Latest Posts – Page 159
£50 Cake
It’s disappointing. I had this great idea of flying to various little airfields and compiling a list of the best cakes in southern England. Enstone usually has slices of home-made carrot cake on the counter (next to a tin where you drop in your coins) and North Weald have a coffee shop with the cake-of-the-day…
Read more… 11 Feb 08
Photographing Not Flying
This is a bit of an odd one – I need photographs of “not flying” to go with an article where I complain a lot about winter weather and being grounded. I’ve put together a collection of photographs of rain, cloud and fog: Help me out by telling me which ones you like best. If…
Read more… 3 Feb 08
Cambridge
I was just pondering whether I had anything to write about when I got a research question as a comment – how exciting! Sex Scenes at Starbucks is a speculative fiction writer living in Colorado. She is working on a novel which includes a scene with a jet flying out of Cambridge. She asked me…
Read more… 1 Feb 08
Now that’s what I call a cruise!
Forget the Queen Mary, I want to go cruising on one of these: The brainchild of Jean-Marie Massaud, the Manned Cloud is an airborne hotel that he hopes will change the way we view tourism. Manned Cloud is a hotel with a capacity of 40 passengers and staffed with 15 persons, that on a 3-day…
Read more… 23 Jan 08
Crash-landing at Heathrow : Just the Facts, Please
There is a lot of speculation going on in the press and, worse, a lot of speculation being presented as fact. The words “Absolute nonsense!” have become a frequent sound in our household as we read the articles in the popular press. I know accident reports aren’t everyone’s thing, but in the interests of understanding…
Read more… 19 Jan 08
The South Downs
Cliff and I had an appointment in Eastbourne, an English resort city right on the South Downs. As always, we arranged to arrive early, so that a delayed or cancelled flight wouldn’t mean chaos. We flew from Málaga to Shoreham via Bordeaux in a single day, so we ended up with plenty of time to…
Read more… 8 Jan 08
Accident Reports
Ferry Tank Failure: Successful SR22 Ditching in the Pacific
In 2015, I shared a video of an SR22 whose pilot successfully deployed his Cirrus Airframe Parachute System (CAPS) off of the coast of Maui, Hawai’i. I wrote at the time…
The Man in the Right Seat at Prestwick
On the 23rd of April 2024, a Piper Archer II crashed in South Ayrshire, Scotland, after losing power. There were two on board. Both suffered serious injuries and the light…
Demystifying
Meowing on Guard (an attempt at an explanation)
Last week a video went viral and it’s been fun to see the mainstream media coverage try to cover two pilots who were heard making animal noises on the radio. …
Trump Threatens to Ground Canadian Aircraft Over Gulfstream Certification
The US President, Donald Trump, posted the following to Truth Social last night. Based on the fact that Canada has wrongfully, illegally, and steadfastly refused to certify the Gulfstream 500,…
History
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…
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…
