IFR Magazine

We’re pleased to present to you IFR’s brand-new website. On the site, you’ll find more than a thousand articles, lessons and reenactments to keep...

In 2015, the FAA began looking to rationalize ILS approaches. In this context, rationalize means cut. The following year, the FAA developed a cost/benefit quantitative model and conducted an analysis at about 2900 airports with few or no RNAV SIDs or STARs. The finished product was a plan to decommission Cat I ILS approaches at some of these airports between 2020-2030. Before a decision was reached, the project was shelved in 2017.

Things are getting busy approaching Trenton, Tennessee, Gibson County (KTGC), even though its not that bad. But the skies are grey enough to make you squint as you enter the overcast. Youve also entered, as youll soon find out, the murky realm of the regs. A cold crust of rime clings to the aluminum and probably the antennas, so youre anxious to get into that toasty hangar at TGC. Worse, the suns going down and the gyros acting up. So any shortcuts (safe and legal, of course) would be great right about now.

During low index patterns, these frontal systems can be quite deep, even extending into southern California, producing cold-core lows and showery weather. This also tends to allow moisture to circumvent the Sierra Nevadas through the Mojave Desert into the Great Basin, causing snowstorms eastward into Utah. These deep storm systems are particularly favored during El Nio years (the pattern this winter is neither El Nio nor La Nia), but they can occur in any season and theyll definitely have impacts on your flying plans.

Ever wish you flew for a living? If so, think about keeping a smile on while straightening your tie as the client lambastes you that low IFR (whatever that is) didnt stop the last crew. Oh, and you stocked the treat basket with the wrong brand of bottled water. And its too warm. Consider yourself fired-but only after you get your hiney in the pilot seat and deliver them to their ski weekend in Jackson Hole.

Am I upset thinking the inspector unnecessarily picked nits? No. He was just extremely thorough and that's what I claim I want. I am a bit frustrated with the situation and that it wasn't caught before now, but the whole thought exercise has been enlightening, and a good test of my resolution to maintain my aircraft as thoroughly as possible.

Harbour Air flew a De Havilland Beaver on floats on pure electric power for the first time in early December as the first step in its program to fully electrify its fleet of historic seaplanes. The Vancouver-based airline serves dozens of communities off British Columbia's west coast and most of its flights are 30 minutes or less so the company believes new advances in battery technology will enable it to safely carry out the dozens of commercial passenger flights it operates every day. The December flight was a demonstration of the motor in a plane near its gross weight with batteries and lasted about 15 minutes. CEO Greg McDougall lifted the almost-70-year-old airframe off the Fraser River and later reported that it flew like a Beaver. He said newer, lighter batteries that are becoming available will allow room for passengers and cargo and the savings on maintenance and downtime will ultimately pay off.