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I was taking a hiatus from flying when ADS-B started making headlines so I don't know all its history. However, over the last ten years or so, there has been a technology developing in amateur radio that is very similar.

A ham operator named Bob Bruninga (WB4APR) developed something he called the Amateur Packet Reporting System or APRS. This uses a wireless networking scheme (packet radio or AX.25) to broadcast position reports (static or dynamic derived by GPS) from ham operators. The transmissions could be received and plotted in real time or recorded for later analysis.

The next innovation occurred a couple years ago when the amateur radio satellite community and the APRS folks got together. APRS stations are now broadcasting on the uplink frequencies of a couple Low Earth Orbit (LEO) ham satellites which re-transmit the positions. This means that wide areas can be mapped and updated in real time.

The applications for aviation are obvious. A constellation of satellites could receive signals from cheap, low power devices that could get their data from the aircraft GPS or have a "blind" GPS receiver included. Position data could be received at ATC locations and overlaid onto the radar screen. This would actually provide better coverage than radar for participating aircraft because "dead spots" would be eliminated.

Here's another idea from ham radio that could be useful. In order to disseminate bulletins and other general knowledge information via packet satellites, hams developed something called the "PACSAT Broadcast Protocol". This is an error-correcting scheme that allows a passive receiver to copy a broadcast, know where data has been missed, and get the missing data when a broadcast is repeated. This brings the cost of the data link way down because no transmitter is required on the user's end. Again, application of this protocol to aviation could be very advantageous.

By the way, much of the pioneering work in developing the LEO concept of constellations of small, cheap satellites was done by hams. Now the commercial satellite industry that followed is trying to appropriate for its own purposes the frequencies used by amateur satellites. If that happens, where does the next innovation come from?

NASA's investigation found that the Mars lander thought it had landed when it was still 150 feet above the Mars surface, at which time it shutdown the braking rockets. The lander than fell, reaching a speed of about 50 MPH at impact, which lead to NASA's brilliant conclusion that it could not be classified as a landing because it was going too fast.

Your story failed to mention that there are TWO sources for these STC's and placards. Yes, you can get them from EAA, but STCs issued by Petersen Aviation also are compatible with 82UL on airplanes originally certified on 80/87 octane fuel. EAA is not the only source of STCs for auto fuel.

In addition to 87 octane STCs Petersen Aviation has STCs requiring 91 octane fuel in some higher compression engines such as the 0-235-L2C, 160hp 0-320's, and 180hp 0-360's. Airplanes equipped with those engines are NOT approved for 82UL.

STCs issued by Petersen Aviation allowing the use of 87 and 88 octane automotive gasoline in airplanes equipped with engines originally certified on 80/87 octane or lower are approved for 82UL.

I hope you can clarify this for your readers.

This URL will take you straight to the Service Bulletin: http://www.webworksltd.com/webpub/petersenaviation/sb.html

Thanks.

Just a minor correction: The FAA actually approved the use of 82UL on February 22, 1999, over a year ago. The approval was in the form of an official FAA letter to the EAA. However, it has taken this past year and a couple of meetings for the FAA to get a Safety Airworthiness Information Bulletin (SAIB) out and for the EAA and Peterson Aviation to get their Service Bulletins out. No big deal, but, as they say in newspaper business, I just wanted to "set the record straight."

When a person who is responsible for the daily controlling of air traffic makes statements (true statements) like one controller working a sector that was establish and certified to be worked (staffed) by two or more controllers, and that one controller has too many aircraft for just one controller to handle and handle safely, and on top of that there is a first level supervisor STANDING right behind the one controller and WATCHING all that is going on in the sector, it makes one wonder what kind of Air Traffic Control system we have in this country. Further, it says something about the quality (or lack thereof) of supervision/management within the system.

Sectors within each Air Traffic Control Center (ARTCC) are established or de-established based upon certain criteria, and based upon those criteria the staffing for that sector is established. Some sectors may require only one controller, while others may require two or three controllers. In today's Center environment, if the supervision/management of that Center allows sectors that are designed for two or more controllers to be staffed with only one controller and because of the volume of aircraft in that sector is such that the controller "goes down the tube" or has a system deviation or system error, the focus should not only be on what the controller did or did not do, but on WHY the supervisor/manager-in-charge for that shift allowed that staffing situation to occur. They (the managers) are just as responsible as is the controller. And the record of the SD or SE should reflect the fact that Supervisor "A" and or Manager-in-charge were not fulfilling their responsibilities regarding the staffing of the sector(s).

