Flying September 2023

THERE ARE SOME aircraft you can read about and see pictures of, but their sheer size still doesn’t hit you until you are up close and personal with them. The Aero Spacelines Super Guppy—the behemoth aircraft designed in the 1960s specifically to carry oversized loads, like the body sections of the Saturn V rocket—is one of those aircraft. During EAA AirVenture 2023 people marveled at the utter magnitude of the Super Guppy’s cargo compartment—a full 25 feet wide and 111 feet long—that is accessed as the entire front end of the aircraft opens laterally on a hinge actuated by an external electric motor. A control lock and disconnect system at the fuselage break allows the nose to be opened a full 110 degrees without disrupting the flight or engine control…

THE FLYING BUYERS Guide brings together a massive effort from the team to compile the best of the new aircraft on the horizon, with actionable data you can use to make purchase decisions—or just dream a little bit. You want to buy an airplane? You’ve figured out the ones you fancy most, whether through perusing the pages of Aircraft For Sale or serious conversations with the folks standing beside your next love at EAA AirVenture. You have your financing—or cash—together. You have the necessary signoff from the home front. In the post-pandemic world, economic and political factors compete to pull the most on the global aviation industry. So depending on whether you are buying new or preowned (or someone else’s handiwork in the experimental segment), your approach in 2023 differs a…

SEPTEMBER IS ONE of my favorite months. It’s the kickoff of the college football season and cooling temperatures, and kids (I have five!) are back in school. In just two months, the leaves will change, and some of the best flying of the year will descend upon us. It is also an important season for folks that work in the aviation industry. Why is that? Many airplanes are bought and sold before the end of the year, with prospective buyers motivated by accelerated depreciation and other incentives that happen because of the calendar. If you are considering selling an airplane, now is the time to do so. We’ve been focusing on growth at FLYING Media Group, including bringing new media publications into the portfolio and expanding our breadth of coverage. Our…

First Flight I thoroughly enjoyed Jonathan Welsh’s “Destinations” article, “First Flight Airport & The Wright Memorial” in FLYING’s Issue 940. On the introductory page, Mr. Welsh posed the idea, “I also won-der how the brothers [Orville and Wilbur Wright] would feel about our current state of aviation.” My take: If they were to come back in 2023, when Orville and Wilbur Wright were revived after passing out at the wonders of modern aerospace, they would note many miraculous changes that have taken place in the past 120 years. The Wright Flyer’s first flight covered 180 feet and lasted only 12 seconds. Today, we have commercial airliners that can span oceans in hours, military air-craft that can fly around the world nonstop with aerial refueling, [and] aircraft that can fly several…

BILLED AS UTAH’S up-and-coming mountain destination perhaps for some skiing in the winter, hiking or mountain biking in warmer seasons, or some of the newer dining options in town, Ogden could be on your fly-to airport list. If it is, the VOR-A might be the approach you use to transition from the en route environment down to the airport, which means you will end up circling to one of the available runways. A NO STRAIGHT-INS A VOR-A approach like this indicates that the final approach course does not directly line up with a particular runway. It is designed to approach the airport and, once the runway environment is in sight, the pilot will circle to the runway of their choice. Expect some limitations. Circling to Runway 17 is not authorized…

SHORTLY AFTER GETTING my private pilot certificate in 1966, I began my real learning in the form of a near-catastrophic mistake. Looking back now, it dawns on me that most of what I know today did not come from the normal, required syllabus training but from life experiences, along with an occasional hair-raising event, one of which I can finally share. Like many pilots, most of my private pilot training took place in a two-place Cessna. My CFI actually weighed a morbidly obese 350 pounds and was in his upper 60s. Were we always overloaded upon takeoff? No, because being a hard-working, skinny, 25-year-old, I carried maybe 120 pounds. My first solo, however, gave me a startling surprise, though, when the Cessna 150 trainer shot up so rapidly…I had just…