With the loss of AirAsia flight QZ8501, a lot of attention has been focused on thunderstorms and their effects. I was quoted on the BBC talking about storms shortly after the accident. BBC News – AirAsia QZ8501: Does bad weather cause plane crashes? But it’s very rare for the weather alone to cause airliners to…
Read more… 20 Mar 15
Pan Am trip number 7 was an around-the-world flight which disappeared at sea, never to be recovered or understood. The aircraft was Pan Am ship #944 (registration N90944), a Boeing 377 Stratocruiser Romance of the Skies. The Stratocruiser was “the ocean liner of the air” with Pullman-style sleeping berths, reclining seats with 60 inches of…
Read more… 13 Mar 15
So all week, people have been forwarding me Jeff Wise’s piece from New York Magazine in which he comes up with a “new” theory that explains everything about why we can’t find Malaysia Airlines flight 370. How Crazy Am I to Think I Know Where MH370 Is? — NYMag Obviously, I immediately read it with…
Read more… 27 Feb 15
The chilling video of a Boeing 747 crashing on take-off from Bagram Afghanistan meant that this tragic accident from April 2013 made headline news. This is the dashcam video of the aircraft’s take off. Please note that it shows the actual impact and may be disturbing. The Ministry of Transportation and Commercial Aviation in Afghanistan…
Read more… 20 Feb 15
TransAsia Airways Flight 235 was a scheduled Taiwanese domestic flight from Taipei Songhan Airport to the Kinmen Islands. The aircraft, registration B-228516, was a twin-engine turboprop made for regional airliners, the ATR 72. It can seat up to 74 passengers and is operated by a two-pilot crew. B-22816 had two Pratt & Whitney Canada PW127M…
Read more… 6 Feb 15
The U.S. Coast Guard has released video footage of a Cirrus SR22 ditching into the Pacific on the 25th of Jan. The SR22 was being flown by a commercial pilot on a repositioning flight from Tracy, California to Maui. It’s a long flight and well out of range for a normal Cirrus SR22. The aircraft…
Read more… 30 Jan 15
On the 12th of August in 2024, a pilot fatally crashed a Robinson R44 into the top of a hotel building in Cairns, Australia. The pilot held a commercial helicopter…
On the 4th of June 2023, a Cessna Citation 560 aircraft crashed in Montebello, Virginia, killing the pilot and three passengers. The NTSB released their report on the 14th of…
This is not an article that I ever thought I would feel compelled to write! However, given the confusion over a photograph chosen in a regional English paper, apparently it’s…
There are a number of reasons why you might need to quickly point out the differences between a General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon and a Eurofighter EF2000 Typhoon. You might…
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…
This week, we have a guest post by J.B. Rivard who wrote an article for the American Aviation Historical Society (AAHS) and used one of my articles as a reference.…
I’m here, defeated but not yet horizontal, the victim of a relentless summer cold that feels like the universe’s revenge for something I can’t even remember. If I don’t make…
It seems a good time for something a bit more lighthearted. After weeks of analyzing serious incidents and technical failures, I thought I could a moment to appreciate aviation humuor…