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Happy New Year (With a Look Back)
This is the fourth year that I've used this post title on 31 December. A year ago, I looked back on 2011 in this post, and a year earlier I reviewed 2010 in this one. The retrospective for 2009 was...
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A Fairly Bad Week (Part 1 of 2)
Last week began and ended with flights that I will not cherish as warm and glowing memories of my aviation experience. And the first is going to be rather painful to discuss here.Monday began with a...
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A Fairly Bad Week (Part 2 of 2)
As mentioned at the end of the previous post, the forecast on Friday morning foretold a large ridge of warm air arriving in the East, bringing rain but no risk of icing.The low centered over Chicago at...
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Book Review: "A Higher Call" by Adam Makos
Charlie Brown was perfectly clear about the situation. When the young journalist, having "heard a story", sought him out for an interview, he said, "If you really want to learn the whole story, learn...
View ArticleMy '709 Drive
Those of you that visit here regularly will recall that early in January I was involved in an incident wherein N631S struck and slightly damaged another aircraft (described in this post). At the time I...
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Book Review: "The Dog Stars" by Peter Heller
The post-apocalyptic novel has been with us at least since Mary Shelley published The Last Man in 1826. The basic model is familiar the author invokes some catastrophe to kill off the vast majority...
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"Contact the Tower..."
The Air Traffic Control Tower (ATCT) at my more northerly "home 'drome", Sikorsky Memorial Airport (KBDR), is scheduled to close on or about the 5th of May due to the funding cut-off known as...
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2013 Annual Inspection (i)
Yesterday was the first day of N631S's Annual Inspection availability for 2013. My friends at Three Wing Aviation Group will be doing the inspection and associated work package and this year Tony...
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Eternal Father, Strong to Save...
On 10 April 1963, fifty years ago today at 9:18AM EST, the Sea enveloped in her cold embrace the 129 men aboard the USS Thresher and took them away from their loved ones forever. It is important that...
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2013 Annual Inspection (ii)
This year's Annual Inspection, now completed, was an unusual one. And I mean that in a good way. There was very little "emergent" work resulting from the inspection and most of the work effort was...
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5,000 Flags of Remembrance
The Alexandria National Cemetery is just a couple of blocks west of my home in Virginia. This morning it was, as it usually is, peaceful and serene. There are about 5,000 gravesites there; it has long...
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Book Review: "Gyro! The Life and Times of Lawrence Sperry" by William W....
It has been my practice to confine book review posts to books that I would recommend to a friend as being enjoyable or instructive or, preferably, both. In that light, the book I'm about to discuss,...
View ArticleSidebar!
One of the most enjoyable parts of blog-keeping hereabouts is the curating of the sidebar. That stuff over there on the right, adjacent to the primary content column. The process is fun and it leads to...
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Summer Fun
Yesterday's trip from Connecticut down to the DC area was sufficiently entertaining to warrant a post here. Also, it gives me an opportunity to again express appreciation for the amazing skill and...
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Book Review: "QF32" by Capt. Richard de Crespigny
On last Thursday, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) released the final report from its investigation into the causes and consequences of the uncontained catastrophic failure of a...
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Unflappable!
When N631S and I departed KVKX last Monday for the trip north to Connecticut, Bridgeport (KBDR) was reporting a 900 foot overcast that was forecast to improve to 1,500 broken around 9AM local time....
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A Starring Role in "Security Theater"
Home Plate for N631S and myself in the DC area is Potomac Airfield (KVKX). It's one of the "Maryland 3" airports (along with College Park (KCGS) and Hyde Field (W32)) that reside within the Flight...
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Why KESN?
In my last post, I described a bit of a kerfuffle that resulted when the system misplaced my authorization to land at my home airfield, KVKX, lying as it does within the DC Flight Restricted Zone...
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Was that you, Sarah?
We (meaning N631S and I) had to deal with some weather on departure from Bridgeport (KBDR) this afternoon which all went pretty well with the help of New York Approach. Thereafter the trip was...
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"We'd like the visual..."
Since the unfortunate landing short of Asiana 214 at KSFO on July 6th, there has been much comment on the difficulty that some heavy iron drivers may have when confronted with a visual approach (as...
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Book Review: "Blood on the Snow" by S.M. Belser
Allow me a mea culpa in advance, for I am about to bend one of the "house rules" here and offer a review of what is really not an aviation-related book. (I say "bend" rather than "break", as there is...
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Today at KBDR
Early this morning the bright sun was shining at Sikorsky Memorial Airport (KBDR) and warming the old aluminum bones of some visiting veterans. The 2013 Wings of Freedom tour of WW II aircraft...
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Book Review: "Understanding Air France 447" by Capt. Bill Palmer
In a recent radio interview, a doctor described a procedure followed in many hospitals when a patient dies. The attending physician stands before his peers and presents the case what symptoms were...
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Just Because You Can Doesn't Mean You Should
As we move deeper into autumn, the atmosphere reaches into its bag of wintry tricks. The weather of last Friday provided an example of what Gordon Lightfoot called "the witch of November".The driver...
View ArticleTo every thing, there is a season...
Well, if anyone is still dropping by here, I have some news. After nearly 12 years and close to 1,400 hours in the air, N631S has moved on to a new home.I sold our business in Connecticut back in June...
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