The Pilot’s Collection

What controversy? 5 debates new pilots don’t understand

Pilots love a good debate. This may be the only thing that isn’t controversial in aviation. Enthusiasm for debates doesn’t necessarily make aviation unique; after all, sports fans are famous for their spirited arguments too. What is…

Why you should care about the new Part 23 proposal

There has been a lot of talk lately (perhaps too much?) about aviation issues in Washington: Air Traffic Control privatization, the third class medical, and user fees to name just three. Somewhat obscured by these Capitol Hill battles is a…

Surviving a mid-air

I’m writing this story four days prior to the one-year anniversary of my midair collision on December 27, 2014.

It had been a very VFR day and I was cleared for takeoff from Runway 31 at KLNS (Class D) in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, returning to my home base KDMW…

Stop the drone panic — pilots should take their own advice

For an industry that’s usually obsessed with “risk management,” aviation sure isn’t using much of it when it comes to drones. The constant drumbeat of stories about close encounters between airplanes and unmanned aerial systems…

Letter to myself as a young student pilot — lessons learned after 20 years of flying

I’m certainly not the world’s most experienced pilot and I’m not facing a terminal illness, so it may seem an odd time for reflections about the meaning of life and all that. But this…

10 tips for prospective businessmen (or businesswomen) pilots

Would you like to be a businessman pilot? Would you like to fly your own airplane for work and family travel? If so, you are like me from a few years ago. Since then I got my private, my instrument rating and my own Cessna…

Electric airplanes — is the tipping point upon us?

Just like a Chicago Cubs appearance in the World Series, predictions about the coming electric aircraft boom seem to pop up every year, only to be crushed by reality. A brief stroll around the internet shows that “The Year of the Electric…

The three keys to flying safely

This story has its roots in many conversations between my father, Leighton Collins, and his great friend Wolfgang Langewiesche. Both had been there and done that with the quite basic airplanes spawned by The Great Depression. Both flew 36 or 40 hp E-2 Cubs and/or Aeronca…

Is “hard IFR” a myth? 5 things to keep it from being that way

To begin, I never knew what people really meant when they talked about flying “hard” IFR. The implication is that there is also “easy” IFR but nobody seemed to know the exact difference between the two.