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Confessions of a New Corporate Pilot
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In the Citation III Confessions of a New Corporate Pilot
Life would be sweet, I thought, now that I’d successfully passed my Cessna Citation III (CE-650) type rating check ride (this was a few years back). It meant I’d be flying my first swept-wing jet. Surprisingly, my first day at the new job at Chicago Executive Airport (PWK) would also be the first time I’d been up close to a real Citation III since all the training and even my check ride happened in FlightSafety’s full-motion simulator.
From my research, though, I knew the 650’s cabin was roomy enough for eight, and its rocket-like performance was nothing short of spectacular with a VMO (maximum operating Mach) of Mach 0.85 and 39,000 feet on a standard day. In its day, M.83 was pretty fast. That meant we could make the West Coast out of PWK with four people in the back. I learned quickly, too, that the 650’s awesome performance meant I needed to stay much farther ahead of the airplane than I’d had to in the much slower Citation II (CE-550) I’d been flying in a 12-pilot charter department.
A privately held corporation owned this Citation III and I was the junior of three pilots. The chief pilot, my new boss, brought experience from several other flight departments, while the other pilot, I’ll call him Tom well, I was never really too sure where Tom had come from because the guy kept to himself as much as possible and wasn’t the chatty type. That made three-hour flights long when the entire conversation at FL390 ended with an occasional shrug of the shoulders.
But who cared what one guy acted like, I thought. I was there to learn how to fit into a flight department that needed another pilot on their team. Just like in charter flying, my job was to keep the people in the back happy. I came to know these passengers much better than we ever did in the charter world. These folks sometimes invited the flight crew to their home on Nantucket when we overnighted there.
The Interview
Looking back on this job now though, I guess the 10-minute interview the chief pilot and I engaged in before he offered me the job should have been a tip-off that maybe something was a little odd. But with a four-year-old daughter growing up at home, the chance to dump my charter department pager that always seemed to ring at 2 a.m. beckoned hypnotically.
Cessna Citation CE-650 Corporate line training began right away with me flying in all kinds of weather, where I regularly rotated flying left seat with the chief pilot and Tom. Having flown left seat on the Citation II, I wasn’t brand new to jets, just speedy ones.
After a few months, however, I began to notice a few operational oddities that started making me a little uncomfortable. Some sketchy flight planning and questions I asked were sometimes answered with annoyed expressions. If I appeared not to agree, someone might ask if I’d finished all the Jepp revisions (In those days there were no electronic subscriptions. Updates were handled by hand). I found the best solution for getting along seemed to be to just shut up and fly the airplane. Ignoring those distractions did help me pay closer attention to the little things that made my flying the jet smoother.
Then again … On one flight back from Cincinnati (CVG), I was flying left-seat with the chief pilot in the right. I wanted to add fuel before we left since the Chicago weather was questionable, but the boss overruled me explaining, “We’re fat on fuel.”I didn’t say anything. As we approached PWK, the ATIS reported the weather had worsened, considerably. The Swiss cheese holes began to align when Chicago Approach dumped us early. We ended up burning more fuel than planned. I flew the ILS right down to minimums, but my scan uncomfortably included the fuel gauges every few seconds. After a safe landing, we taxied in with 700 pounds of Jet-A, not much for an airplane that burns 1,800 pounds an hour down low. What if we’d missed at Chicago Executive Airport and needed to run for Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport I wondered? We’d have arrived on fumes. The boss looked at me after we shut down. “Don’t tell me that whole thing bothered you. It all turned out fine, didn’t it?” (more…)
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Remembering Gordon Baxter: Bax Seat was a Flying Magazine Reader Favorite
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(Reposted by request)
Each time I stand near my desk, my eyes naturally focus on the framed cover of the August 1983 Flying magazine. Below it is page 100, the “I Learned About Flying from That” (ILAFFT), where my first column appeared. On it, the author of Bax Seat, scrawled in brown ink, “To my friend Rob Mark. His story, my push. Gordon Baxter, August 5, 1983.”
Many months before, Gordon Baxter had given me the Flying editor’s phone number. When I rang with my brief pitch, all I heard was “yes.” I suddenly had an assignment for my first column. That 1983 issue was the first, but not the last, time my name and stories appeared in the aviation industry’s iconic magazine. That same issue also ran a pilot report about the then-new Cessna Citation III, an aircraft I later added to my list of type ratings. Looking back, there were so many aspects of my aviation career that came to life around Bax and that August 1983 issue, not the least of which was that we became friends.
Gordon Baxter, Bax as he preferred folks call him, helped shape my career as an aviation journalist like no one before him and only a few people since. The author of 13 books, Bax’s own magazine writing career at Flying spanned 25 years. His monthly column, Bax Seat, focused on vivid descriptions of his adventures. It was known simply as “Bax Seat.” Did I mention he was also a long-time radio personality in Beaumont, Texas, another interest we shared.
