Latest Posts – Page 123
The Worst Aircraft Ever Constructed
Dr William Whitney Christmas (1865-1960) loved planes. He claimed to be one of the first aeroplane pilots: Dr Christmas said that he made his first flight in 1908 but he burned the aircraft in order to protect his design secrets. In his lifetime he patented 300 inventions to do with aviation. This, despite the fact…
Read more… 14 Sep 12
“We Have Some Planes” – A timeline of events on September 11th
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
From the Archives
I’ve got some new and exciting projects in the pipeline which I can’t wait to share with you. Unfortunately, they are taking a lot of my time — I hope you don’t mind if this week I leave you with a fun story from the archives. If you would like to follow me on Twitter,…
Read more… 31 Aug 12
Everyone Loves a Happy Ending
This week: a collection of aviation news that turned out well. I find it terribly disconcerting to see a large plane doing a wheelie: Photos: Airbus A310-325/ET Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net CS-TKN (cn 624) This month of November had been really good for us spotters, with so many different things coming by!! Not being a…
Read more… 24 Aug 12
Fly Like an Eagle, Land Like a Crow
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
Analysis of Crash Video from the Cockpit
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
Accident Analysis
The Anatomy of an A350–CRJ Collision at Atlanta
On the 10th of September 2024, an Airbus A350 took the tail off of a Bombardier CRJ at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in Georgia, USA. Delta Air Lines flight 295…
Why KLM Cut the Steering Cables on Two Perfectly Functional Boeing 737s
Last month, we looked at the night of 28th of November 2004 at Barcelona Airport. KLM 1673 ran off the runway at high speed, stopping just short of a canal.…
Demystifying
How Important is Having a Sterile Cockpit?
This question was posted to r/flying by a private pilot who wanted to know: do airline pilots ever engage in small talk about irrelevant things during taxiing, run-up, takeoff, and…
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”…
History
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…
Fun Stuff
Bird Strikes, Balloon Landings and Falling in Love with a Boeing 777
The exciting news on Fear of Landing this week was a huge scare about critical vulnerabilities in PHP. PHP is widely used on the web, including in WordPress, which is…
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…
