason in our company rulebook to
deny boarding. And if I took it upon
myself to make such a decision, another crew would be faced with the
same issue. Wonderful. Not wanting
to pass the buck, I reluctantly agreed
to take the passenger.
J U M P S E A T | F LY I N G O P I N I O N
Halfway across the Gulf of Mexico,

I answered an intercom call from the
No. 1 fight attendant.
Remember the Guatemala passenger? the fight attendant asked.
I sighed and replied with a Yes.
According to a nurse, he appears
to be showing signs of cardiac arrest.
I gritted my teeth and rolled my
eyes for the second time that day.
Were diverting to Houston Intercontinental. You have approximately
20 minutes to prepare the cabin for
landing.
We declared a medical emergency
and landed without incident. The
passenger survived and was removed
by paramedics, then diagnosed with a
heart attack. While reviewing fight
plan paperwork for our impromptu
leg from IAH to SFO, I called the customer resolution department just to
report on the wisdom of the decision
that had almost cost a man his life
and had cost the company a few
bucks, not to mention the inconvenience to the remaining passengers.
Not surprisingly, the individual I
had spoken to while in Miami was
nowhere to be found. I shook my
head at the phone with the thought
that captains authority had been
usurped by a customer resolution
offcial sitting in a cubicle detached
from the world and the airline. Great.
Ill fast forward to a more recent
event. For those of my colleagues
that have experienced the joys of
crew member screening at this thriving European hub, my anecdote is for
you. Because this airport is one of the
worlds busiest international destinations, security procedures are strict.
Prior to departure, crew members are
driven via their hotel transportation
buses to specifc control posts located
around the perimeter of the airport.
The buses proceed through a quarantined gate where crew members
disembark into a screening area.
Crews are subjected to physical body
searches, physical bag searches,
wanding and an X-ray machine. Liquids, gels and any other items deemed
suspicious are confscated and recorded on a bad crew member list.
Considering that I have responsibility for 303 lives and a 777,000-pound
airplane, I question the hyper-scrutiny
of my 10-mililiter Visine bottle not
being placed in the approved gels and

liquids Ziploc bag. But its their country, and I have to respect them for
their attempt at protecting the world.
In contrast, JFK, an equally active
international hub, has a portal available for crew members to bypass
security through a prescreening
process approved by the TSA. Background checks and fngerprinting are
just some of the compliance requirements in order to take advantage of
this portal. And JFK is not the only
airport in the United States that utilizes this process.
That being said, I comply with
the rules and dont waste energy
challenging security agents at this
particular European airport.
I passed through the magnetometer
and got the dreaded beep, a frequent
agent will be facing some form of

disciplinary action.
I refected on the implications of
the experience. Perhaps one security
agent had taken his responsibility too
far, but what did that say about the
ability of this individual to question
the authenticity and authority of a
captain, not to mention the implied
lack of respect? Did this event defne
a new culture?
It has also come to my attention
that an element among the fight
attendant training department at my
airline may also be defning a new
culture, if not a new attitude. The
FAR that legally deems the PIC to be
in charge of the entire crew has
not been receiving the emphasis it
deserves. Apparently some of our
fight attendant trainees have been
I was asked, dId you buy your

wIngs, or dId you earn them?
but allegedly random occurrence. I
was curtly instructed by the security
agent to remove my shoes, despite the
fact my footwear was purchased and
tested to be magnetometer-friendly.
As anticipated, the agent began a
physical pat-down, asking if I had
removed all sharp objects. I replied
that the only sharp objects not removed were the wings pinned onto
my uniform shirt a true statement.
I was then asked, Did you buy
your wings, or did you earn them?
Incredulous, I responded, You
didnt really ask me that question,
did you?
The agent replied, Well, you could
be a fake pilot.
I glanced down at the ID hanging
from the lanyard around my neck
that had just been scrutinized after
passing through the magnetometer.
A few unprofessional comments ran
through my head, but rather than
vocalize unsavory thoughts, I chose
to remain silent. After conveying my
experience to the appropriate managers, I received an apology for the
behavior. It appears the security
told that this command responsibility can be challenged.

When this subject matter came
up in conversation, one of my colleagues conveyed a discussion he
had with a new fight attendant. The
new hire claimed to have been told
that an option to deal with disagreeable pilots was to add a splash of Visine to their coffee, a legendary
airline recourse that is rumored to
cause serious upset stomach issues.
To the best of my knowledge, poisoning pilots is a federal offense. In my
book, incapacitating both pilots on a
two crew member airplane might
also be deemed suicide.
No doubt, captains authority has
eroded since Ernie Ganns era. The
evolution of the airline environment
has created this new culture. I agree
that some situations dictate crew
resource management skills. But
sometimes captains just have to be
captains simply because they were
trusted with that responsibility on
the day they added the fourth stripe
to their epaulets. I, for one, do not
take that responsibility lightly.
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25
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WE TOOK a
Beechcraft
Staggerwing
that aesthetic
beauty of past
eras up for
a spin and
reported on
the enjoyable
ight. While the airplane lacked lateral
stability, its sensitive response to pilot
inputs, high speed and great visibility made
it a pleasure to y, not to mention look at.
A LOOK BACK
AT FLYING MAGAZINE
25 AND 50 YEARS AGO
OUR COVER FEATURED
THE SLEEK, FRENCH-MADE
SOCATA TOBAGO. EASILY
DISTINGUISHABLE BY A
VERTICAL FIN LOCATED AHEAD
OF THE STABILATOR, THE
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WE REPORTED on the brawn of a British

Aerospace BAe 125-800 that sustained
a missile strike while cruising at 35,000
feet over Botswana.
The airplane,
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Quett Masire,
suffered a rapid
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OUR COVER FEATURED A PIPER

CHEROKEE 235 FLYING OVER
THE BEAUTIFUL, RUGGED
TERRAIN OF BRYCE CANYON,
UTAH. ANTHONY LINCK
PHOTOGRAPHED THE AIRPLANE
FROM HIS MOONEY SUPER 21
AS PART OF THE ISSUES PIECE
ON AIR-TO-AIR PHOTOGRAPHY.
In The Flying Dinosaur, WE DETAILED
the history of the Bristol Brabazon, an
eight-engine, 225 mph cruiser built
by the British after World War II. The
airplane was
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AIRLINE CAPTAINS

NEW CULTURE OF DISRESPECT?

SURVIVING THE OUTFLOW

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