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Confessions of a New Corporate Pilot
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In the Citation III Confessions of a New Corporate Pilot
Life would be sweet, I thought, now that I’d successfully passed my Cessna Citation III (CE-650) type rating check ride (this was a few years back). It meant I’d be flying my first swept-wing jet. Surprisingly, my first day at the new job at Chicago Executive Airport (PWK) would also be the first time I’d been up close to a real Citation III since all the training and even my check ride happened in FlightSafety’s full-motion simulator.
From my research, though, I knew the 650’s cabin was roomy enough for eight, and its rocket-like performance was nothing short of spectacular with a VMO (maximum operating Mach) of Mach 0.85 and 39,000 feet on a standard day. In its day, M.83 was pretty fast. That meant we could make the West Coast out of PWK with four people in the back. I learned quickly, too, that the 650’s awesome performance meant I needed to stay much farther ahead of the airplane than I’d had to in the much slower Citation II (CE-550) I’d been flying in a 12-pilot charter department.
A privately held corporation owned this Citation III and I was the junior of three pilots. The chief pilot, my new boss, brought experience from several other flight departments, while the other pilot, I’ll call him Tom well, I was never really too sure where Tom had come from because the guy kept to himself as much as possible and wasn’t the chatty type. That made three-hour flights long when the entire conversation at FL390 ended with an occasional shrug of the shoulders.
But who cared what one guy acted like, I thought. I was there to learn how to fit into a flight department that needed another pilot on their team. Just like in charter flying, my job was to keep the people in the back happy. I came to know these passengers much better than we ever did in the charter world. These folks sometimes invited the flight crew to their home on Nantucket when we overnighted there.
The Interview
Looking back on this job now though, I guess the 10-minute interview the chief pilot and I engaged in before he offered me the job should have been a tip-off that maybe something was a little odd. But with a four-year-old daughter growing up at home, the chance to dump my charter department pager that always seemed to ring at 2 a.m. beckoned hypnotically.
Cessna Citation CE-650 Corporate line training began right away with me flying in all kinds of weather, where I regularly rotated flying left seat with the chief pilot and Tom. Having flown left seat on the Citation II, I wasn’t brand new to jets, just speedy ones.
After a few months, however, I began to notice a few operational oddities that started making me a little uncomfortable. Some sketchy flight planning and questions I asked were sometimes answered with annoyed expressions. If I appeared not to agree, someone might ask if I’d finished all the Jepp revisions (In those days there were no electronic subscriptions. Updates were handled by hand). I found the best solution for getting along seemed to be to just shut up and fly the airplane. Ignoring those distractions did help me pay closer attention to the little things that made my flying the jet smoother.
Then again … On one flight back from Cincinnati (CVG), I was flying left-seat with the chief pilot in the right. I wanted to add fuel before we left since the Chicago weather was questionable, but the boss overruled me explaining, “We’re fat on fuel.”I didn’t say anything. As we approached PWK, the ATIS reported the weather had worsened, considerably. The Swiss cheese holes began to align when Chicago Approach dumped us early. We ended up burning more fuel than planned. I flew the ILS right down to minimums, but my scan uncomfortably included the fuel gauges every few seconds. After a safe landing, we taxied in with 700 pounds of Jet-A, not much for an airplane that burns 1,800 pounds an hour down low. What if we’d missed at Chicago Executive Airport and needed to run for Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport I wondered? We’d have arrived on fumes. The boss looked at me after we shut down. “Don’t tell me that whole thing bothered you. It all turned out fine, didn’t it?” (more…)
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Remembering Gordon Baxter: Bax Seat was a Flying Magazine Reader Favorite
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(Reposted by request)
Each time I stand near my desk, my eyes naturally focus on the framed cover of the August 1983 Flying magazine. Below it is page 100, the “I Learned About Flying from That” (ILAFFT), where my first column appeared. On it, the author of Bax Seat, scrawled in brown ink, “To my friend Rob Mark. His story, my push. Gordon Baxter, August 5, 1983.”
