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| Today's Exclusive Feature: Mid-Air Facts and Figures | back to top |  | ||
AOPA'S
FLYING CLUBS INITIATIVE, WHERE IT'S GOING AOPA started on this project about one year ago, announced its intentions publicly at AOPA Summit last October, and is now setting out on an effort to grow the nationwide collection of 650 independent flying clubs into 1,000 networked aviation cooperatives. Like many large successful organizations that attempt to collect people -- and money -- to support a common cause, AOPA has found its critics regarding what it does and how it spends its money. But Adam Smith, who originally joined the cause as a consultant for the project and now serves as senior vice president of AOPA's Center to Advance the Pilot Community, is frank about his assessment of the association's flying clubs initiative. "If this isn't classic association work," says Smith, "I don't know what is." "We don't want to obscure our work with dollar signs," Smith said to AVweb this week. "AOPA isn't coming at this from a financial perspective." AOPA is well aware that successfully building a national network of grass-roots flight clubs wouldn't be bad for the organization and could present opportunity for growth. But done right -- by facilitating more affordable access to more aircraft for more people -- the effort could bring benefits to aviation as a whole that may be similarly undeniable. It's that mix of motivation and benefit that could make possible the idea of nearly doubling the number of flying clubs. And nearly doubling the number of flying clubs is only the short term goal. As Smith says, "There are 5,100 public-use airports in the country. Why wouldn't we want a flying club at each one?" There are, of course, some significant hurdles. Click here to read the full article. More... |
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| From the Pages of Aviation Safety Magazine | back to top | | ||
MID-AIR
COLLISIONS: THE MYTH AND THE MATH Few chapters in the great book of safe flying are as incomplete and misleading as guidance for avoiding mid-air collisions. In over 50 years of active flying, I have not yet seen any information accurately describing a workable method ensuring awareness and avoidance of mid-air collisions for the general aviation pilot. In fact, the FAA's well-meaning rules and guidance may be dysfunctional seeds of disaster, sown early in a pilot's flying career, later leading to a mid-air collision. It's actually a familiar story: Concepts based on intuitive assumptions — instead of empirical knowledge — so often become concrete and immutable. The pilot's ability to see and be seen is one of the most profound of all safety myths, and understanding why pilots are not always able to meet this obligation will help avoid complacency, motivating us all to compensate for deficiencies in the system. Let's get started. Click here to read the full article. More... |
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| AVweb Audio — Are You Listening? | back to top | | ||
PODCAST:
CIRRUS AIMS FOR THE FUTURE |
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| Names Behind the News | back to top | | ||
AVwebFlash is a twice-weekly summary of the latest news, articles, products, features, and events featured on AVweb, the world's premier independent aviation news resource. The AVwebFlash team is:
Have a product or service to advertise on AVweb? Your advertising can reach over 225,000 loyal AVwebFlash, AVwebBiz, and AVweb home page readers every week. Over 80% of our readers are active pilots and aircraft owners. That's why our advertisers grow with us, year after year. For ad rates and scheduling, click here or contact Tom Bliss, via e-mail or via telephone [(480) 525-7481]. Click here to send a letter to the editor. (Please let us know if your letter is not intended for publication.) Comments or questions about the news should be sent here. If you're having trouble reading this newsletter in its HTML-rich format (or if you'd prefer a lighter, simpler format for your phone or handheld device), there's also a text-only version of AVwebFlash. For complete instructions on making the switch, click here. Aviate. Navigate. Communicate. More... |