One thing is very hard for me to understand: Where does NATCA (the union that represents the controllers) stand on this subject? What are they doing about seeing that the sectors are staffed with the necessary controllers to work the traffic?

If the airline industry operated on the same mentality that the FAA's supervisors/managers operate with regarding staffing, can you picture this: an airline operates a flight from A to B, using a type of aircraft designed to be flown with three (3) persons in the cockpit, but for some reason there is only one (1). The pilot announces on the intercom: "Welcome aboard, we expect a smooth flight today ... however, there will be only one person in the cockpit for this flight ... enjoy your flight and thanks again for flying with Single Pilot Airlines." Can you imagine the reaction of the passengers???

In AVflash 6.13a you wrote:

That item contains a couple of errors. The first is that the Vickers 'Vimy' used during the first nonstop transatlantic flight was the first Vimy produced. It wasn't. The Vimy was developed as a medium bomber during the end of WWI. It's development outlasted the war - so it wasn't used in action -- and the type was had a rather short life in Royal Air Corps. service because aviation technology was advancing so quickly.

The second error is that the Vimy crewed by John Alcock and Arthur W. Brown was the first transatlantic flight. That honor goes to the Curtis NC-4 aircraft (one of a flight of NC 'planes that attempted the crossing) although the NC-4 made a stop in the Azores for refueling. Alcock and Brown's flight was the first nonstop crossing and it was quite an adventure! At one point, one of the men had to climb out onto the wing (while in flight, of course), insert his hand between the propeller (which was spinning because the engine was kept at cruise power) and the radiator (a space of only a few inches) and chip away ice developing in the throat of the carburetors!

Several of my acquaintances and I have had very favorable experiences with firms like T. L. Clowes in London or Switzerland's Winterthur. I have had 4 US registered planes insured offshore. I reside in Europe but one of my friends has his Australian Twin Commanche (which I had previously owned) insured by the above mentioned London broker.

I have generally found European insurance rates very competitive with American companies. Also they seem to be much more flexible, liberal and much less likely to try to find loopholes to avoid having to pay out claims. As an illustration of the authoritative attitude insurers take, a few years back an American company dictated to me the route I had to take to ferry a plane from the US to Europe.

I'm a reader and member of AVweb since I don't remember when, but I have never been so indignant in my whole life as when I read the following item from AVflash 6.13a:

I'm a Colombian commercial pilot, and I want to make some points very clear to you and if possible the rest of people who read your flashes.

Although we are producing a great deal of drugs, (because that's what I think you meant in your very ironic comment), North America and Europe are the biggest consumers of the drugs we produce. So I wonder who's to blame.

The way you think about the problem is the same as the following example: You take a gun and kill someone -- you're not to blame, just blame the company who produced the weapon, right?

Second, for the last 20 years, my country has fought narcoterrorisim, with more than a 70% of the IBP for you (Internal Brut Product) -- that's 70% of the nation's production. And to go beyond the mere value of money, more than 100.000 people had died for the stupid cause of stopping the flow of drugs to your country.

Just think about it. Here we are doing a great deal of sacrifice. There are homeless families that were taken by force from their homes for a internal war that is being fought for an external cause. Orphans of killed people who fought for justice in my country.

And one thing to add: You always think of Colombia as the leader in cocaine production, but did you knew, that the USA is the biggest producer of marijuana, the biggest producer of the chemicals needed for the production of cocaine, and that the companies that produce those chemicals just don't want to know anything about who they are selling their products to? Think about it -- is that just "politically correct" as you say in your country?

Your country has an enormous debt with the people of mine -- not a debt of money, but a moral debt -- but that is never said in the news.

I hope that next time you are more careful of what you write in your flashes, which by the way are very good, and entertaining. Please understand the way I feel. Imagine if you were to go to any country and be treated like garbage -- that hurts in your most patriotic sense.

I am speaking of the constellation of 66 Iridium satellites currently in orbit at 780 km which, if not funded and used for their initial purpose, have been threatened with de-orbiting in the name of keeping LEO clear of un-wanted space debris. I realize that the orbit altitude is different from that of the GPS satellites, and that the Iridium birds lack the atomic clock carried on the Block II.

If the transponders are of a compatible frequency range with the GPS system, couldn't the on-orbit Iridium satellites be re-configured to provide a supplemental navigation fix? I realize this may be a naive question, but on the other hand, maybe it is just something no one put together yet.

Thanks for the great and informative news that you at AVweb provide.

AVflash 6.12a reported:

Cheers and ha ha.