A Bit of Bax’s Background
I first met Bax in the mid-1970s. He brought his show, his act, or whatever the heck he called his evening of storytelling, to the Stick and Rudder Flying Club at Waukegan Airport. I was a tower controller not far away at Palwaukee Airport. Having been an avid Flying reader since high school, I switched shifts with another controller so I wouldn’t miss the event. Bax captured the audience for over an hour with stories from his flying career and his columns that often alternately “em rollin’ in the aisles” with gut-wrenching laughter and an emotional Texas-guy style that also brought tears to many an eye. Another way to think of Bax’s storytelling night was like an evening of improv but all about flying and airplanes.
Born in Port Arthur, Texas, he learned to fly after World War II following his stint as a B-17 turret gunner. Bax was no professional pilot—just a guy with a private certificate, an instrument rating, and eventually his beloved Mooney. On the back cover of one of his books, appropriately titled Bax Seat, Flying’s Stephan Wilkinson said “Bax tries to pass himself off as a pilot, but don’t believe him. He never could fly worth a damn. But Gordon feels airplanes, loves and honors them in ways that the rest of us are ashamed to admit. And he’s certainly one of the few romantics who can express what he feels so perfectly.” I couldn’t have written that myself, but I, too, felt it.
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Making the Brazilian ATR-72 Spin
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Note: This story was corrected on August 10th at 10:23 am, thanks to the help of a sharp-eyed reader.
Making an ATR-72 Spin
I wasn’t in Brazil on Friday afternoon, but I saw the post on Twitter or X (or whatever you call it) showing a Brazil ATR-72, Voepass Airlines flight 2283, rotating in a spin as it plunged to the ground near Sao Paulo from its 17,000-foot cruising altitude. All 61 people aboard perished in the ensuing crash and fire. A timeline from FlightRadar 24 indicates that the fall only lasted about a minute, so the aircraft was clearly out of control. Industry research shows Loss of Control in Flight (LOCI) continues to be responsible for more fatalities worldwide than any other kind of aircraft accident.
The big question is why the crew lost control of this airplane. The ADS-B data from FlightRadar 24 does offer a couple of possible clues. The ATR’s speed declined during the descent rather than increased, which means the aircraft’s wing was probably stalled. The ATR’s airfoil had exceeded its critical angle of attack and lacked sufficient lift to remain airborne. Add to this the rotation observed, and the only answer is a spin.
Can a Large Airplane Spin?
The simple answer is yes. If you induce rotation to almost any aircraft while the wing is stalled, it can spin, even an aircraft as large as the ATR-72. By the way, the largest of the ATR models, the 600, weighs nearly 51,000 pounds.
Of course, investigators will ask why the ATR’s wing was stalled. It could have been related to a failed engine or ice on the wings or tailplane. (more…)
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How the FAA Let Remote Tower Technology Slip Right Through Its Fingers
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In June 2023, the FAA published a 167-page document outlining the agency’s desire to replace dozens of 40-year-old airport control towers with new environmentally friendly brick-and-mortar structures. These towers are, of course, where hundreds of air traffic controllers ply their trade … ensuring the aircraft within their local airspace are safely separated from each other during landing and takeoff.
The FAA’s report was part of President Biden’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act enacted on November 15, 2021. That bill set aside a whopping $25 billion spread across five years to cover the cost of replacing those aging towers. The agency said it considered a number of alternatives about how to spend that $5 billion each year, rather than on brick and mortar buildings.
One alternative addressed only briefly before rejecting it was a relatively new concept called a Remote Tower, originally created by Saab in Europe in partnership with the Virginia-based VSATSLab Inc. The European technology giant has been successfully running Remote Towers in place of the traditional buildings in Europe for almost 10 years. One of Saab’s more well-known Remote Tower sites is at London City Airport. London also plans to create a virtual backup ATC facility at London Heathrow, the busiest airport in Europe.
A remote tower and its associated technology replace the traditional 60-70 foot glass domed control tower building you might see at your local airport, but it doesn’t eliminate any human air traffic controllers or their roles in keeping aircraft separated.
Max Trescott photo Inside a Remote Tower Operation
In place of a normal control tower building, the airport erects a small steel tower or even an 8-inch diameter pole perhaps 20-40 feet high, similar to a radio or cell phone tower. Dozens of high-definition cameras are attached to the new Remote Tower’s structure, each aimed at an arrival or departure path, as well as various ramps around the airport.
Using HD cameras, controllers can zoom in on any given point within the camera’s range, say an aircraft on final approach. The only way to accomplish that in a control tower today is if the controller picks up a pair of binoculars. The HD cameras also offer infrared capabilities to allow for better-than-human visuals, especially during bad weather or at night.
The next step in constructing a remote tower is locating the control room where the video feeds will terminate. Instead of the round glass room perched atop a standard control tower, imagine a semi-circular room located at ground level. Inside that room, the walls are lined with 14, 55-inch high-definition video screens hung next to each other with the wider portion of the screen running top to bottom.
