Aileron

I'm still keeping up my determination to get to solo this week. They shouldn't, but the extra little papers in my logbook make me fe...

I am endorsed… as far as the FAA is concerned, as a solo student pilot. We met up for a three hour ground session to review the student know...

Rimas got himself some extra instructing time this week so I jumped on it and booked a bunch of time with the intention of getting me to sol...

Flight Hours: Δ0.4   Σ37.4 METAR KPAO 212347Z 33010G20KT 10SM SKC 23/17 A2996

Four week hiatus because of work/travel. Landings, no flap landings, simulated engine out landings, engine out on takeoff. Flaring is...

Forgot to grab the METAR again and this one was a good one. Something like 15 gusting to 23 from 330. Lots of hard landings. Rimas had anot...

We started out with some airwork over the Fremont hills and I'm feeling really solid with that. Have to remember to start the flaps up f...

Rimas's schedule opened up at the last minute so we were able to squeeze in a morning lesson again. I like morning flying because (1) I...

I was getting cozy with N9968F and wanted to book her until soloing so that I'd be familiar with the aircraft, but I found out at the la...

Same route as the previous lesson: we headed west past Stanford and did airwork near the Stanford Dish. Another simulated engine failure...

Super busy at KPAO today. We were number four or five in sequence waiting for departure when a twin had an engine fail at the start of its ...

We did some airwork out towards the coastal range today, then practiced a diversion to KSQL. The idea is, if the runway at KPAO closes for ...

We went to Hayward for pattern work today. This was the first flight where we started assuming I'd handle all comms. Rimas is still h...

Zulu is still under construction at KPAO, so after taking off from there, we did a right Dumbarton departure to do pattern work at KRHV, wi...

I had my medical today. This amounts to a ten minute physical and then paying a doctor $165 for a piece of paper saying yeah, this guy proba...

I'm back! It's been a long hiatus, a little under eleven months. In that time, Joanna went through the last weeks of pregnancy, we ...

Landings. Let's do this. My response to screwing up is usually to have at it again, and have at it again soon. I've found that if ...

Everything was squirrely tonight. And by everything, I mean me; and by squirrely, I mean imagine a squirrel flying a plane through a hailsto...

It occurred to me that I should probably find out how Joanna reacts to small planes since, if for some reason she was terrifically frightene...

Tonight's plan was to fly to the Fremont practice area to play more with slips and ground reference maneuvers. After pre-flight, my CFI ...

I'm pretty happy with tonight's flight. There are flights where I feel stupid and clumsy and seriously doubtful of my learning abili...

Today we made a right Dumbarton departure, meaning we flew runway 31 out and turned right at the Dumbarton Bridge to head east across the ba...

I'm back! After a year and a half since my last lesson, I've gotten back to flying. Different model plane, different side of the cou...

I think between Iceland and Greenland.

The Solar Impulse 2 is a long-range solar-powered fixed-wing aircraft currently attempting to circumnavigate the world under solar power al...

Lenticular cloud! After the wind travels over the mountains on the right, it forms a standing wave on the lee side, where we are. The cres...

It's been a while since my last cloudscape! Here's N51 after my lesson today, just as an overcast sky was breaking up. Looks like ...

Calling out the points I needed to work on after lesson № 11 really helped – the act of putting into words what I was missing in my flying m...

Now that the sun sets earlier, evening lessons after work are less attractive since I would be in the dark the entire time. It's beautif...

While I was starting my research into flight training mid-2014, it was a rare and valuable find to come across a frank discussion of costs, ...

I had another flight lesson Saturday to work in the pattern practicing landings. I feel like I've plateaued in my training, where my lan...

No, not my crash. We went hiking in the Catskills this weekend and found the wreckage of one of the plane crashes there on Kaaterskill Peak....

Waiting for the bus this morning.

It's been about a month since my last flight lesson, but I got back to it tonight and it was good to be back flying. As usual, I forgot ...

A drizzly kind of day this Saturday.

I downloaded the demo for X-Plane 10 the other day, but now I kind of regret it. It's a lot of fun and all, but I tried practicing land...

Another one from last night at the airport, but this one viewing a receding storm.

At one point I thought it would be a great job to be a flight instructor – flying all the time, building hours, all while getting paid – but...

If you've ever been highly tempted to make a scene on an airliner when the person next to you asks you to close your window shade an...

Last September we were still living on our sailboat across from New York. It's sunrise, and this is what I saw when I stepped out into...

When I went traveling for work last week, I was afraid of aviation withdrawal and so took some precautions to be safe (symptoms include atte...

After Tuesday's lesson, I jotted down some specific things to work on in addition to landings, so I might as well publish them here. ✈...

I got back to flying last night after two weeks away. I was worried that I had forgotten all of the procedures and the feel of the plane but...

This past week was my first time on an airliner after starting flight lessons and what hit me was how fast these planes can climb, fancy jet...

Every pilot secretly dreams of the short-field takeoff that really matters, with people watching, skills on the line, jubilation upon su...

Enroute from EWR to SFO on a B737 at FL320, I think somewhere over Pennsylvania.

I took Thursday and Friday off from work this week to focus on wedding preparations, but I also snuck a flying lesson in last night. I got...

Walking home from the bus stop tonight. It was muggy last night and this morning, but finally some high pressure moved in this afternoon. ...

Right around sunset today, a couple hours after some thunderstorms passed through.

I got out to the airport this morning for a 0900 start time and it felt good because I feel like it's been a while since I flew in full ...