Plane and Pilot

JULY 31, 2025

Aviation then was a realm of VOR needles, paper charts, and the pure joy of stick-and-rudder flight. Navigation meant tuning VORs or tracing sectional charts, while entertainment was a crackling AM radio delivering faint music or static-laced talk shows. Today, glass cockpits dominate even entry-level aircraft.

VOR

Pilot's Life Blog

JUNE 17, 2025

Industry Backgrounds : Some instructors are airline captains, others are corporate pilots, and all have logged thousands of flight hours. Simulated instrument scenarios: partial panel, unusual attitudes, instrument approaches (ILS, GPS, VOR). Minimum 50 hours cross‐country PIC, 40 hours actual or simulated instrument time.

Checkride

Photographic Logbook

JUNE 29, 2025

I momentarily put HAL into heading mode, inserted the East Texas VOR into the route, programmed GPS direct to ETX, then switched back to "nav" mode to avoid any unexpected turns from tinkering with the active leg in the GPS flight plan. I exited the terminal parking lot and walked east toward the hangar housing the museum.

Runway

Northstar VFR

AUGUST 25, 2024

Every airline/operator must establish a Continuous Airworthiness Maintenance Program (CAMP). These checks take a full working day, so the aircraft is usually parked inside of a hangar. These checks require many more man hours, tools, hangar space, and aircraft downtime.

Annual Inspection

AeroSavvy

AUGUST 20, 2021

Piper PA-32 Cherokee Six Navigation equipment includes a Garmin GNS-530W GPS navigator and two VOR receivers for secondary navigation. Cherokee Six instrument panel Like my airline job, I fly nearly paperless using an iPad Mini and the ForeFlight app for navigation charts. Santa Fe is located 6,349 feet above sea level.

Density Altitude

Photographic Logbook

OCTOBER 10, 2023

Just north of the Selinsgrove VOR, Harrisburg called with the first change in routing. A prop lock is required on all aircraft parked outside of a hangar at the MD-3 airports, though throttle locks provide an alternate means of compliance. Cherokee Four Eight One is cleared direct Baltimore, then direct destination."

Transponder

Photographic Logbook

OCTOBER 19, 2023

I filed a route of BRUIN to ART (Watertown VOR) to Kingston to avoid overflying significant portions of Lake Ontario. On the ramp at Kingston with the former airline terminal and control tower. I filed a route from Kingston via the Ottawa VOR (far left of the chart above) then direct to Rockliffe to avoid the restricted areas entirely.

Runway