Piloting - Page 7

Flying a plane is certainly an anxiety-inducing experience, although for pilots with anxiety, the real stresses may be waiting back on land. There are many helpful tools to manage anxiety, including anti-anxiety medication. However, are pilots allowed to manage their anxiety with medication? In short, pilots are allowed to take anti-anxiety medication as long as

Billions of people around the world enjoy an occasional tipple of alcohol at the end of a long day (although, hopefully, most are not drinking on the job). However, for some professions, rules concerning alcohol consumption apply even off the clock. Pilots fall under that category, but the rules regarding drinking are not what you

If you’ve ever experienced glare while driving or riding in a car, then you’ve experienced a fraction of what pilots experience while flying. With no cloud cover to protect from the sun (and clouds, in fact, reflecting sunlight), it’s no wonder that pilots need sunglasses to see. However, can they wear any sunglasses, including polarized

Shopping for the right type of pilot school can take a little research. There are tons of new terms to wrap your head around, and the dollars and cents of flight training might also look like a riddle. One of the biggest questions potential students need to tackle is the difference between Part 61 vs

If you’re considering taking flight lessons, don’t take picking your flight school lightly. Choosing a flight program is like picking a college. But, flight school will ultimately cost even more than college will in most instances. There’s no silver bullet or definitive guide on how to pick the right flight school. The right school will

Despite the ominous-sounding name, dead reckoning is a fundamental skill that all pilots must learn. It’s been around for hundreds of years and is a basic part of celestial navigation. Pilots and mariners have crossed oceans with nothing more. And while modern pilots seldom learn celestial nav anymore, dead reckoning is a handy skill for

A METAR is an airport’s routine weather report, issued every hour. What METAR stands for and how to decode every group, from wind and clouds to AO2 and $.

Coffin corner is the altitude where a jet’s stall speed meets its Mach limit. FAA figures, the U-2, Pinnacle 3701, and why AF447 is the wrong example.

Most people have heard of the solo flight during flight training. But it isn’t until you start learning to fly that you fully appreciate just how much stuff you have to grasp before you can do it completely on your own. Your first solo flight is a big occasion–the first big milestone in your training.

VDP in aviation: what a visual descent point is, how to spot the V on the chart, how to calculate one with HAT divided by 300, and when to go missed.