I got a little concerned about the "technical difficulty" in question. After questioning various individuals on staff at Cargair, it turns out that apparently, a connecting rod "blew up" and went through the oil pan. If indeed that is what happened, it seems that "technical difficulties" was un understatement!

My questions to you are: How frequent do you hear about such dramatic engine failure? If such failures are not a rare event, can they be prevented, and how? If one is considering the purchase of a used 150 or 172, should this be a source of concerns?

Thank you for your help and keep up the good work.

I thought I'd fill you in because your article does not have the facts straight and while it may seem minor, you guys bash the news media when they don't report accurate information related to Aviation.

What can we do to put pressure on the insurance industry to rectify this? Should we try and call a boycott of the insurance industry, and everyone cancel their coverage on say the same day, or can we get everyone to send letters to their representatives and insurance carriers and complain?

During my last visit to the U.K., I took the opportunity to go to Shoreham Airport (EGKA) near Brighton on the South East Coast of England. It is a very nice airfield -- in fact "England's oldest Aerodrome" -- and I picked on the largest flying schools on the field to do a check out and rent. Southern Air has a large fleet of Warriors and a few C-152s. I did a checkout on a PA28-161, G-BPDU, in very good condition and IFR-equipped (2 VORs, ADF, DME). The checkout included local area familiarization, stalls, forced landing practice and touch-and-go's including a flapless landing and all completed in 0.9 hour. Thus far, nothing special, but wait....

When I got the bill: Dual flight time was £100 ($160), each touch and go £5.96 ($10), the full stop landing £10.22 ($16.50) and value added tax £22.20 ($36) ... total: £150.40 or $240.

Is anyone in the flying community surprised that there are dozens of incidents of "air rage" each year, and a few major ones?

Few people outside the aviation world know about hypoxia, and that it already impairs you before you start drinking alcohol. Add a couple of alcoholic drinks to people who are used to being at sea level, or near, and of course you're going to have some with exaggerated side effects of drunkenness/hypoxia.

AIM 8-1-1 d1 says, "Alcohol also renders a pilot much more susceptible to disorientation and hypoxia."

AIM 8-1-2 a4 says "The altitude at which significant effects of hypoxia occur can be lowered by a number of factors. ...Small amounts of alcohol and low doses of certain drugs, ... render the brain much more susceptible to hypoxia." and a2 contains some of the effects: "... judgment, memory, alertness, coordination and ability to make calculations are impaired, and headache, drowsiness, dizziness and either a sense of well-being (euphoria) or belligerence occur."

Why won't the FAA limit, or eliminate, alcohol on flights? Are they afraid of the alcohol lobby, the reaction of the major airlines, and "alcoholic" America? Why won't major airlines limit, or eliminate, drinking on flights? Because they will lose an extra source of income? What will it take? A couple of hypoxia-enhanced drunks causing a serious problem landing the plane?

In fact, our government supports Airbus too! Congressional legislation for the EAS (Essential Airline Service) provisions within DOT funding offers ticket subsidies and loan guarantees for airlines to buy jets with less than 70 seats to serve smaller, outlying airports. Guess what? Nobody in the U.S. makes small commuter jets. They're made by Embraer, Bombardier and other foreign companies. Guess what again? Airbus has a financial interest in these companies. Jets like the 737, 717 and MD-80 series could serve such airports easily but the arbitrary seating limit cuts American airplanes out of the running.

With "help" like this from our government, the U.S. commercial airplane industry battles on a very uneven playing field, facing enormous developmental costs alone, denied competitive access to the markets. One can only hope that the climate will change before we lose our position completely.

Just a short note to register my complaint about use of the term "taildragger" when the term "tailwheeler" is the more correct one. Both the Decathlon and the Pawnee are equipped with tailwheels and neither has a tail skid. Okay, so I am getting old and crotchety.

Your "report" from ENGM includes a number of factual errors and speculations regarding the event itself and the possible cause of the air proximity situation.

According to preliminary statements from the Norwegian equivalent to the NTSB, Aviation Section, which is investigating the case, communication problems (double transmissions and blocked frequency, Tenerife, sic!) prevented the controller, who identified the problem and took action, from reaching the aircraft taking off with appropriate instructions. The main question as far as I see it remains: why did the landing aircraft make a 180-turn on a busy runway, apparently not being under any such instructions from the controller and well aware of the fact that the runway was being used for both takeoffs and landings, one aircraft in the takeoff position and one on final approach? The controller in question, incidentally, is one of the most experienced ones currently working in the tower at ENGM.

