Category: Miscellaneous –  Page 18

Ditching in the Irish Sea

Kate Burrows was flying from Guernsey back home to the Isle of Man in her PA30, a Comanche Twin, when she noticed problems with her right engine. She shut down the engine and, as she was still some 38 miles from the Isle of Man, she decided to divert to Blackpool. A few minutes later,…

Read more… 22 Jan 10

Haitian Relief Efforts

In lieu of a post today, here are some links regarding the situation in Haiti, with a focus on aviation. These photographs are not easy to look at but helped me to understand the scale of the devastation. Earthquake in Haiti – The Big Picture – Boston.com Tuesday afternoon, January 12th, the worst earthquake in…

Read more… 15 Jan 10

Odds of Airborne Terror (Gizmodo)

FiveThirtyEight: Politics Done Right: The Odds of Airborne Terror has done some interesting research: Over the past decade, there have been, by my count, six attempted terrorist incidents on board a commercial airliner than landed in or departed from the United States: the four planes that were hijacked on 9/11, the shoe bomber incident in…

Read more… 3 Jan 10

Best of 2009

I’m not sure how 2009 managed to disappear quite so quickly! But it’s gone and I’m quite happy to be able to talk about my plans for twentyten like I’m from some sort of futuristic sci-fi film. Before I start investigating what I need to get a space licence, I thought I’d take a final…

Read more… 1 Jan 10

Merry Christmas to all!

A retelling of the 19th-century story, especially for aviators. This has been floating around the Internet for years in various forms — and probably was passed around as photocopies for years before that. ‘Twas the night before Christmas, and out on the ramp, Not an airplane was stirring, not even a Champ. The aircraft were…

Read more… 25 Dec 09

The Ninth Day: A Gift Guide

A number of aviation bloggers have joined up to bring you The Twelve Days of Christmas: An Aviation Gift Guide. I’m going out on a limb with today’s recommendation but it can be hard to be sure what a pilot might like – we’re all different – and this was the one thing I could…

Read more… 10 Dec 09

Accident Reports

Bomber 139's Third Run: What the Investigation Found

In order to follow this analysis, you’ll need to have the details of the flight and the crash from last week’s article about the flight. When we last saw Bomber…

Bomber 139's Third Run: Downhill to Disaster

On the 6th of February 2023, a Boeing 737-3H4 Large Air Tanker crashed into a ridge line of 222 feet elevation in Fitzgerald River National Park in Western Australia. There…

Demystifying

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…

Durga Puja Pandal Shows Air India Flight 171 Crash

The following video from a religious festival in West Bengal, India, has caught a lot of social media attention. It shows a detailed representation of an Air India Boeing Dreamliner…

History

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…

The Disappearance of the Hawaii Clipper May Not Be as Mysterious as Was Thought

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.…

Fun Stuff

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…