Innholdsfortegnelse for July 2025 i Flying

EVERY SUMMER, the skies above Oshkosh, Wisconsin, come alive with the roar of engines, the buzz of vintage propellers, and the smoke trails of aerobatic displays. But EAA Air-Venture is more than just an airshow—it’s the world’s largest aviation gathering, where the diversity of aircraft is matched only by the diversity of attendees. For tens of thousands of pilots and aviation enthusiasts, the pilgrimage to Oshkosh is a deeply rooted tradition. Entire families, flying clubs, flight schools, hangar groups, etc. return year after year—many camping under aircraft wings—reconnecting with old friends and sharing stories. The grounds also host hundreds of businesses showcasing the latest aircraft, products, technologies, tools, and training. Having attended 12 times in the past 15 years, I can confidently say there’s no atmosphere quite like it. While…

AS THE nation reels from one tragedy, researchers at NASA are working to prevent another as they study a new generation of aircraft—one that could introduce even more complexity in the national airspace system (NAS). Advanced air mobility (AAM) is no longer a Jetsonian dream. Autonomous drones are inspecting infrastructure, flying missions for police and first responders, and delivering food, drinks, and prescriptions in major cities like Dallas-Fort Worth. Aerial firefighters are using remotely piloted aircraft to battle blazes. By the end of 2025, electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) air taxis could begin ferrying passengers in city centers. These AAM entrants take a variety of forms, all of which complicate air traffic management. “Modernizing our current airspace systems to integrate remotely piloted or autonomous operations is an immense undertaking that requires…

Research has shown fatigue has the same effect on cognitive capabilities as alcohol, and your performance can be impaired before you realize what is happening. I LOOKED over and he was sound asleep.” That’s how an instrument candidate described an experience he had during a training flight at night. He was under the hood, and they were on an IFR flight plan and going in and out of the clouds. The candidate was confused by a radio call, and when he looked over at his CFI, he saw the man was asleep, so he quickly nudged him to wake him up. The CFI regained consciousness, but the event still rattled the student, who wondered how long the CFI had been “out.” I related to the candidate’s concerns because as a…

MOST OF us have experienced taxing out, running up (if needed), then waiting a long time for the tower to clear you. If you’re IFR, you may think, “What is taking so long?” But what if you’re flying a C182 instead of the C560? “Now all the jets are going ahead! What the heck?!?” (I’ve actually heard this on frequency.) Throw in a couple VFRs, and you start to wonder even more. All of these jets are going, and you’re chilling in your Skyhawk wondering how far the Hobbs meter will go before getting your turn. I’ve personally been there, done that, got the shirt, and got it cut. With everything going up in price, I will do anything in my power as an air traffic controller (ATC) to get…

STANDING AT 630 FEET, THE Gateway Arch is the country’s tallest monument and St. Louis’ most iconic attraction. The distinctly designed structure pays homage to the westward expansion and sits at the location of where the city was founded in 1764. St. Charles, Missouri, which is about a half-hour drive from downtown St. Louis, is deeply rooted in the quest for exploring land west of the Mississippi River. The contributions of Meriwether Lewis, William Clark, and their crew is celebrated at several sites, including a marker denoting the expedition’s starting point, a statue, as well as an acclaimed boathouse and museum feet from the Missouri River. Preserving and celebrating history is an important goal for St. Charles, which was first founded in 1769 by a French-Canadian fur trader. Initially known…

LIKE MANYof us, I have a few special flying memories in my logbook that stand out because they only have one entry. For example, taking my grandfather for our one and only flight after years of training and earning my pilot certificate. Riding as a passenger on the Collings Foundation’s B-17 Flying Fortress Nine-O-Nine is another. I was recently reminded just how special some of those moments can be when, during the last week of April, the aviation community lost one of its most talented and respected aerobatic pilots, Rob Holland. Back when I was just beginning my career in the industry, a chance meeting between Holland at an airshow sparked a conversation and led to a memorable flight and logbook entry that I’ll always cherish. I had met very few…

