This weekend I conducted two instructional flights which allowed my students to gain confidence in their abilities, which of course boosted my confidence as a teacher and reminded me of why I love doing what I do, so much. On Saturday, I took a student (who is working on his Private Pilot certificate) up to [...]
Posts from ‘March, 2010’
Going missed.
A pilot friend of mine challenged me today to use aeronautical decision making as the basis for all of my other life decisions. In other words, when faced with a non-aviation problem, tackle it with the same set of values and rules that I would use to make a decision in the cockpit. It took [...]
Night current.
It’s been a long, cold, and hard winter, and I have the logbook to prove it. I had to flip back a few pages to find the last time I’d made a landing at night, so it was time for me to get out there and get current again. FAA regulations require that all pilots [...]
Spring ahead, but not so fast.
Yesterday morning we Americans collectively turned our clocks one hour forward to mark the beginning of daylight savings time, which for a pilot means remembering that local time is now one hour closer to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) than it was during the winter. Nearly everything that requires a time stamp in aviation is based [...]
The aura of a pilot.
An interesting thing happened on the subway this afternoon, as I made my way home from the office. I noticed that the older woman sitting in the seat adjacent to mine was alternately directing her gaze at me, then at the cover of the book I was reading. A friend recently lent me his copy [...]
A new Perspective.
This afternoon I’m going up for a short flight with my friend Mike to review the avionics and other systems in the Cirrus SR22 Perspective. It’s been a few months since I’ve flown a Cirrus and I’m looking forward to getting back into one. Hopefully the button pushing will come back to me easily. 6 [...]
Late bloomers.
The cherry blossoms are starting to show signs of life in Washington. I took a walk on the Mall today, past a familiar park bench, and noticed that the trees are adorned with tiny soon to be leaves. The world is constantly changing around us, isn’t it?
Getting what I need.
You can’t always get what you want. But if you try sometimes, you just might find That you get what you need. – Mick Jagger I am a pilot, and I need to fly. I am a teacher, and I need to feel the sky and share it with others. I gave my first instrument [...]