On January 22, 2000, I flew from JFK to Pakistan. I am disabled -- I have a right leg amputation, and use a wheelchair. Well, on the trip to Pak, they boarded me on the plane with an on-board wheelchair. This chair is supposed to remain on the plane to get those who can not walk to and from the restroom.

Our return flight was February 8th. This trip was a disaster. First they boarded me on the on-board chair, and had me seated all the way at the back of the plane. Before taking off, I told my husband to please make sure the chair was on the plane. They assured us that there was no problem. Later, after flying a few hours, I needed to go to the restroom. My husband went to get the chair, and the attendants told him that they did not have one!!!

Now what was I supposed to do? The bathroom was along way down the aisle. The flight attendant very blatantly said "you will have to walk." Mind you, I only have one leg. I really had to go by this time, and my husband assisted me trying to hop down the aisle, while, every passenger in sight was staring at me like I was some freak. I was so humiliated.

On the way back to our seats, there was a lot of turbulence and I lost balance and hit my knee on an armrest. I managed to make it back to my seat and we again requested to be seated closer to the restroom, to no avail.

Our next stop was in Ireland, and we were told they would get a chair there. Well, when we landed, all the other passengers were able to get off the plane and relax, but I had to stay on and see if they were going to get me a chair so I could at least go to the restroom. Then, some man boarded the plane and told us that he had been working for the airline for over 15 years, and he had never heard of an on-board wheelchair. We explained to him that I boarded this plane on one, that we were assured that it would remain on board. He just very nonchalantly said that he could not give me what they do not have.

By this time, I was in tears, because I needed to go to the restroom, and I was very embarrassed about the whole situation. I felt they did not care at all. Then the flight attendant came over to say that it was only 7 more hours until we would reach New York.

Before we landed at JFK, my husband went to make sure that they called JFK so they could have a straight-back chair ready to get me off the plane. Again they assured us that they'd called and everything was okay. Of course, we landed at JFK at 9:59 a.m., and by 11:30 a.m., I was still sitting on the plane because know one called in for a straight-back chair. Now I am really humiliated. This plane was to go on to Canada, and the passengers were getting restless -- they wanted to know what was the hold up. (I was the hold up)

Finally, a transporter came from JFK, and she told me "you are going to have to walk off this plane because it has to leave." My husband tried to show her that I had only one leg. I am so hurt and embarrassed that I can not even speak. Finally, someone came with a straight-back chair. They rushed me onto the chair. No one tied me down, and they almost dumped me out of this chair three times. They were screaming throughout the whole plane for help. Now I am really humiliated. Finally when they got me off the plane, no one came to apologize for the inconvenience or anything. They were to busy blaming one another, the airline said they had no business seating us so far in the back, and JFK says they never followed procedure.

I have done some research on disability law, and they broke every law there is. Besides, their negligence led to me having to see an orthopedic surgeon for my knee.

I want this company to know, that I paid a full fare ticket same as everyone else, and I deserved to be treated just as they treated the other passengers.

I know that aviation law requires an airline to carry an on-board wheelchair. When those other passengers were allowed to walk off that plane in Ireland, they denied me that right. I think this company needs to be taught a lesson on how to treat disabled passengers.

I need to know what my rights are. Do I have a case, and who should I go about fighting them?

Re Mike Busch's idea of respiration training for pilots: Numerous articles about this exist in martial arts circles. Slowing your respiration rate, breathing into you stomach and not raising your chest as you inhale have been used to decrease fatigue both in physical combat and even at rest. You might ask a martial arts instructor about it.

Kaufman & Broad, a major developer, is trying to convince the County to build the Moss Beach Highlands Development -- 55 ocean-view market-rate homes on a 12-acre site on the northeast corner bordering the airport property. Two of the twelve acres are designated "low-cost senior apartments" and the other 10 acres is supposed to be the payoff to the developer for building the low-cost senior apartments. Its a sweetheart deal that the County wants in order to get low-cost housing credits.

Never mind that the seniors will be in the flight path!

It seems that San Mateo County is one of the few Counties in the State of California that does not have their General Plan updated to include the 1993 State mandate to keep the density of housing way down in airport encroachment situations -- for safety and noise control.

The Kaufman & Broad project includes moving 101,000 cubic yards of dirt in the sloping hillside in the flight path of the airport. The Environmental Impact Report does not address HAF or the flight path. In fact, the County Planner is trying to get this project approved just one day before the City/County Association of Governments of San Mateo meets to work on the County's Airport Land Use Commission and adopting the current State regs -- thus trying to "grandfather" in the project before any one from the Aviation Community can object to it.

