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Balloons absolutely can snuck up, thanks to the great rates of descent they can develop. A change in altitude is a common factor in mid-air collisions. Typically it happens with landing helicopters, but there were instances where a training aircraft on instructional flight smacked someone while...

It can be sudden. That's how my first VFR into IMC happened too, the loss of contact with the ground was abrupt. I was flying under an overcast and in snow. When I decided that snow wasn't ending, and in fact was getting worse, I made a 180. Unfortunately, I sucked at piloting in general and was...

Maybe more shoulder room in an LSA, but the headroom is absent. Not only I'm going to crack my skull upon the spar in the crash, but I'm completely blind to the sides. It's like flying under the hood. Look where my eyes are and where the side window ends.

And this is in Texas:

My M20E is a Chapparal, meaning electric everything and not the lightest. However, I took a checkout in a 1967 M20E Super 21 and it was 1651 lbs empty: only 44 lbs lighter.

The gross take-off weight for my M20E is 2575 lbs. My ship empty weight is 1695 lbs, I weigh 230 lbs, my wife weighs 150 lbs. If I take 312 lbs of gas, it leaves 188 lbs. Plenty for 2 people: we never have more than 55 lbs of baggage. But not so good if a child is added.

I fly M20E but if I needed to carry a woman and a child, I'd go with the 182, even if it's a bit slower. BTW, it may come as a surprise, even prompt a vigorous disagreement, but a 182 is about as fast as Tiger. Just burns more gas, is all. My M20E beats 182, but not by much. It's noticeable when...

Detochikin and Inspector did it in 1966.

Here's what my kneeboard page looks like. And yes, I save all of those. On the top, it's the date and tail number. On the right, start, tank change, and stop times, in case I want to know how much gas remains (unless there's a leak, obviously). In case of a rental, there may be tach and Hobbs...

Most LSAs actually have an occupant weight limit of 240 or 260 pounds, just to make sure she's not falling out of the bottom of the airplane. It's right there in POH. I weigh 230 lbs and right on the cusp.

Does it work with Garmin Pilot? No? Then it's not the same capabilities.

The only country I would consider for retirement outside of the U.S. is Japan. But they are stingy with residency, and they are specifically set against foreign retirees. I would need to marry in, which is challenging at this age (not to mention that I'm already married). With all that in mind...

I think it's mostly word of mouth. I was quite satisfied with Cleo Chamberlain (of chamberlainaviationsales.com) when I was buying a C-150. Of course, I refer her to friends, especially in NM and AZ. Since she owns an airport, she can actually keep the airplane parked there and handle the...

Went to watch Kholop in a theater with wife. It was pretty good, if not spectacular. Decent comedy. The focus of the social satire is perhaps not easy to empathize with. The target audience of this movie was mad enough to march in protest with blue buckets on their heads, so you can imagine the...

Some of the reports I've seen mentioned that the destination was actually not the location of the training camp, but Camarillo airport. Not sure what they base it on, but if those are true, they could've gone IFR. I looked it up on Airnav and Camarillo has IFR approaches, even a legacy VOR approach.

Paying $26,000 is not impossible, but that's one massive jet. Citation Sovereign can take 1700 gallons. At $7/gal that's "only" $11,900. You aren't going to pay this much to gas up your L-39, because it's simply not big enough.

No, he just drifted it off the runway on his solo flight. It was at Belen, not Angel Fire. I'm just saying that you can't find the registration for that airplane anymore.

Here's an interesting blog article: http://www.geekinthecockpit.com/2020/01/well-that-was-not-fun-at-all.html I wonder how often stuff like this happens. Good thing those passenger jets have some redundancies. P.S. It was a pleasant surprise to know that Airbus can run APU in flight. In old...

Here's the ridge we're talking about, I think. Pictured also is my rental Cherokee 93W that another student flew into a hangar later.

BTW, one rumor that I heard in relation to TRAC SR20 was that SR18 is not at all abandoned or made obsolete by TRAC. The development continues, and it may yet come online as TRAC SR18. That is going to happen ahead of any twin or turboprop. Personally I suspect that if Cirrus made a turboprop...