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 all the good food and drink.

Mendel brings on the holiday cheer with a hilarious video for us.

Perhaps you were wondering if an old guy jetting all over the world in an ancient sleigh is safe, the FAA has got you covered:

May the holidays light a spark of brightness in the darkness of winter!

The big news story is the plane that landed itself. On the 20th of December, a Beechcraft Super King Air B200 was the first emergency landing using Garmin’s Emergency Autoland. The aircraft experienced a rapid decompression climbing through 23,000 feet, in IMC conditions in mountainous terrain, activating the Garmin Emergency Autoland. The pilots put on their oxygen masks and remained fully conscious but decided to trust the Garmin and allow the Autoland to continue with both pilots monitoring.

The Garmin Autoland chose the nearest suitable airfield, configured the aircraft for landing and contacted ATC.

The audio is chilling: Pilot incapacitation. Emergency Autoland in nineteen minutes.

The aircraft landed safely, the first proof of concept of the technology that Garmin spent years getting through certification.

Air India have found a forgotten Boeing 737-200 which seems to have been completely missing from their records. VH-EHH was delivered to Indian Airlines in 1983, leased to Alliance Air in 1998 and then converted into a freighter in 2007. It was grounded in 2012 and parked in a remote corner of Kolkata Airport. There was no paperwork trail and when Tata Group acquired Air India, it was not included as an asset.

Now Air India have received a parking bill for nearly 10 million rupees (US$120,000). Kolkata Airport charged standard parking fees for the thirteen years that the Boeing 737 was parked there, although when they initially contacted Air India, the airline said it wasn’t their aircraft.

The Boeing 737 has now been transported to Kempegowda International Airport in Bengaluru, where it will serve as a cautionary taletraining platform for aviation maintenance technicians.

Kolkata Airport says this is the 14th abandoned aircraft cleared from Kolkata Airport in the last five years.

An Airbus A321XLR has been grounded in Dublin after a hard landing on the 13th of December. The Aer Lingus A321 was flying from London Heathrow to Dublin and encountered gusty crosswinds on landing on runway 28L, leading this incredible video from a planespotter.

A normal landing would register between 1.1G and 1.4G. The aircraft was found to have suffered with a 3.3G landing load, well beyond the structural certification threshold for the A321XLR’s reinforced landing gear. The aircraft, one of five in the Aer Lingus fleet, now requires a complete landing gear replacement; a complex and expensive operation.

This VAS video using the audio of a pilot reporting an unknown object went viral during the slow news week.

The pilot reported that they had just flown past a “small silver canister”. ATC had no other reports and no idea whatt it could be. In the end, they left the pilots with this worrying message. “Good luck with the aliens.”

Finally, this five-minute video of the Irish Air Corps saving Christmas for Santa posted by Mendel is sure to bring a smile to your face.

And with that, I’m taking the rest of the year off. Thank you so much for all the comments of condolences and I’m sorry that I don’t have the emotional energy to reply to them all. But I read every one and they made me remember just how much I love this community. When Cliff died, I wondered if I would continue with Fear of Landing. Now, I can’t imagine ever doing without it.

Please have a happy transition and I’ll see you in 2026.