Many months before, Gordon Baxter had given me the Flying editor’s phone number. When I rang with my brief pitch, all I heard was “yes.” I suddenly had an assignment for my first column. That 1983 issue was the first, but not the last, time my name and stories appeared in the aviation industry’s iconic magazine. That same issue also ran a pilot report about the then-new Cessna Citation III, an aircraft I later added to my list of type ratings. Looking back, there were so many aspects of my aviation career that came to life around Bax and that August 1983 issue, not the least of which was that we became friends.
Gordon Baxter, Bax as he preferred folks call him, helped shape my career as an aviation journalist like no one before him and only a few people since. The author of 13 books, Bax’s own magazine writing career at Flying spanned 25 years. His monthly column, Bax Seat, focused on vivid descriptions of his adventures. It was known simply as “Bax Seat.” Did I mention he was also a long-time radio personality in Beaumont, Texas, another interest we shared.
A Bit of Bax’s Background
I first met Bax in the mid-1970s. He brought his show, his act, or whatever the heck he called his evening of storytelling, to the Stick and Rudder Flying Club at Waukegan Airport. I was a tower controller not far away at Palwaukee Airport. Having been an avid Flying reader since high school, I switched shifts with another controller so I wouldn’t miss the event. Bax captured the audience for over an hour with stories from his flying career and his columns that often alternately “em rollin’ in the aisles” with gut-wrenching laughter and an emotional Texas-guy style that also brought tears to many an eye. Another way to think of Bax’s storytelling night was like an evening of improv but all about flying and airplanes.
Born in Port Arthur, Texas, he learned to fly after World War II following his stint as a B-17 turret gunner. Bax was no professional pilot—just a guy with a private certificate, an instrument rating, and eventually his beloved Mooney. On the back cover of one of his books, appropriately titled Bax Seat, Flying’s Stephan Wilkinson said “Bax tries to pass himself off as a pilot, but don’t believe him. He never could fly worth a damn. But Gordon feels airplanes, loves and honors them in ways that the rest of us are ashamed to admit. And he’s certainly one of the few romantics who can express what he feels so perfectly.” I couldn’t have written that myself, but I, too, felt it.
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Making the Brazilian ATR-72 Spin
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Note: This story was corrected on August 10th at 10:23 am, thanks to the help of a sharp-eyed reader.
Making an ATR-72 Spin
I wasn’t in Brazil on Friday afternoon, but I saw the post on Twitter or X (or whatever you call it) showing a Brazil ATR-72, Voepass Airlines flight 2283, rotating in a spin as it plunged to the ground near Sao Paulo from its 17,000-foot cruising altitude. All 61 people aboard perished in the ensuing crash and fire. A timeline from FlightRadar 24 indicates that the fall only lasted about a minute, so the aircraft was clearly out of control. Industry research shows Loss of Control in Flight (LOCI) continues to be responsible for more fatalities worldwide than any other kind of aircraft accident.
The big question is why the crew lost control of this airplane. The ADS-B data from FlightRadar 24 does offer a couple of possible clues. The ATR’s speed declined during the descent rather than increased, which means the aircraft’s wing was probably stalled. The ATR’s airfoil had exceeded its critical angle of attack and lacked sufficient lift to remain airborne. Add to this the rotation observed, and the only answer is a spin.
Can a Large Airplane Spin?
The simple answer is yes. If you induce rotation to almost any aircraft while the wing is stalled, it can spin, even an aircraft as large as the ATR-72. By the way, the largest of the ATR models, the 600, weighs nearly 51,000 pounds.
Of course, investigators will ask why the ATR’s wing was stalled. It could have been related to a failed engine or ice on the wings or tailplane. (more…)
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How the FAA Let Remote Tower Technology Slip Right Through Its Fingers
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In June 2023, the FAA published a 167-page document outlining the agency’s desire to replace dozens of 40-year-old airport control towers with new environmentally friendly brick-and-mortar structures. These towers are, of course, where hundreds of air traffic controllers ply their trade … ensuring the aircraft within their local airspace are safely separated from each other during landing and takeoff.
The FAA’s report was part of President Biden’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act enacted on November 15, 2021. That bill set aside a whopping $25 billion spread across five years to cover the cost of replacing those aging towers. The agency said it considered a number of alternatives about how to spend that $5 billion each year, rather than on brick and mortar buildings.
