Latest Posts – Page 3
Forced Down North of the Arctic Circle
Despite the name, Coldfoot Airport, Alaska was pretty warm on the morning of the 22nd of June, 2026: a pleasant 17°C/63°F with a mild breeze of 5 knots and good visibility. It was a great day for flying. Coldfoot is remote: a tiny settlement about sixty miles north of the Arctic Circle with a population…
Read more… 25 Jul 26
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 knew you’d be interested too. It was originally published on cia.gov in 2019 and reprinted with permission. I did my best to recreate the images,…
Read more… 17 Jul 26
Death of a Flight Instructor During a Training Flight
Last Saturday, the 4th of July 2026, a 22-year-old low-hour pilot departed for a flight with a flight instructor at Coronel Olmedo Airport in Córdoba, Argentina. Coronel Olmedo (SACD) is an uncontrolled airfield with a single unpaved runway (5/23) of around 4,000 feet/1,200 metres in length. The small airfield hosts a number of flight schools.…
Read more… 10 Jul 26
Fatal SR22 Stall on Final at Barwick LaFayette
On the 20th of March, 2025, a Cirrus SR22 crashed in LaFayette, Georgia during an instructional flight, killing both the pilot and the flight instructor. It was a good flying day, good visibility, scattered clouds at 4,300 feet with light wind. Both the pilot and the flight instructor had a free day and agreed to…
Read more… 3 Jul 26
There Is a Parachutist in Front of You
On the 15th of June 2023, a light aircraft crashed into the runway at Aversi private airfield in Denmark. The aircraft, registered in Germany as D-EPRR, was a Cessna TU206G Stationair, a six-seater single-engine aircraft which had been converted to a turboprop (with a Rolls Royce 250 turboshaft) by Soloy Aviation Solutions. Later, it was…
Read more… 26 Jun 26
The Loss of B-52 Spirit of Aggieland II
On the 15th of June 2026, a B-52 Stratofortress crashed at Edwards Air Force Base shortly after take-off. There were eight on board and no survivors. The B-52 Stratofortress is a long-range heavy bomber built by Boeing. It has eight jet engines mounted in four pods with a maximum takeoff weight of 488,000 pounds. The…
Read more… 19 Jun 26
Accident Analysis
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.…
KLM 1673 Veers Off the Runway with Full Right Rudder
On the 28th of November 2004, a Boeing B737 ran off the runway at Barcelona Airport. The weather had been good at Barcelona that evening. The flight crew agreed to land…
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 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…
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…
Fun Stuff
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…
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…