Life is not easy in San Mateo County if you're an aviator.

There is a group of activists out there called the "U.S. Citizens Aviation Watch" whose sole purpose in existing appears to be the ultimate demise of aviation as we know it.

Everything from aircraft to airports would be verboten, or severely restricted. I've been doing a little quiet research, and these people are well connected, politically active, well financed, and totally nuts.

Check out their web-page at: http://www.us-caw.org/. You won't take flying for granted anymore after you read their propaganda and agenda.

In AVflash 6.11b, you wrote:

Proper response by security, keep anything worse happening than this unknown party being on the ramp.

Yup, once you have them don't let them go. Half the required credentials isn't good enough. If the guy was a terrorist his pals would be running away instead of hanging around and causing ??? (bad things).

Too bad, let him take the fine out of his own paycheck. It seems clear he had no authorized purpose in this area. He may be "just visiting" but his presence is just one more person for the security system to process. What if while he has security tied up a real bad guy does something to another AC on the other end of the ramp? Then the guy is guilty of aiding the other party...

What did the airline expect? Without knowing the details of the contract or the M.O. of the "Security Company", I would say that the actions of the flight crew were commendable, as they had no way of knowing that they were not involved in a "drill". Also, I see that this story and the one about the low pay of the "security" staff at airports dovetail nicely.

It was good to read that "...some immunity..." is to be given to those involved in runway incursions. I presume it will be in the style of the NASA Aviation Safety Reporting Program. All safety issues should be covered by such immunity. Anything less discourages people from participating, and safety is somehow compromised. We learn from our mistakes, and the mistakes must be studied in detail. The threat of criminal sanction, in the form of certificate actions, is counterproductive.

Does this mean that somebody in the FAA has admitted that the criminal sanction (certificate action) may often be the wrong approach? I hope so. The threat of criminal sanction can only go so far in achieving results. When it comes to incidents that are close calls but no harm is done, the criminal sanction will actually stifle any discovery of the truth of what happened.

I recently took a trip from Portland OR. to Philadelphia on TWA.This was my first ride on TWA for a long,long time. I usually fly Delta, NW/KLM to Europe,United,Alaska and Horizon if "having" to go commercially and this is usually several times a year. (Course I'd rather take my trusty Bonanza.} After getting to altitude I fired up my Garmin GPS III Pilot for a little practice and fun.(to see how well those big bus drivers fly their route) and immediately got told by a rather testy male attendant to turn it off.

I've used GPS's for years on part 121 rides without ever as much as a squeak from anybody even on Continental trips. On the first leg (out of 4) the Captain strolled by and after I asked him said that he had no problem with me using it, so I thought that the flight attendant was just misinformed. On the second leg the same thing happened again, but with a much more pleasant attendant, who than dragged out "their" (TWA's) Part 121.306 that specifically specified GPS as a disallowed item. FAR 91.21 and 121.306 specify nothing like this. However this is up to the operator(TWA) or to the Captain. Next month I'm going to Florida but no more TWA for me!

NASA's Space Shuttle Independent Assessment Team (SIAT) recently posted the results of their investigation into the numerous NFF and age related wiring problems on the shuttles. The report is available on-line at http://www.hq.nasa.gov/osf/siat.pdf.

The report, critical of NASA's management practices, outlines in great detail how those practices have lead to a general decay in reliability to the world's space icons. Maybe the airlines and other repair and service organizations ought to take notice because the reports many cited problem exists at the FAA, NTSB and the airlines also.

As a member of the ATC rank and file, I take issue with the depiction that the lack of supervisors is a cause of the rising number of incidents... Over the period you have cited, the FAA has also changed the manner in which such incidents are reported... There has also been a documented increase in the volume of air traffic...

It is very easy for the managers to manipulate the numbers when they determine the criteria under which these sorts of things are documented and reported...

Report both sides of the story... I suggest you contact the National Air Traffic Controllers Association for more information (www.natca.org)... From a journalistic standpoint, telling half the story assures your bias is clear...

Boeing has dispensed with that idea, stating lack of market demand. Their are a number of major obstacle to developing such an airliner. Boeing bet the existence of the company itself in the airline growth era of the sixties to develop the 747. Also, the worlds major airport runways are certified to 1 million pounds. The 747-400 max takeoff weight is 875,000lbs. That leaves little room for a larger airliner without huge costs incurred all over the world.