I, M JUMPING into one of the most dissected and debated issues in the aviation world. If you want to start a lively discussion with a group of pilots, ask for their opinions on the safest, most effective, and workable way to handle a crosswind landing… particularly a strong one with rain, turbulence, or gusty winds. Hopefully, include some “big airplane” guys and some taildragger pilots to spice things up. My personal choice—the one I normally use in my Cessna 180—is a slip, where you lower the upwind wing on final to counter the drift of the wind and simultaneously feed in enough opposite rudder to position the nose (the longitudinal axis—you) straight down the middle of the runway. It’s really a side slip, but any sideways movement is negated…

Holy Smokes A capture by EAA photographer Camden Thrasher of some of the up-close airshow magic at EAA AirVenture 2024. Performers at this year’s 72nd annual fly-in convention, scheduled for July 21-27 at Wittman Regional Airport (KOSH) in Wisconsin, feature a long list of aerobatic champions and crowd favorites. The event features a total of nine airshows over seven days, including two night airshows on July 23 and 26. Have a photo you’d like to see featured here? Email it to editorial@flyingmag.com.…

THERE’S not not a more iconic, well-recognized passenger jetliner in history than the venerable Boeing 737. Ever since the 1960s, the compact 737 seemed to explode onto the market and transport just about everyone, everywhere. Originally designed as a short range commuter jet, with the little “rocket” engines slung under the wings, the smaller 737-100 series was born out of the larger, first passenger jetliner to make its mark—the four-engined Boeing 707. The 707 from the 1950s roared up to 600 mph, taking a 12-hour prop liner to cross the U.S. in six or less hours at high altitude. Boeing took the nose, cockpit, and much of the forward fuselage right off the 707 to make assembly and commonality a main feature. In fact, today’s brand-new 737s still have the…

WHEN PEOPLE want to talk about something unpleasant, they often invent nicer-sounding phrases to disguise what’s really going on. “Wake turbulence” is the kind of term that can bring to mind vague, unpleasant imagery. “Wing tip vortices” sounds nicer—more refined, perhaps—but actually may be more frightening. The FAA’s definition in its Pilot’s Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge (PHAK, FAA-H-8083-25C) doesn’t help much: “The rapidly rotating air that spills over an airplane’s wings during flight. The intensity of the turbulence depends on the airplane’s weight, speed, and configuration. Also referred to as wake turbulence. Vortices from heavy aircraft may be extremely hazardous to small aircraft.” That would get anyone’s attention. What They Are Wing tip vortices exist any time an airplane’s wing is generating lift. They slowly trail downward behind an airplane—yours included. Obviously,…

WHERE DO you get your information? Do you go to experts, or rely on what people tell you in a Facebook post? I try not to spend too much time interacting on social media because to me it’s largely a waste of time. It can also be a huge source of wildly speculative, uninformed answers to questions that people pose. Often the correct answer to a question is in the comments, but how does one sort it from the other 95 comments that are incorrect? Coincidentally, I was reading the book Pains and Planes: A Doctor’s COVID-19 Memoir by Dr. Victor Vogel, and I noticed he has the same frustration. Vogel, who’s also a CFI, is the founder of Susquehanna STEM to the Skies, which uses aviation to inspire students…

ANYONE CAN quickly plan flights on Garmin Pilot Web, even for free without a Garmin Pilot subscription. Let’s start your flight planning—perhaps for EAA AirVenture Oshkosh?—with these easy steps: • Go to pilotweb.garmin.com to start your quick flight plan on the Map page. Enter your route, use the altitude selector for best winds aloft, and enter aircraft cruise speed and fuel burn for more accurate quick-glance flight planning. • In the bottom left corner of the Map, you’ll see an overlays button. You can change these overlays for things like a new Aeronautical layer to see airspace more easily along your route of flight. A plethora of popular weather overlays also makes in-flight weather planning a breeze. • If you click on an airport, you can also see the new…

THERE IT sat on a lonely section of the ramp at Bartow Executive Airport (KBOW) in Florida, looking threadbare, forlorn, and forgotten. Its paint, sun-bleached to a dull, flat finish, was of an indeterminate hue, while a recent hurricane had blown parts off, including the rudder. Its engines, long unprotected, were certain to have housed generations of local avian species. How many times have we watched similar scenes unfold at our local airports? Pilots and passersby alike can spot a neglected aircraft easily. Often parked just inside the airport fence, far from the FBO but close to the road, providing a clear view for drivers. The airplane’s last flight probably was not declared as such, but turned out to be. Over time the paint dulled, tires flattened, cracks formed in…