One alternative addressed only briefly before rejecting it was a relatively new concept called a Remote Tower, originally created by Saab in Europe in partnership with the Virginia-based VSATSLab Inc. The European technology giant has been successfully running Remote Towers in place of the traditional buildings in Europe for almost 10 years. One of Saab’s more well-known Remote Tower sites is at London City Airport. London also plans to create a virtual backup ATC facility at London Heathrow, the busiest airport in Europe.
A remote tower and its associated technology replace the traditional 60-70 foot glass domed control tower building you might see at your local airport, but it doesn’t eliminate any human air traffic controllers or their roles in keeping aircraft separated.
Max Trescott photo Inside a Remote Tower Operation
In place of a normal control tower building, the airport erects a small steel tower or even an 8-inch diameter pole perhaps 20-40 feet high, similar to a radio or cell phone tower. Dozens of high-definition cameras are attached to the new Remote Tower’s structure, each aimed at an arrival or departure path, as well as various ramps around the airport.
Using HD cameras, controllers can zoom in on any given point within the camera’s range, say an aircraft on final approach. The only way to accomplish that in a control tower today is if the controller picks up a pair of binoculars. The HD cameras also offer infrared capabilities to allow for better-than-human visuals, especially during bad weather or at night.
The next step in constructing a remote tower is locating the control room where the video feeds will terminate. Instead of the round glass room perched atop a standard control tower, imagine a semi-circular room located at ground level. Inside that room, the walls are lined with 14, 55-inch high-definition video screens hung next to each other with the wider portion of the screen running top to bottom.
After connecting the video feeds, the compression technology manages to consolidate 360 degrees of viewing area into a 220-degree spread across the video screens. That creates essentially the same view of the entire airport that a controller would normally see out the windows of the tower cab without the need to move their head more than 220 degrees. Another Remote Tower benefit is that each aircraft within visual range can be tagged with that aircraft’s tail number, just as it might if the controller were looking at a radar screen. (more…)
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Review: Eric Brown’s Wings on My Sleeve, the Life of Flying’s Forrest Gump
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Like many history-obsessed aviation geeks, I had a passing knowledge of Captain Eric “Winkle” Brown defined by the most common bullet points that most often summarized his life. He was (he passed in 2016 at age 97) a Royal Navy aviator and test pilot who the Guinness Book of World Records says has flown more different aircraft—487—than any other pilot. (He also logged an astounding 2,407 landings on aircraft carriers.) So, when I came across his book, Wings of My Sleeve, during a regular reconnoiters of Half-Price Books, I bought it.What captivated me was not the vast and diverse list of aircraft he’s flown, but from the people he’s met, flown with, and interrogated. Winkle is, without a doubt, the Forrest Gump of aviation. Born in Edenborough, Scotland, his father fought World War I with the Royal Flying Corps. A Royal High School student, Brown went to the 1936 Olympics with his father, who was invited to aviation events by the World War I pilots who made up the resurgent Luftwaffe. There he met Hanna Reitsch, a world-class glider pilot, and Ernst Udet, a top-scoring ace second only to the Red Baron, who took Brown flying in a Bücker Jungmann and put the two-seat biplane through its aerobatic paces.
In 1937 he entered Edenborough University in an honors course in modern languages, with German as his principal subject. He also joined the University Air Squadron and learned to fly. Visiting Berlin in 1938, he called on Udet, now a major general, who took Brown to see Hanna Reitsch fly the FW-61 helicopter at the International Automobile Exhibition inside the Deutschland Halle in Berlin. That evening, Reitsch some of his Luftwaffe friends celebrated the day at Udet’s apartment.
Recruited by the Foreign Office, he spend his penultimate year, 1939, in an exchange program that placed him for six months in France and another six months in Germany as a student teacher. “One of my favorite outings was to the popular city of Munich, and there I was staying in a small inn that fateful first weekend of September 1939.” That Sunday morning, he awoke to two SS officers at his door who informed Brown that their countries were at war. They knew everything about him, and after three days of interrogation, they abruptly drove him to the Swiss border and returned his MG and said he was free to go.
