Max Trescott Aviation Trends Aloft

Northwest Airlines Flight 188 Pilot Explains How Plane Overshot Minneapolis

 Ever since the pilots of NWA 188 overflew their Minneapolis destination, speculation has been rampant about what actually happened in the cockpit. It was widely assumed that the pilots had fallen asleep. Their subsequent explanation that they’d been out of radio communication for 78 minutes because they became distracted while using their laptops seemed strange enough that it might indeed be true. Still, most pilots wondered how both pilots could have totally lost situational awareness for so long.

I received an email today, reproduced below, that purports to have the full explanation...

Cirrus SR22 crash lawsuit Video

Last week, The Legal Broadcast Network released an 11-minute video interview with the attorneys for plaintiffs awarded $16.4 million in damages for a January 2003 fatal crash of a Cirrus SR22. Pilots and flight instructors, particularly those not in the legal profession, will find ...

Get the Instrument Rating in a Glass Cockpit or Round Gauge Airplane?

The following is an excerpt from my Max Trescott’s GPS and WAAS Instrument Flying Handbook. You can read more about my IFR book and purchase it online or call 800-247-6553. If you’d like to get instrument training from me or another GPS and glass cockpit expert in any of the aircraft models listed below, email me for details.

If you’re studying for the instrument rating, you may be wondering whether to do your IFR training in a round gauge (sometimes called steam gauge) airplane or in a modern glass cockpit aircraft such as the Garmin G1000 (Beechcraft, Cessna, Diamond, Mooney, etc), Avidyne Entegra (Cirrus SR20, SR22, etc) or Garmin Perspective (Cirrus SR22, etc). Like many of life’s questions...

Pattern Entry Procedures and Operation for Non-Towered Airports

Knowledge of the proper procedure for entering a traffic pattern at a non-towered airport continues to evade some pilots, as I was reminded again this weekend. The procedures are simple, yet I’ve concluded that many pilots either weren’t properly trained on the entry procedures or they have forgotten them. Based on some of the airmanship—and I use the word loosely in this case—that I see at some non-towered airports, I’ve become convinced that pilots who know they don’t have the skills to land at towered airports congregate at non-towered airports instead. This creates the need for pilots to be on even higher alert for the antics of others when they visit a non-towered airport.

This weekend, I...

Drunk Airline Pilot Video – United Pilot Arrested in London

On Monday, British police arrested a United Airlines pilot after he failed a breathalyzer test. The pilot, who apparently had already boarded a Boeing 767, was preparing the fly the aircraft from London’s Heathrow airport to Chicago. Scotland Yard reports that they charged the 51-year old pilot, Erwin Washington of Lakewood, CO, with having too much alcohol in his system while working as a member of aviation staff. The flight was cancelled and the plane’s 124 passengers were rebooked on other flights.

This incident comes on top of a series of recent pilot lapses that...

Video on Strategies for Learning to Fly Glass Cockpit Aircraft

I’ve been in Tampa, Florida this week for AOPA Aviation Summit 2009. One of the great innovations this year is AOPA Live, a live streaming of selected portions of the event over the internet. In the past, about 10,000 people attended AOPA Expo each year. Yesterday, 20,000 people viewed AOPA Live, effectively tripling AOPA’s audience. That’s a smart move in a tough economy where General Aviation needs to spread its message as broadly and effectively as possible.

I was lucky to be one of the few people on both ends of AOPA Live. On Thursday...

New Garmin aera Portable GPS Comparison

Garmin’s announcement today of four new portable GPS products—the aera 500, 510, 550 and 560—essentially refreshes all but the high end of their portable aviation GPS product line. To help pilots understand these products, I’ve put together a comparison chart that compares the aera GPS with the Garmin...