Read accident case studies and aviation stories to help you stay sharp.
After two mock checkrides with my instructor John and another with Matt, the chief flight instructor, I was ready for the flying portion of my private pilot checkride.
"This is where the fun begins," said my flight instructor John as we finished our debriefing after my first solo flight. The next phase of my training would work on navigation skills, flight planning and cross country flights.
I have always had an interest in aviation and enjoyed going to the airport whenever family vacations arose. For fifteen years, my dream of flying an airplane remained a dream. Then I read two books that inspired me to take the next step and learn to fly.
In April 2021, the NTSB released its final report of the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress crash that occurred in October 2019, in which the World War II bomber crashed at Bradley International Airport, Windsor Locks, Connecticut.
Did you know that even music can be used as a teaching tool in flight training? It may not seem obvious, but there are musical moments that can help you fly the airplane.
Ever wondered when pilots started using checklists? What did Orville and Wilbur Wright's 1903 pre-flight checklist look like? Did they use a GUMPS checklist? Actually, the checklist didn't really come into existence until 32 years later in 1935 with a crash.
In 2003, a pilot attempted an ILS approach where weather was reported and observed as 100-foot ceilings with 1/4-mile visibility, far below the minimums for the ILS approach. The aircraft collided with trees while on approach. Why did this happen? We take a look at the accident chain.
We read too often of accidents caused by fuel exhaustion, fuel starvation, or fuel planning errors. While some fuel-related accidents are caused by mechanical-related issues, there are too many that involve the pilot and his or her pre-flight fuel planning.
As a student pilot or a newly certificated pilot, you may find yourself grounded for any number of reasons. When you're not able to fly consistently, what can you do to keep your flying skills up to par and stay sharp mentally?
You may have first seen it on an old piece of paper posted on a bulletin board at your flying club, or at a local flight school. The '178 Seconds to Live' story and VFR into IMC flights provide some interesting lessons about why VFR flight into IMC happens.
In 2017, a passenger jet came within feet of causing what could have been the worst aviation accident in history, when it attempted to land on the taxiway at San Francisco International Airport.
After a crash into a river, pilot Cory Robin posted his own YouTube video about the mistakes he admits he made that led to an accident with his airplane landing in a river.
On January 13, 1982, Air Florida Flight 90 crashed in the Potomac River in Washington, D.C. The flight's accident chain on that cold, snowy day started before the aircraft left the gate.
A small light bulb became a catalyst for a deadly commercial airliner accident in the Florida Everglades in 1972. The lesson learned from this aviation accident has implications for every pilot, regardless of experience.
You don't have to be a commercial airline pilot to learn valuable lessons from a passenger flight accident. The Air France 447 crash into the Atlantic Ocean yields valuable lessons about how an "emotionally charged situation" can potentially make things worse in an accident chain.
In April, the NTSB released its docket detailing the accident that killed Roy Halladay. As AVweb's Paul Bertorelli explained, there may have been other more important factors which may have lead to the accident.
Real-world scenarios can help pilots of all experience levels improve their ability to stay ahead of the power curve. That's exactly what the military and NASA continue to do to ensure their pilots are prepared and have practiced what to do in any given situation.
Jason Schappert over at MzeroA.com released a short video expressing the same thoughts that have been going through our minds shortly after the Kobe Bryant helicopter accident.
The laws of aviation dictate that an airplane should not be able to fly while missing a wing, and very rarely will it continue to fly after having a wing ripped off during flight. Yet that's just what happened to a Cessna 172 in December 2018, and an Israeli F-15 Eagle during a training mission in 1983.
Hope and luck are two things a pilot should never rely on. This pilot prepared as though he expected an emergency to occur during every flight. When he lost his engine on approach to land, his quick reactions made sure he wasn't caught off guard, saving his ship and himself from becoming an accident report.
Brian Schiff, a captain for a major airline and an accomplished general aviation flight instructor, led a seminar titled 'The Possible Turn - Engine Failure After Takeoff in a Single-Engine Airplane', showing that 'The Impossible Turn' can in fact be 'The Possible Turn', given the right scenario and training.
Consider the aiplane you fly most often. Do you know the limit of the slowest speed allowed in each configuration for your airplane? Don't look at your checklists. Don't look at your POH. Don't google it. Do you know it? Chances are, if you're a general aviation pilot, you don't know it.
What does an F-4 Phantom jet and a Piper Archer piston airplane have in common? The lessons learned by these two pilots, as they describe in their blog post and podcast -- two seemingly unrelated piloting stories -- can help you avoid being the star of your own 'never again' story.
Watch this interview with four pilots who spent a day flying to remote airstrips in Central Idaho that ended in a stall/spin accident, and learn 14 flight planning tips every pilot should know for situations where aircraft performance, locale, and density altitude are critical factors to understand.