He drove straight to the recruiting station. With the RAF not yet realizing its need for pilots, Brown signed up with the Fleet Air Arm of the Royal Navy, which was hungry for pilots. Naturally, Brown had to learn how to fly all over again, the Navy way. Trained in fighters, this led him to test flying at Farnborough. And in 1944, he was one of a half dozen pilots who flew the Meteor. The only naval aviator, he was assessing the jet for carrier operations, and spent some time discussing this with Sir Frank Whittle, who designed and built the powerplant.In March 1945, Brown got a 20-minute demonstration flight in one of the four Sikorsky R-4B helicopters lent to Britain. He and a squadron mate went to pick up two of them days later. When Brown inquired about who was going to teach them to fly this intriguing new machine, the U.S. Army tech sergeant assembling the helos handed him a manual with an orange cover. That’s how he became a rotary-wing test pilot, and in April discussed the results of autorotation air flow patterns through the rotors with Igor Sikorsky, who’d invented the flying machine he was testing.
Reichsmarschall Herman Goring (left) and Udet, head of the technical office of the air ministry, observe aerial maneuvers by the new Luftwaffe on June 16, 1938. (Ullstein Bild via Getty Images) With World War II reaching its conclusion, Brown, because of his fluency in German and aviation knowledge, became the commanding officer of the Enemy Aircraft Flight at the Royal Aviation Establishment at Farnborough. Its mission was to find and secure essential aviation aircraft and personnel, including Werner von Braun, Willy Messerschmitt, Dr. Heinkel, Focke-Wulf designer Kurt Tank, Hanna Reitsch, and the Horton brothers (leading glider designers), before the Russians did. His team didn’t get everyone on its list, but shortly after the war ended, Brown interrogated Herman Goering and several other high ranking Luftwaffe officers.
Others he interacted with before and after the war ended included Jimmy Doolittle, Grand Admiral Karl Donitz, Winston Churchill, Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Phillip, and many other notable names. But I won’t spoil these stories for you because reading this 296-page book is worth the time because Brown’s stories about flying 487 different aircraft are equally absorbing.
If you enjoyed this story, why not SUBSCRIBE to JetWhine, if you haven’t already, and please share it with anyone who might find it interesting. — Scott Spangler, Editor
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Backcountry Destinations Getting GPS Recognition
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Aviation is not exempt from the aphorism that what goes around comes around. When humans first flew on powered wings, their fields of operation were unimproved, what military aviation now describes as austere. (While the people who selected this word might embody its first dictionary definition of “stern and cold in appearance or manner,” they went for the third, “markedly simple or unadorned.”)
As aviation progressed, so did its fields of operation and the technology that helped pilots safely to, from, and between them in ever less visibility. Like most things expensive, this technology trickled down from military and commercial aviation to general aviators. Embracing this new technology and the capabilities it provided, flying IFR with numeric precision was the holy grail starting about half a century ago.
But that technology, from VORs to Loran to GPS driving a digital autopilot with Autoland capabilities, seemingly has excised some of the challenges aviation posed to aviators drawn skyward by opportunities to acquire and test new skills and abilities. What goes around comes around, so these aviators looked back and rediscovered the stick-and-rudder skills that atrophied during the IFR era and challenged themselves at unimproved “austere” backcountry airstrips.
You can’t miss these adventurous folks. They fly airplanes with big tires. And you can see their eyes, which are always up and looking around, the first step in making what they see look safe by moving the stick (or yoke, but usually a stick), rudder, and throttle. In 2003, a band of these adventurous aviators established the Recreational Aviation Foundation as a nonprofit 501(c)3 to support, develop, and promote recreational flying to backcountry airports on public land.
Eschewing the IFR environment doesn’t mean these outward looking aviators discard all of the technology that makes flight within it possible. Only the foolhardy would consciously fly with GPS, even when their desired backcountry destinations were rarely, if at all, were included in the database. But that is about to change. On February 9, Avidyne, Jeppesen, and RAF announced the formation of a team dedicated to include in Jeppesen Nav Databases for aviation GPS systems the information for existing and new backcountry airstrips on public and private land.
The benefits of this are straightforward. “Adding more of those type of airstrips to the Jeppesen Nav databases of aviation GPS units makes it much easier for a larger number of private pilots across the country to gain access and enjoy the benefits and freedom of flying that we all cherish,” said Avidyne President Dan Schwinn. “Our goal is to promote back country flying and to encourage more pilots to join us in the adventure of flight,” said RAF Chairman John McKenna. “Avidyne actively supports the RAF and we really appreciate their efforts working with Jeppesen to enhance the NAV databases so these not-so-mainstream kinds of places can find their way onto the screens of modern avionics.”