After connecting the video feeds, the compression technology manages to consolidate 360 degrees of viewing area into a 220-degree spread across the video screens. That creates essentially the same view of the entire airport that a controller would normally see out the windows of the tower cab without the need to move their head more than 220 degrees. Another Remote Tower benefit is that each aircraft within visual range can be tagged with that aircraft’s tail number, just as it might if the controller were looking at a radar screen. (more…)
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The Internet & Homebuilt Aircraft Accidents
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The sharp increase in the number of accidents involving amateur-built experimental aircraft is the most disturbing piece of data in the recently released 2009 Nall Report. Published by the AOPA Air Safety Foundation, it dissected and analyzed 2008’s GA accidents to identify trends and factors. Overall, the GA accident rate adjusted proportionally to 2008’s decreased flight time. Homebuilts, however, are about 10 percent of the GA fleet, so their accident and fatality numbers contribute to the overall GA safety rate. Remove—or reduce—the homebuilt data, and GA would have had a much safer year.
Succinctly, per 100,000 flight hours, in 2008 the homebuilt accident rate was 5x higher than store-bought airplanes. The fatal rate was 7x higher. Contributing to this is the interesting—but not surprising—fact that nearly twice as many homebuilt accidents were caused by mechanical problems and other causes that often start with a sudden loss of power. It should be no surprise that this has captured the attention of many, and it won’t be a surprise when they attempt to remedy the problem with an online education effort. Before they invest too much in this, however, I suggest some research because, it seems to me, the Internet could well be a contributing factor to homebuilt accidents. Here’s my logic.
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FAA Tweaks Sport Pilot Ticket for the Better
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The FAA published the final rule on 22 proposed improvements to sport pilot certification and operation in the February 1, 2010 Federal Register. It’s taken me a month to brew the courage to read it because I felt that a number of them would take sport pilot down the same path the private pilot certificate followed in the last century.
After World War II, the private pilot requirements weren’t that much different from today’s sport pilot ticket. Then the FAA started adding requirements to keep pace with technology, which was only right. One private ticket should be enough, but the NPRM appeared to put sport pilot on the same path. Proposing that sport pilots get an hour under the hood violated every concept that led to the creation of this Day/VFR-only ticket. Yeah, new fixed-wing LSAs have glass up to the simulated IFR training mission, but what’s the point, other than someone thought it was a good idea? Reading elsewhere that only 150 or so people and AOPA, ASC, EAA, NAFI, and USUA submitted comments didn’t do much to assuage my cynical skepticism. Given the whole of aviation and its problems, sport pilot barely registers in the overall picture. With so few comments, I figured the FAA would approve its proposals and move onto more pressing problems.
Imagine my surprise to read that the FAA withdrew the problematic proposals—including hood time—and approved those that will benefit the greatest number of people. First among them is the use of Special LSAs, like the Cessna Skycatcher, by Part 141 flight schools (see Ground School Delivers Consistent Quality). With the outcomes of these proposals, the FAA has sedated by cynicism and planted a seed of hope for the future. -
Wedged in the Window Seat
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I have a confession.I’m responsible for much of the hate spewed at my friends Christi Day and Linda Rutherford at Southwest Airlines when a Southwest pilot tossed director Kevin Smith off a flight last week. The aircraft captain decided Smith was too gastronomically challenged to fit into the seat. Smith blogged and Tweeted ( let’s see, what’s a good word for rudely) about being asked to leave the flight which caused the airline no small amount of embarrassment, despite the fact that Rutherford posted a public apology on behalf of Southwest.
All I can say is that I’m really, really sorry to have put my friends in this corner.
I could have prevented this mess if only I’d spoken up about the chunky guy that squished me into a window seat when I climbed aboard a Southwest flight back from San Antonio to Midway through Nashville a few days before. But I didn’t. I was too uncomfortable to ask this guy to move they hell over to his own seat and leave me mine, even with the armrest down. Nope I sat sideways from SAT to BNA with my mouth shut.
And let’s be serious, that’s what this is all about … skinny, wimpy guys like me who don’t want to make a scene because they’re afraid a lunatic chubbo like Smith is going to haul off on them. So we suffer in silence. And we shouldn’t. I’m sorry they’re overweight, but it’s not my fault.
The Southwest people did the right thing by pulling Smith off the flight. Sure they could probably have offered him a free ticket rather than a voucher, but considering Smith’s short fuse, I doubt it would have helped anyway. That’s OK though. As one of my clients told me after the Smith affair, she would never change her mind about Southwest based on the rantings of a guy who had everything to gain for himself – as in free publicity – by going nuts on his blog and Twitter.
That being said, this incident again shows the power of social media on a brand. Ignore it at your peril.
And Christi and Linda. I’ve learned my lesson. I won’t be squished against the window again. I’ll speak up first next time so people like Kevin Smith won’t be able to say that some mean old airline is picking on them. I’ll pick on them first. But I’ll make sure I speak up nicely, using clean persuasive words in case it’s Smith sitting next to me — Rob Mark
