On the 29th of November 2013, Mozambique Airline flight 470 was flown directly into the ground by a pilot, believed to be the Captain, who was alone in the cockpit. As the fatal accident took place in the Republic of Namibia, their Directorate of Aircraft Accident Investigation (DAAI) were in charge of the investigation. They…
Read more… 6 May 16
Sometimes I have nightmares about getting confused in the cockpit and doing something so foolish that pilots all over the world will slap their foreheads in wonder. This is that kind of foolish. There may be snark ahead. The Air Accident Investigation Unit (AAIU) of Ireland released a report on a serious incident which at…
Read more… 22 Apr 16
There’s some odd news today which had me scurrying for the original accident report in order to make sense of a court case against two Air Traffic Controllers in Taiwan. TransAsia flight 222 crashed near Magong Airport on the Penghu archipelago on the 23rd of July in 2014. The Aviation Safety Council (ASC) released their…
Read more… 15 Apr 16
The mindset of the pilot whose suicide flight killed 150 people, crew and passengers, is hard to comprehend. He was the first officer and Pilot Flying of Germanwings flight 9525 and on the 24th of March 2015, he clearly and deliberately crashed an Airbus 320 into the French Alps, killing everyone on board. The Bureau…
Read more… 18 Mar 16
It was the morning of the 18th of August 2007 in London. The aircraft was HB-IYU, an Avro RJ100, the improved version of the British Aerospace 146 short-haul airliner, with four turbofan engines and a retractable tricycle landing gear (the most common landing gear for modern aircraft). The captain had over 9,000 flying hours, of…
Read more… 11 Mar 16
Flight SWA4013 was a Southwest Airlines scheduled passenger service from Chicago, Illinois to Branson, Missouri. The incident occurred on the 14th of January, 2014. The aircraft was a Boeing 737-7H4 registration N272WN. In the cockpit was the captain, who was Pilot Monitoring, the first officer, who was Pilot Flying, a company dispatcher who observed from…
Read more… 4 Mar 16
TNflygirl and the Beech Debonair
On the 7th of December 2023, a Beech 35-C33 Debonair crashed into terrain. The private pilot and the passenger, the pilot’s father, were both killed on impact. The private flight…
At All Costs
On the 11th of December 2024, the passenger in the right seat of a 1973 Grumman AA-5 was recording a video as they approached Pearland Regional Airport in Texas. The…
Trump Threatens to Ground Canadian Aircraft Over Gulfstream Certification
The US President, Donald Trump, posted the following to Truth Social last night. Based on the fact that Canada has wrongfully, illegally, and steadfastly refused to certify the Gulfstream 500,…
Another quick round of questions and answers
It’s time for another Questions and Answers session. I started this series a few years back, when a reader asked if there was a way to pose aviation questions outside…
Four Point Two Stars Where You Only Stop If You Have To
I always look up airports when I’m writing about them, partly out of habit and partly because I’m afraid I’ll miss an important detail. When I was writing Any Landing…
Gladys Ingle Inflight Wheel Change: Emergency Action or Stunt?
This video of a mid-air wheel exchange goes viral once a year or so, but I never get tired of watching it. Last week, it showed up on Reddit and…
Aviation Stories You Might Have Missed
I hope you all are having a wonderful holiday season. This week, I’ve put together a compilation of interesting items in the press that you might have missed while enjoying…
Nathan Pyle Strange Worlds
Thank you so much for all the kind words. I don’t quite have the wherewithal to respond to each of you individually but I very much appreciate all of you…