The current 747-400 can carry 524 passengers. Boeing stated that it continues to analyze the market for the possibility of a larger 747. Hope this has been helpful,

The CIC program only cuts Sups to a 1-to-10 controller ratio. How many Sups does it take to manage 10 controllers?

The FMA says reducing Sups will "threaten the efficiency and safety of aviation." This is just total malarkey. It is the controller alone who manages the efficiency and safety of the air traffic system. Ask yourself this: If I am in a jam at a sector where a Sup does not maintain currency and knows very little (if nothing) about it, what kind of help are they going to provide me? They may pick up the phone and page someone back. This takes time and may be too late. A fully-certified CIC who works all positions can provide what I need to get through this jam immediately.

I could go on but I think you get the gist of this. Let's move forward.

First was the AIM SAS-696D CO detector recommended by Mike Busch in his review in AVweb. This detector reported high levels of CO when I pulled the cabin heat on in my 182. A bit of experimenting confirmed the connection. My mechanic pulled the cowling and sure enough the muffler had developed a crack. I've got a new muffler, and much cleaner air thanks to the AIM detector. How could anybody ride around with some slow color-changing "mood dot" pasted to the instrument panel when you can get an accurate instrument like the aim detector at such a reasonable price? I appreciate the alert by AVweb on the issue.

The second addition is a factory-refurbished R20K LightSPEED headset. I've been flying with David Clark passives, but the LightSPEED is light years ahead. The 20K came in while my plane was waiting for its new muffler, so the new headset had to undergo a rigorous ground test of canceling our dryer's deep frequencies, followed by canceling an admirable portion of a Metallica CD. The headset was amazing on these non-scientific trials, so, with confidence, I tried the set out on the first flight in the clean air 182. The result? An astounding difference, all to the positive compared to my passive sets. If you fly a small plane and you haven't tried this technology, you should. I appreciate the great bargain I got on the refurbished headset via the LightSPEED special that I learned about through AVweb.

I was disappointed with your claim about how math and science skills are crucial. I was further disappointed by your promotion of careers aerospace and engineering.

Do you not realize the reason the upper management at Boeing (and companies like Boeing) makes so much in bonuses? For example the $20 million Mr. Stonecipher was given when Boeing bought out McDonnell Douglas. Do you not realize his bonus (which is more than I will earn in 15 life-times of engineer jobs at Boeing) was at the expense of poorly paid engineers at the company he works at?

Do you not realize the reason stock prices are so high is that someone has to make such a valuable item and not be paid for his/her value?

I have struggled, sacrificed and worked for more than 20 years with a medical disability to achieve a job as a technical engineer and my compensation with my years of experience and education (graduate degree) is 33% below the market value. Boeing calls this compensation competitive.

If I were smarter, I would have chosen a profession in finance (i.e., stock broker). The real measure of a job's value is the compensation and authority a society gives to that profession. My engineering profession has no clout in government, draws low pay for what the investment and sacrifice is and is becoming a career that will have no viable means for retirement.

I see the U.S. Government believes I am rich. They see my income as of such a high number that I can afford to support other people who are irresponsible (those who have several children and cry for more entitlement programs) and believe I should support them. I have had to sacrifice not having a family because I cannot afford a family. I cannot buy an average price home within a reasonable distance from my job with my income. I can afford a house about 100 miles away or I can live in a gang-infested neighborhood. But if I want the adverse health from the long, daily commute or the probable occurrence of robbery and bodily harm of dangerous, local neighborhoods, I guess I could compromise my life for such housing.

I would prefer you not to advertise my industry as a good choice for young people. It is not right to create a false impression with statements like, "to get a good job, you need a good education." I see too many examples of highly paid people who make mistakes without consequences while well-educated, hard-working people like myself do the work without the commensurate pay and carry the burden of the "haves."

Rather, instead of being so thoughtless and simple-minded in your article, teach your audience something. Teach the young about our country's real value system. Teach them about how businesses are responsible. Teach kids that managers make technical and financial disasters and they do not have the criminal, cradle-to-grave liability of an engineer. Teach kids that the majority of the population could care less about what it takes to have a stable, healthy environment and sustainable, decent standard of living. To have those things we need to have changes to things most people feel violate their inalienable write to have kids and trash the earth while others have to be their caretakers and garbage collectors.

I have seen what has happened to the financial scene. Do not begin to thing you can describe how great our lives are today. I know were I was as a child and what my parents generation had compared to what I have now. By the time my parents were my age, I was a teenager. The house we had then would require me earning seven times what I do now. That is insane. The buying power of my discretionary income is less than 1/100 of the executives of the company I work for.

