Affordable Aviation

“This, too, shall pass…” said my neighbor, Bill Chernish, who flies for Southwest Airlines. His industry is unusually battered by the coronavirus pandemic. His calm and forward-looking view is refreshing amidst the fear seen, well… everywhere. For everyone around the globe, the word “coronavirus” or the clumsier “Covid-19” disease it causes, has been the major […]

Delay, postpone, or cancel — that seems to be the question organizers of events faced in the current pandemic scare. Some, like the Twelve Hours of Sebring endurance auto race (not the former Sebring Sport Aviation Expo) or the Sun ‘n Fun airshow, elected to postpone and announce alternative dates in 2020. Sebring quickly checked […]

Update: April 2020 — Faced with a difficult decision and under enormous pressure, Sun ‘n Fun organizers changed plans and have now rescheduled the event for April 13-18, 2021. Relax, folks. We’re not going anywhere fast. Across all industries, shows and events have been “falling like dominos,” as publisher Ben Sclair put it when I […]

That was several hours of my life I will never get back — booking airline, rental car, and a series of hotel rooms… and then cancelling all of them! Drat! Yet my frustration in scuttling travel plans to attend and work Aero Friedrichshafen is minor compared to the effort by the people running Aero and the […]

How does one LSA brand rise and stay above others? Many reasons can be introduced; all possibly valid. However, it doesn’t hurt when a brand has a distributor that itself rises above all the rest. In case you think I am torturing the “above all the rest” metaphor, well, you may not have met the […]

If you like airplane statistics and facts, this article may interest you. Some pilots don’t follow such things while others eat it up (you know who you are). For these readers, we have a new perspective that many may find intriguing. The comparisons below relate to the numbers of Single Engine Piston (SEP) general aviation […]

Update 2/17/20 — From a commenter whose handle is “Concerned Citizen” on Videoman Dave’s YouTube channel comes this update on Mike’s flight home:  “Mike left Copperstate Sunday morning and made three legs, stopping in Blythe, Bermuda Dunes, then Banning due to severe winds and rain. After a two-day layover with strong wind gusts, Mike made […]

Copperstate is proving to be as valuable for the collection of Video Pilot Reports as Midwest and DeLand. We are reporting from the new and improved show for the second year in a row, and it’s looking good for Copperstate to earn a new, regular slot on our show calendar. Some very positive developments were […]

One of the reasons why Videoman Dave and I attend smaller events is because we can do a particular kind of work while visiting: Video Pilot Reports. We’ve now done many dozens of these (among some 700 total videos on Light-Sport Aircraft, Sport Pilot kit aircraft, and ultralights). Interviewing developers, pilots, and enthusiasts about all […]

Copperstate is officially the show that starts off the new aviation year these days. The 47-year-old event — one of the longest lasting aviation events in the Western USA — was for many years held in October. More recently, Copperstate organizers linked up with the municipal airport in Buckeye, Arizona, the westernmost community in the […]