Over a decade later, I am writing about the September 11 attacks for the first time. Initially it was just too raw and I couldn’t stand to try to analyse the situation when my own emotions were so close to the surface. Then, each anniversary, it seemed like everyone was writing about it and I…
Read more… 7 Sep 12
Edit: This was written directly after the accident. I wrote an updated two-part piece after the final report came out, which you can find here: https://fearoflanding.com/accidents/accident-reports/land-like-a-crow-part-1/. On the 1st of November in 2011, LOT airlines flight LO16 was flying into Warsaw-Okęcie when the main landing gear and nose gear failed to deploy. They landed on…
Read more… 17 Aug 12
Note: update with pilot comment at bottom of the post Earlier this week, I linked* the following video of a 1947 Stinson 108 crash as seen from the cockpit: This is unprecedented footage of a small airplane crash from inside the cockpit from two different views. Miraculously, everyone survived. The pilot will make a full…
Read more… 10 Aug 12
Last week, a Boeing C17 Globemaster III landed unexpectedly at Peter O. Knight Airport, a small GA airport in Tampa, Florida. The large military transport aircraft was meant to be flying into MacDill Air Force Base four miles away. The plane was inbound from Southwest Asia with 23 passengers and 19 crew on board. The…
Read more… 27 Jul 12
One of my pleasures on a Friday morning is to read the posts in Professional Pilots Rumour Network (known as PPRuNe for short) and this morning was no exception. I was intrigued by a post by a Scottish controller asking a question of the Private Flying forum. I recognised the name as a regular poster;…
Read more… 15 Jun 12
In the evening of 6 June 2010 a Boeing 737-4B6 of Royal Air Maroc was en route from Amsterdam Schiphol Airport to its destination of Nador International Airport in Morocco. Flight AT-685 had 156 passengers and four crew members on board. The captain was Pilot Flying, first officer was Pilot Monitoring. Timestamps and actions are…
Read more… 8 Jun 12
Fatal SR22 Stall on Final at Barwick LaFayette
On the 20th of March, 2025, a Cirrus SR22 crashed in LaFayette, Georgia during an instructional flight, killing both the pilot and the flight instructor. It was a good flying…
There Is a Parachutist in Front of You
On the 15th of June 2023, a light aircraft crashed into the runway at Aversi private airfield in Denmark. The aircraft, registered in Germany as D-EPRR, was a Cessna TU206G…
Someone has to write the TAF
It turns out that there a person sitting there deciding what the weather is going to do. Which seems obvious, except that I had somehow never asked msyelf who “someone”…
The Pilots, the Probes, and the AF447 Verdict
On the 21st of May 2026, the Paris Court of Appeal convicted Airbus and Air France of involuntary manslaughter for their roles in the crash of Air France flight 447,…
The CIA's Shark Screen
Today we have a guest post from the CIA! In their archives, researching something completely different, I found the answer to a question I never thought to ask. I immediately…
The First Jet to Land on an Aircraft Carrier (Deliberately)
“The Vampire was the first jet to land on a moving aircraft carrier deliberately.” This quote from Airshow Luke, our MC at the Legacy of Liberty airshow, made me almost…
Petrified, Petrified, Petrified
There’s been some interesting reporting in the UK media about a “near disaster” over Canary Wharf involving the captain having to intervene (the horror!) after air data systems failed on…
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…