The Joy of Aviation

It was a brilliant foliage season in the Northeast this year. Here are a handful of shots I was able of take on some of my Fall flights.
(click on any photo to enlarge)

Following the August 8th plane and helicopter accident that claimed nine lives, the FAA developed new airspace rules for the Hudson Corridor, or as it’s officially known, the NYC Class B Hudson River exclusion zone, which become effective today.
First I want to say that these are decent rules that we can live with (pun [...]

The Piper Cub is an iconic light airplane that’s perfectly suited for flying “low and slow” (less than 200′ above the ground (AGL) at 65 knots). Almost 20,000 of them were built between 1937 and 1947 and a flight in one time-travels you back to the barnstorming days of early aviation. I [...]

OK, imagine this. You’re a kid, about thirteen. Just a regular guy; popular, cool, independent. You’re talking to your friends, and one of them goes, “Boy, I love hanging out with my Dad.”
Wait, what? Yeah, not to often do you hear, “My Dad is really cool”, comin’ out of a teenager’s mouth. But that’s me… [...]

Today was supposed to be my first day of IFR flight training, but my CFI had a cold and was as he put it, “running about 7 seconds behind the world.” With such lousy weather the past weeks and more in the future, I can’t resist having a weather window open and a plane with [...]

3:30 PM Tuesday. The Phone Rings. It’s Bill. He can’t make the flight tomorrow. Life just jumped in the way. We were going to meet at Butter Valley Golf Port in PA (7N8) for lunch. This would be our first flying meeting since the flying bug bit him (again) almost exactly one year [...]

So far, I’ve been very fortunate to have enough friends who want to go up with me. And during this awesome autumn season, I’ve tried to get as many as possible up to see the foliage. Now with the leaves brown and down, I feel the need for a little “me” time. Just [...]

It was a dark overcast moonless night. It was also two days before my Portland trip, which had a high probability of a late return – with a passenger. I needed to get my night currency up to date.

It was one of those perfect autumn days. The leaves were brilliant gold against a cobalt blue sky. The air was calm and warm. I was outside doing seasonal cleanup chores (ugh) and after the 10th small plane flew over my house, I declared it was too nice a day to be [...]

My daughter accompanied me on yesterday’s local foliage flight. She borrowed my camera for a while. Being seven year old, I didn’t know what to expect, but as usual I was wonderfully surprised. If you can stand a bit of “kid’s home video” check out this clip.

Is that just wonderfully revealing – or am [...]