I am paying an increase in my taxes of 15% this past year without any increase in my income. I pay the government money to support people that have lost all because of layoffs by highly-paid executives at large companies. This practice is unconscionable.

Why do you want to perpetuate this inhumane treatment of people? Are you just blind or is it because you could care less about other people.

You might find that Boeing has told NASA that they (Boeing) will replace the missing articles at company expense, with no additional charge to taxpayers.

My experience has been that a significant percentage of those transported by helicopter from the scene of accidents do not get additional benefit from that higher cost and higher risk form of transport, over that offered by conventional ALS ambulance. True, there are some significant injuries where time is critical and that patient will benefit from arriving at the treating hospital as soon as possible, and there are parts of the country where air transport is several magnitudes faster than ground transport, and these situations clearly justify the use of a medevac chopper, but these are not the majority of the airlift patients that I have observed.

As a department chairman at the hospital, some of these medevac patients charts eventually passed through my hands as part of the internal medical staff review of the care rendered. In having the completed chart in my hand I was often struck by the fact that the charted condition of the patient upon arrival in the emergency room did not support the need to use a medevac chopper for the initial transport to the hospital, over a few minutes longer by ground transport (in my view).

Likewise, I see transfer of some patients from the local hospitals to the university hospitals a hundred miles to the south utilizing the helicopter, that raises questions in my mind as to the appropriateness of the cost of that mode of transport for that patient.

Before some hair-triggered soul accuses me of being a Luddite and wanting to end medevac programs, I hasten to assure you that is not true. What we do need to do as a society is a calm, rational review of the choice of medical problems to be transported by helicopter, and the weather conditions under which a given level of medical problem may be transported by helicopter, and set some firm guidelines.

It appears to me that the decision to air transport is driven by multiple factors. The need of the operators of the chopper to have it producing revenue is a major factor, the prestige factor in the eyes of the the local rescue crew in calling in the medevac, the emotions of the family of the ill or injured party in wanting near instantaneous treatment, and major over estimation of the time savings (at least in the Midwest part of this country).

As a coroner I have seen injured patients held at an accident site in an ambulance awaiting the arrival of the medevac chopper. When I later sat down and did the math, had the ambulance crew begun ground transport at the time the patient was loaded into the ambulance the arrival time at the hospital would have been the same as what it took to wait for the chopper to be summoned, the chopper to fly to the accident site, the time to reload the patient from the ambulance to the chopper and for the ambulance monitoring equipment on the patient to be removed and replaced by the medevac equipment, then fly back to the hospital. Remember, 120 knots both ways is only 60 knots from the accident site to the hospital.

The most recent crash of a medevac chopper, carrying an infant transferred from an ambulance, is is both a true tragedy for all involved, and another wakeup call for the rest of us to look at and carefully define what situations justify the need for a chopper transport. Increasingly, emergency rooms are using a triage scoring system on acutely ill or injured patients to determine what treatment level is logical and justified. I will not discuss the intricacies of those scoring systems here. I do propose that a national scoring system be created for use prior to all chopper medevac flights that will be used to dispassionately judge whether the proposed flight should be undertaken.

I am not in any way trying to pre-judge the cause of this accident BUT as a CFI doing training, I always emphasize a CLEAR ON THE LEFT/CLEAR ON THE RIGHT before entering the active. With a student or another pilot, we do this OUT LOUD and check each other. When by myself, I also do it OUT LOUD. This applies at controlled and uncontrolled fields.

While the NTSB might take a year (or more) to publish their findings, I seriously hope the message of checking before entering the active is sent home to every pilot.

Does the ReliefBand work? Here's my story.

My wife is (was) a motion sickness person looking for a place to happen. She got sick riding around the block if she was on the passenger side of the family car. Poor thing was absolutely miserable on long trips and to fly with me in a small airplane was a no-brainer!

We wanted to take a cruise this winter, but both of us knew what would happen. A friend of mine told me about the ReliefBand and I read about it in AVweb. We booked the cruise and I ordered the ReliefBand with replaceable batteries.

The commercial flight down to Florida was the beginning of a wonderful relationship with the ReliefBand. No motion sickness! The second day at sea we ran into some bad weather, the seas got rough and the ship naturally pitched and rolled with the flow. Everybody on board went to their cabin including some of the crew. Not my little wife! She was having a great time in the ship's casino! Anyway, the cruise turned out to be great fun and she never got sick.

The big news for me came when I ask her if she wanted to fly with me to see her sister in Virginia. It's a four-and-half-hour flight over the Appalachian Mountains. She decided to give it go and we took off early on Friday morning. The flight was wonderful and when her sister picked us up at the airport my little woman was beaming.

