Innehållsförteckning för January 2026 från Flying

WHEN WE talk about bucket-list flying, most of us picture aircraft we’ve always wanted to fly or destinations we’ve pinned on a map for someday. But sometimes a bucket-list experience doesn’t start on a list at all—sometimes, it reveals itself in real time. One of those defining moments found me during a photo flight over my hometown, New York City. This mission was to photograph a formation flight of five Mustangs—both jet and warbird kind. Our six-ship formation, including the Bonanza photo platform I was in, launched out of Teterboro Airport and followed the Hudson River south. I captured the Citations and the P-51 alongside the Statue of Liberty, One World Trade Center, and other Big Apple landmarks. Undertaking a flight with so many aircraft, wedged between the busy Bravo…

THE MOST recent global market forecasts from Boeing and Airbus project demand for more than 43,000 new commercial airplanes over the next two decades. But according to Aleksey Matyushev, co-founder and CEO of Natilus, the manufacturing titans may struggle to meet it. Matyushev estimated that Boeing and Airbus have the capacity to produce about 11,000 and 15,000 planes, respectively, in that timeframe. That leaves a gap of more than 17,000—one the Natilus CEO believes could be filled by the company’s fuel-efficient, blended-wing body (BWB) design, Horizon. “I think the airlines are now more than ever interested in new ways of thinking, both from a manufacturing and a fuel efficiency perspective,” Matyushev told FLYING. Horizon, which Matyushev said will have capacity for about 200 passengers, is one of a handful of…

What was the first airplane you wanted to fly? For me, it was the J-3 Cub. I was 4 years old and at a birthday party at the San Carlos Airport in California. One of the adult guests brought his J-3 Cub out for us kids to look at and sit in while our parents took photographs. Dad placed me in the front seat of the cockpit then gently reached in and moved the stick, pointing out how the ailerons were moving and explaining how that made the airplane turn. When Dad went to pick me up to remove me from the cockpit so another kid could take a turn, I grabbed the stick with both hands and let out a howl of protest. Many years later, I met the…

IN MY previous life, flight plan data would spit out of a printer, producing a stack of recycled folded paper that we would transport from operations to the cockpit. The stack included the flight plan, takeoff data, crew information, and, of course, NOTAMs. Most airlines have embraced technology and eliminated paper. Electronic tablets rather than printers now retain flight plan data. Still, reviewing NOTAMs can be a tedious process for an airline pilot, especially if multiple destinations and alternate airports are involved for a typical trip sequence. Honestly, if we took the time to precisely review all the NOTAM information, our flights would be sitting at the gate past departure time. Even for me now as a GA pilot flying to a destination with one fuel stop in a single-engine…

GARMIN PILOT Web has added multiple weather features to its flight planning platform so that VFR and instrument pilots can more easily map out routes around challenging conditions. These new attributes help pilots better visualize and understand weather ahead of a flight. Future Radar Users can now drag the playback bar at the bottom of the screen forward to view future radar and how precipitation and storms may impact their route of flight. Storm Tops Found by clicking the “Radar” button above the playback bar, this feature will show the tops of storms so you can plan flights over or around them and discern how powerful a system may be. Echo Tops See the altitude of the highest precipitation returns and use this feature to understand storm intensity. Surface Visibility…

On July 4, 1999, my wife and I departed the now-closed Howell-New Lenox airport (1C2) in Illinois in our Cessna Skylane for a 150 nm flight to Battle Creek, Michigan (KBTL), to attend an airshow featuring the Air Force Thunderbirds and Canadian Snowbirds. The adventure began the moment our wheels touched down. Ground asked where I’d like to park, and they named two FBOs. Unfamiliar with either, I echoed the first name offered. Their reply: “November 4 Golf Lima, taxi past the Thunderbirds and park in the first available spot.” We happily obliged, and while we were walking to the f light line, I glanced back at the ramp. Having the same color scheme as the Thunderbird F-16s, my Cessna 182 fit right in. And when the Thunderbirds crew did…