But just because pilots will be able to find these backcountry destinations in their GPS database does not mean unprepared pilots can safely visit them. Unlike many of the airports in the destination database, there are no related instrument approaches for the autopilot to fly. In the backcountry, the pass/fail margin for short and soft-field flight operations are tighter than an FAA checkride by several orders of magnitude.In one regard, backcountry flying is the same as instrument flying. If you go there without the requisite training, proficiency, and planning, bad things will happen. If you think flying an ILS to minimums is “exciting,” consider a VFR approach to Idaho’s Soldier Bar (85U). The 1,650-by-15-foot dirt Runway 7/25 is on a mountain-side shoulder in Big Creek Canyon, 500 feet above the eponymous Big Creek.
Runway 25 has two bumps, one 450 feet from the approach end and another 905 feet from the approach end, just before the runway doglegs to the right. Having landed here once (as a passenger) the pilot emphasized precise speed control and the need to touch down after the first bump, to hitting it would not throw his de Havilland Beaver back into the air. Just to make things interesting, Runway 25 has a 4-degree slope to the right, toward Big Creek. The approach end of Runway 7 also slopes down 4 degrees, and given the dogleg and second bump, prudent pilots NEVER attempt an approach or landing on Runway 7. It should be no surprise that GO-AROUNDS ARE NOT RECOMMENDED.
As it is for every aspect of aviation, acquiring the necessary knowledge and skills are the essential keys to safety and survival. If curious about the backcountry destinations coming soon to your GPS database, a good place to start is the RAF’s Education & Safety page. While knowledge, training, and the accompanying pilot proficiency are crucial, you don’t necessarily need big tires. Everyday rollers will do at many backcountry destinations, although you may want to leave your (wheel) pants at home.
If you enjoyed this story, why not SUBSCRIBE to JetWhine, if you haven’t already, and please share it with anyone who might find it interesting. — Scott Spangler, Editor
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Pilot Transitions, Becoming Pluperfect
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As a word merchant focused on subjects aeronautical, people often ask if I am a pilot. Because a pilot certificate does not die (unless the holder surrenders or the FAA revokes it), my answer is always affirmative (pilot speak for you betcha!). Usually, the interrogation stops there because it is my turn to pose a question related to the word merchantly conversation I’m pursuing.But sometimes my interlocuters persist. What do I fly? Almost anything that is currently airworthy that I can get into and apply full control inputs without bruising some part of my impeding anatomy (it’s a short list). Before they ask the next question, I explain that I am not now current. To once again fly as pilot in command I would need a current medical certificate and flight review. Call it pilot present and past tense.
Until recently, present and past tense described my relationship to the verb “to fly.” But a recent diagnosis of Parkinson’s Disease has put the possibility of a medical certificate in the realm of not worth the time, tests, money, and bureaucratic calisthenics necessary for a one-year special issuance medical. Closing the door on once again becoming a current, present tense pilot, calls for a new adjective, former, as in “having been previously.”
Pondering this transition, I realized that past perfect is the verb tense that talks about an action that was completed before some point in the past. It is also known as the pluperfect tense. Phonetically, my neurological affliction became Poppa Delta, and before he arrived, just before Covid-19 showed up, I used to fly as pilot in command. Without the possibility of once again exercising those privileges, I am now a pluperfect pilot.
Oh! The conversational possibilities this transition offers. Because I have not surrendered and the FAA has not revoked my pilot certificate, my answer to the primary question remains the same. Only those who persist will learn about Poppa Delta, the pluperfect pilot. This could be fun!
Some may wonder if this transition is a depressing downer? Absolutely not! Never having had the opportunity to become a pilot would be worse by an exponential degree. Now is the time to appreciate all the rewards that becoming a pilot has given me. It is time to recall warmly all of the once-in-a-lifetime adventures with heartfelt gratitude. And while I will never again be a current PIC, as long as I keep getting out of bed in the morning, being a pilot continue its rewards.
If you enjoyed this story, why not SUBSCRIBE to JetWhine, if you haven’t already, and please share it with anyone who might find it interesting. — Scott Spangler, Editor