Recently Adam Torres, host of the Money Matters Top Tips Podcast, talked with us on an episode about how Flight Chain App is helping to improve aviation safety, keep general aviation growing, and how we're working to make it easier for pilots to learn from NTSB accident reports.
Flight simulation was vital to the Apollo program that landed men on the Moon. In fact, if it wasn't for simulation practice, the Apollo 11 landing likely may have been aborted, and history would probably recall the first human to set foot on the Moon as being Commander Pete Conrad of Apollo 12.
Flight Chain App 1.12 is available now for download on the App Store. This release includes a new 'Safety Quiz' feature that lets pilots quiz themselves with questions based on actual NTSB accident reports. It's another step in our continued effort to make it easier for pilots to learn from NTSB reports.
Just as "currency" doesn't mean "proficiency", a similar thought could be said of the required ADS-B Out and optional ADS-B In. Meeting the FAA's legal requirement of ADS-B Out is just one-half of the solution in helping make general aviation safer. If you don't have ADS-B In, you're missing out.
Because a bird strike can happen suddenly and without warning, it must be impossible for pilots to plan for, and mitigate the risk of, bird strikes. Or is it? I recently came across an interesting website that uses data to help pilots mitigate the risk of experiencing a deadly bird strike.
In 2017 during an annual airshow at Duxford, England, British warbird pilot Mark Levy was flying a P-51 Mustang when he experienced an intermittent partial engine failure. In a conversation with the Air Safety Institute, Levy discussed the entire sequence and important lessons learned every pilot should know.
John Young worked for NASA for 42 years as an astronaut and served in other vital roles with a focus on engineering, operations and safety. In his book, Young discusses NASA's successes and failures, particularly the losses of the space shuttles Challenger and Columbia, lessons that can apply to all pilots.
The holidays are nearing an end, and a new flying year is upon us. What are your flying goals in 2019? A new rating? Perhaps an instrument or commercial rating? How about mountain flying training to experience and learn about aircraft performance in density altitude situations?
November marks our one-year anniversary! In the past 12 months, we've released 12 updates to Flight Chain App in our continued effort to improve the app and give you convenient, easy access to NTSB aviation accident reports for your iPhone and iPad. In our latest release, we've added some hidden easter eggs.
Reading accident reports can tell you how accidents happen and teach you what not to do. That's one reason we created Flight Chain App. But we kept wondering -- how can we reach more pilots with safety information, have more impact when we reach them, and help improve decision-making skills?
As the saying goes, a good pilot is always learning. Steven Daun, the National Chief Pilot for American Flyers, recently wrote an article suggesting ways every pilot can learn something new. Here are three aviation books that can help you keep learning and fly safe on every flight.
"Houston, we've had a problem." The Apollo 13 mission to the Moon in 1970 was a successful failure -- in that the crew returned safely to Earth but never made it to the Moon. But the explosion that jeopardized the crew's survival could have been avoided had it not been for two decisions early on.
One of the most recognized aviation podcasts in the world is Jason Miller's The Finer Points. Earlier this year, Miller recorded an interesting podcast in which he discusses an accident where three top engineers from Tesla Motors died when they attempted to take off in 0/0 conditions.
As a flight instructor once told me, your private pilot certificate isn't just your license to fly. It is your license to learn. One way you can continue your education as a private pilot, and log some extra flight time while you're at it, is by flying as a safety pilot for an instrument rated pilot.
Fighter pilots are some of the most skilled aviators in the world. But just because you're not a fighter pilot doesn't mean you can't borrow from their tool set. Whether you're a 100-hour general aviation pilot or a 10,000-hour commercial pilot, it behooves you to think like a fighter pilot in some key areas.
In the early days of manned spaceflight, America and the Soviet Union were racing to be the first to launch a man into space. NASA had just been established in July 1958 as America's response to Sputnik, the first man-made satellite in space, courtesy of the Soviet Union.
I once sat inside the cockpit of a Cessna L-19, a two-seater with a big engine and a climb rate more than double that of a Cessna 172. The Cessna's flight ended prematurely, however, going down vertically into gradually rising terrain, fatally injuring the pilot and passenger onboard. But I survived the two-seater's crash.
Neil Armstrong once said: "You've got to expect things are going to go wrong. And we always need to prepare ourselves for handling the unexpected." That mindset applies to everything in life, from the extreme of exploring the Moon to the mundane of driving to and from work each day.
"It's clear that we're on the front end of something much larger than any of us can imagine." While astronaut Ed Gibson of Skylab 4 was speaking of space flight when he made that statement, his quote could be applicable to any new endeavor in life. Learning to fly is no exception.
The only aviation accident app that helps you see and understand the accident chain from NTSB reports.
Flight Chain App and its blog Ahead of the Power Curve are committed to reducing general aviation accidents, helping improve aviation safety, and growing the pilot population.
