With the help of the pilot who is arguably the most popular aviator since Charles Lindbergh, a California Congressman is proposing legislation that strengthens the power of the nation’s air investigators in dealing with the Federal Aviation Administration. But some are worried about inserting politics into aviation safety. At a news conference on Thursday, Cong. Mark DeSaulnier and Capt. Chesley (Sully) Sullenberger the now-retired US Airways pilot of Miracle on the Hudson fame, announced a need to correct flaws in the nation’s safety system. Referring to the uniformed airline pilots who shared the stage, Capt. Sully said of their job, “These gents and their colleagues… Read More…
With a stiff wind blowing from the east, Ingrid Lang of Kreizlingen, Switzerland steadied herself against the gate, her cell phone tightly clasped in her hand. She and her husband had pedaled their bikes from a campsite a few miles across the Spanish border just to be at the barricade on the south side of Gibraltar International Airport in time to see British Airways flight 493 depart for London. An aviation geek from childhood, Ingrid may have been the most enthusiastic bystander but she was far from the only one. Pedestrians, cyclists and drivers were also watching, having been brought to a temporary halt by… Read More…
A Boeing 747 Sky Lease Cargo flight skidded off the end of runway 14/32 at Halifax Stanfield International Airport, after a flight from Chicago on Wednesday morning. Nathan Coleman of Canada’s weathernetwork.com captured photos and video of the jumbo jet, up to its lower cowlings in the dirt on the left side and resting on the fuselage. Video just shot at the scene @weathernetwork pic.twitter.com/Pi7DorhDW0 — Nathan Coleman (@NateTWN) November 7, 2018 The airport was shut down shortly after 5:00 am local time but some flights have resumed. Four people, all members of the crew were taken to the hospital. There does not appear to have been… Read More…
The pilots whose 2017 flight very nearly landed atop four loaded airliners waiting in line on a taxiway to take off from San Francisco International Airport, failed to manually tune the airplane’s navigation system for the landing. Had they done so, it may have helped them realize they were off the lateral track for the runway, according to investigators looking into the near disaster. Tuning the instrument landing system frequency was not a typical procedure for the Air Canada crews. This lapse was one but not the only factor that led the pilots of Flight 759 to get “dangerously close to other airplanes” so that at… Read More…
