Not all of these questions are really all that frequent, if I’m honest with you. Most of them are more like occasionally asked questions. Or in the case of the last question: asked once, by my mother. Nevertheless, I will endeavour to answer them all. How many people can you fit into your plane? The…
Read more… 23 Oct 09
Today’s xkcd made me break out with a smile before I’d even finished my first coffee: As with all of the xkcd comics, be sure to hover your mouse over the image for a further comment from the author. For more intriguing views of the world we live in, visit xkcd.com.
Read more… 19 Oct 09
It’s been a while since the day I missed the runway at Oxford Airport. I’ve done a lot more flying and I’m a lot more competent. But my first near-miss (no damage was done except the loss of a runway light) is not an incident I’m likely to forget in a hurry. The Saratoga is…
Read more… 16 Oct 09
I totally lost control of my week! I had no idea it was Friday and now it’s the end of the day and I am out of time to write an interesting post for you. So I am giving you permission to play a game. Spend the time you would have wasted reading my ramblings…
Read more… 9 Oct 09
This week: A selection of aviation articles and images that I found intriguing. Bird strike! The moment 200 starlings were sucked into passenger jet engine on take-off | Mail Online ‘It was like a scene from the Hitchcock movie The Birds. One second all was clear, and the next thing you saw were these birds…
Read more… 2 Oct 09
I shouldn’t have hopped the fence. It was shut with a big padlock and surrounded by barbed wire so I can’t exactly claim that I hadn’t noticed it. But I’d walked such a long way – 5 miles! – just to take some photographs for my blog, it seemed such a shame to give up…
Read more… 25 Sep 09
Any Landing You Can Float Away From: Successful Ditching in the Arctic
On the 29th of July 2024, a light aircraft encountered engine trouble off the coast of Greenland and was forced to ditch in the North Atlantic. The aircraft was a…
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…
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…
Four Point Two Stars Where You Only Stop If You Have To
I always look up airports when I’m writing about them, partly out of habit and partly because I’m afraid I’ll miss an important detail. When I was writing Any Landing…
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…
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…