THE TESTIMONYof witnesses to crimes is notoriously unreliable. The testimony of witnesses to airplane accidents is even more so, because most people are poor judges of heights, angles, distances, and speeds. Besides, they don’t know what airplanes ought to look and sound like and how they might be expected to behave—or misbehave. Accident investigators have to pick and choose among testimonies to construct a physically plausible scenario. That was the case after the crash of an A36 Bonanza at Round Valley Airport in California (O09) in October 2023. Two eyewitnesses described the fatal takeoff similarly but with one or two significant differences. Both witnesses were standing between the departure end of the runway and the hill 2,000 feet away where the Bonanza went into the treetops just 70 feet above the…

‘Being a kitplane company helped us learn how to be an aircraft company before we tried to [attain] certification.’ The curves compel. Looking at the flowing, complex bends of the carbon fiber airframe, the flawless fairing of the windshield, windows and deice boots with the skin as it stands tall on its trailing-link landing gear, one tends to think that the Epic E1000 AX just slips between the air molecules. Well, sort of. Its clean design is augmented by the most power ever hung on a production turboprop single—1,200 hp, making it the fastest of the breed. Epic Aircraft’s path to being the manufacturer of one of the top-end, single-engine turboprops was not exactly conventional. The E1000 started life as a kitplane. However, as Epic CEO Doug King told FLYING,…

ROLL UPon the transient ramp in a Meyers 200 and expect some attention because the chances are good that on lookers know what it is. That’s because there were only around 127 Meyers 200s produced, and there are fewer than 100 still flying. However, there remains a lot to like about this interesting classic, starting with its timeless good looks and safe construction. If speed is the goal, the Meyers brings it—well north of 180 knots for later models. But more interesting is the aircraft’s history. In 1935, Al Meyers began work on his first design—a biplane called the Meyers OTW (Out To Win), which earned Uncle Sam’s blessing for use in the Civilian Pilot Training Program. Meyers then designed a two-place, retractable, low-wing taildragger called the Meyers 145. The 145…

ON THE third day of attempting to leave Durango (KDRO), Colorado, after our ski trip, it appeared we would be successful in making the 6 a.m. MT departure to Dallas-Forth Worth (KDFW). Although not exactly the comforts of an international B-777 flight, we were nonetheless grateful that our American Airlines AAdvantage status got us upgraded to a first-class seat on the CRJ-700. Nothing could go wrong. We pushed back from the gate in anticipation of a quick spray of Type I deicing fluid to melt a thin layer of frost on the wings and tail. But the rattling sound of propylene glycol smearing across the cabin windows never came. My airline pilot’s intuition smelled a mechanical problem. The captain’s PA confirmed it. We were to be towed back to the…

I FIRST saw Nancy Salter in the kitchen of a dilapidated three-decker in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in summer 1967. The only utensils in the kitchen were a few wrenches scattered around somebody’s partially dismantled motorcycle. We didn’t talk then, but I worked up the courage to call her the next day—quite a trick, for me—and ask her to a movie. In spite of her having to get up early the next morning to catch the first of three buses for work at the Winchester Star, she consented. Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band played on an endless loop that summer. I took Italian classes, and she wrote wedding announcements and obituaries. In September I left for Europe. It was during that year that I began the design of the first airplane…

NAVIGATE EAA AirVenture Oshkosh—one of aviation’s busiest events—with help from ForeFlight’s powerful planning tools. Use the following features to prepare for your trip and stay ahead of changes along the way. Whether it’s your first time flying into KOSH or your 15th, ForeFlight helps make it a smooth arrival for the annual fly-in. NOTAMs Stay informed on changing conditions and airspace restrictions en route and at AirVenture. • PREFLIGHT AND EN ROUTE: Tap Maps > Layer Selector > NO-TAMs to display color-coded graphical NOTAMs showing type, severity, and active times. These can also be packed when filing a flight plan and are included in your preflight briefing under Flights > Briefing. • AT THE AIRPORT: For airport-specific NOTAMs, go to Airports > NOTAM to view notices grouped by Airport, Obstacle, TFR/ARTCC,…