“MY AIRPLANE.” I was only five hours into my private pilot training when Dutch, my CFI, gave this command. The Cessna 150 we were flying suddenly wasn’t producing much power. We were in the practice area south of the airport at an altitude of 3,500 feet and about to practice steep turns. I had just finished the clearing turns when the engine sounded funny. I thought Dutch was testing me, as I had just learned the loss-of-engine-power procedures. I had activated carburetor heat, made sure the mixture was full rich, and pushed the throttle all the way in—nothing changed. Then when I switched over to the left magneto only, the airplane shuddered. I knew this was not normal, and Dutch taking the controls confirmed it. We headed back to the…

OF ALL the ratings a pilot can earn, the instrument rating is often the most intense academically and the most useful. Filing IFR on VFR days gives you priority handling—like flight following on steroids—and the procedures you learn and skills gained can give a pilot more confidence in general. Unfortunately, the skills are also the most perishable. If your IFR ticket is a little rusty and dull, here are some suggestions on how to regain your edge. Currency vs. Proficiency Per 14 CFR 61.57, instrument currency begins with meeting VFR recent flight experience, meaning the three takeoffs and landings within 90 days. The instrument-rated pilot wishing to act as PIC under IFR or weather conditions less than the minimums for VFR must have, within the six calendar months preceding the…

WHEN LOOKING THROUGH YOUR logbook, there are some flights that stick out more than others. Your first solo. The time you took a spouse or friend for their first general aviation flight. Or maybe you were able to add a few clicks of Hobbs time behind the powerful engines of a warbird. These noteworthy events are part of the reason flying is so enjoyable and worth the continued costs and time spent remaining current. Sometimes a routine flight becomes one that you just have to pen a special remark about. That day becomes a memory that you will look back on years later with a smile. Other times, you need to proactively create an exciting itinerary. If you fly to any of these bucket-list destinations, they will certainly become among…

I WAS reviewing some of my old FLYING magazines and once again read Sam Weigel’s Taking Wing column in the February 2014 issue. You titled your writing “Sunset Patrol: A Midwinter Night’s Dream.” In my opinion, this may be your best column ever. It resonated with me as my story is similar to yours. I grew up in Alexandria, Minnesota, obtained my private ticket on my 17th birthday in 1972. I worked at the Alexandria airport for Harold Chandler. Eight hours of work at the FBO paid for one hour of flying. Harold rigged up a heating system using an old Knipco heater—a lot of cold mornings, we were warming engines for impatient pilots ready to hit the skies. In the winter during Christmas break, we would take my dad’s…

WHEN YOU fly, do you practice difficult things that you don’t do well? Or do you focus on the easy stuff, leaving harder skills to rust until you need them most? Pilots tend to focus on takeoffs and landings, which make sense, since they’re critical phases of flight. By comparison, the approach to landing, or even the entry into a traffic pattern, garners less attention, probably because it seems trivial compared to landing a plane. Sadly, a lot of bad landings, even fatal ones, are rooted in poorly thought-out approaches to landing. Two recent events—a fatal accident in North Carolina that I’ll write about in the future and a poorly flown pattern entry by a pilot I flew with—brought this to mind. I feel great empathy for both pilots, as…

WHAT DOES the Boeing factory in Everett, Washington, have in common with the Pyramids of Giza and Vatican City? They are all known for their size, and visiting them is on the bucket list of a great many people. For pilots and aviation enthusiasts, a tour of the Boeing factory, the largest airplane manufacturing plant in the world is a must-do. According to the aerospace giant, over 150,000 people come each year for a tour. The Boeing Future of Flight opened in 2005 and is a company-centric facility that is part-museum, part-gallery, part-store, in addition to being a working factory that rolls out freighters and passenger jets destined for airlines in all corners of the world. The center sits adjacent to Seattle Paine Field International Airport (KPAE) in Mukilteo, Washington,…

MY HIGH school journalism teacher told me not to bury the lede, so I won’t: This will be my final Taking Wing column in FLYING. Now, now. Sheathe those pitchforks and snuff those torches, good citizens, for the magazine leadership has nothing to do with this. My editors assure me that if they had their druthers, I would scribble on ’til the ink pot slipped from my ancient, withered fingers. The decision to retire these pages at a somewhat earlier date is mine alone, though admittedly made under some duress. Most readers will recall that my real job—the one that pays the bills, whilst my literary endeavors primarily feed the ego—is playing Boeing 737 captain for a major U.S. airline. It’s a good job—a great one, even—that I like very…