Glenn over at RantAir links to an interesting article on noise abatement problems at Denver International Airport. There’s not much I can add. The article speaks for itself. Read more →
Wildfires
I launched on a night cross country flight this evening with a pilot who’s approaching his checkride date. He’s got over 100 hours logged, largely because he’s doing his primary training in an SR22. The big question mark for me before departure was how the wildfires in the Santa Ana canyon would affect this VFR flight. Since Dan is based out… Read more →
Let It Snow
Snow is a funny thing. It reinforces the essential truth that airplanes are both incredibly strong and terribly fragile. Snow looks pretty, but when enough collects on the top of an aircraft’s wing while it’s parked on the ramp, the sheer weight of that snow can be enough to damage it. I can’t find it at the moment, but AVweb has a… Read more →
Orange County TFR
It’s the most wonderful time of the year!   Or…. perhaps not if you live in the Anaheim Hills area. ANAHEIM – A wildfire pushed by Santa Ana winds quickly spread over 800 acres of the Cleveland National Forest a few miles east of Orange County suburbs on Monday. No homes were immediately involved but State Route 241 was closed in the area… Read more →
United Airlines Out of Bankruptcy
To quote Frank Costanza, “I’m back, baby!”. United Airlines exited bankruptcy protection today. I suppose that should be cause for celebration, as many (most?) people doubted the legacy carrier would even make it this far. Don’t get me wrong, I’m hoping for the best. United is a historic airline — it was founded by Boeing and has ties to the… Read more →
A Different Perspective on Iraq
Iraq is now creeping away from murderous authoritarianism to face the more normal messes of a creaky Third World nation: corruption, poverty, health problems, miserable public services. And that is vastly preferable to what came before. American Enterprise editor-in-chief Karl Zinsmeister just got back from Iraq, and he looks at the war’s progress from short and long-term historical perspectives. His… Read more →
FAA Flight Review Prep Guide
Every pilot must, by law, complete a Flight Review (or equivalent) every 24 calendar months. The law specifies that this review must comprise at least one hour of flight and one hour of ground instruction, and it must include a review of the operating procedures of Title 14, Part 91 of the Code of Federal Regulations. “Part 91”, as it’s affectionately known,… Read more →
Boys Will Be Boys
Wikipedia is an online encyclopedia written and maintained by the millions of people who use it.  Anyone can edit Wikipedia, and its contents are free and open. Open communities of this type have a sordid history on the internet. Without rigorous moderation, these things devolve into a repositories for conspiracy theorists, morons, flame wars, and really twisted stuff like spam. Usenet is… Read more →
Skylane Prepurchase Advice
The House of Rapp must show up at the top of some frequent Google search used by prospective Skylane owners, because I field a lot of inquiries about the airplane. In fact, I received one such query today. As a C-182 driver and previous owner I was wondering if you could comment authoritatively regarding the following comment from a back… Read more →
The Big 34
I just put up some captioned photos from my birthday party. I was gonna write a big thing about it, but photos are far more interesting aren’t they? I will say that when you have birthdays like this one, it almost makes getting older something to look forward to! A small group of close friends laughing the night away. Perfect.… Read more →