Coming home was a different story. The weather was good, but we had strong headwinds, and turbulence over the mountains was reported light to moderate. It turned out to be more than moderate and we got tossed about quite a bit. I was pretty busy flying the airplane and I just knew she was turning green. Not so! She hung in there like a trooper. We landed at Beckley West Virginia for fuel after two and half hours, and to my great surprise she was hungry and wanted a sandwich!

The ReliefBand works, and it changed our outlook on travel! Now, motion sickness is not an issue!

In the most recent issue of AVweb News, you state that GA is to grow 0.9% yearly ... BUT WHAT PART OF GA? Judging by the money being spent on the corporate jet fleet combined with the increase in regional air carrier operations, means that the single-engine aircraft owner is going to find him/herself being restricted.

Back in the heydays of the 60 and 70's, I used to fly my Bellanca or Bonanza into Washington National, or Toronto International, and there was no landing fee and no slot position needed. Now to fly into Toronto, for example, I am required to pay a hefty landing fee (depending on the time of day,) and I'd have to have a slot position which is almost impossible to obtain. If airline passenger travel is going to continue to increase then it means bad news for the little guy.

When I read stories here on AVweb about the incredible lengths the FAA has gone to persecuting innocent people or even the zeal with which they will prosecute an unintentional violation, I am utterly stunned to read that for the last four years Atlantic City has deliberately and maliciously thumbed their noses at the FAA and the FAA has done nothing.

FAA lawyers: If you really want to show people how tough and smart you are or if you really want to set some legal precedents, why don't you enforce your written contracts with malicious offenders like Atlantic City instead of wasting huge sums of tax payer money chasing after small fries who are trying to do some good in aviation like Bill Bainbridge? It would seem to me that in an environment with limited resources (which the FAA always whines about every time they try to resurrect user fees) that you should prioritize offences based on their seriousness. Yet here is a case involving YEARS of deliberate defiance involving MILLIONS of dollars and you have ignored it.

In light of the above, you FAA lawyers sure do give every appearance of being sniveling little cowards who are afraid to take on someone who might have the resources to fight back but you won't hesitate to bring the full weight of a federal agency down on the head of a private citizen who has done no wrong.

Contract controllers can go on strike.

Foreign governments can control the air traffic system, including the Oceanic sectors. Do you think a foreign corporation will have the best interests of the U.S. taxpayers in mind?

It typically takes one year for a FAA controller, with experience, to become certified in a new tower. Contract controllers will be given 60 days to be certified or lose their jobs. Contract managers are threatened with THEIR jobs if the controllers are not checked out in time - a strong incentive to certify them even if they aren't capable of handling the duties.

The different companies do not have to have follow the same operating procedures. Flying from one area of control to another could involve various procedures and become extremely confusing.

Contractors don't follow the same rules as the FAA. A controller can be left alone for his entire shift without breaks. These are past experiences with the contracting of the level one towers, not just unwarranted fears.

I look forward to reading your bi-weekly installments of AVflash. I am troubled, however, as the latest issue refers to the striking Boeing engineers as "the nerds."

Just read your "Short Final" item:

As I recall my tour of Meteor Crater it was a 90-ton meteorite the size of a large car that hit 25,000 years ago. The 300,000 tons quoted would be 3,000 times larger and likely would like have killed most life on earth. Perhaps the pilot was thinking of the meteorite 65 million years ago that killed the dinosaurs.

In light of that subject, and considering human nature, I would like to mention that Windows users have had long filenames available to them for many years now, yet every IT professional I see (I am one myself) not only uses abbreviated filenames, they actually spend time just before the save thinking about how to turn their file description into some unrecognizable cluster of four or five letters!!!!

Perhaps this parallel between teletypes and computers says something about patterned behavior. What's next? NOTAMs that look like METARs?

The media is at it again. AP reporters interviewing passengers from the Southwest flight that skidded off the runway at Burbank report that passengers said the plane was "going too fast." Really, how do they know? When I take passengers up in a 172 they think I'm going to fast at 65 knots when we are landing.

This is another example of the media reaching for a story where they may not be one. Meanwhile, the public will start to believe that the plane was going too fast on touchdown. 99% of the flying public have no idea how fast a B737 actually touches down at.

I never thought I'd be writing AVweb to praise a product, but here it comes:

I've been reading all Mike Busch's glowing endorsements about the LightSPEED headsets for months now and, quite frankly, I thought he was just hyping an advertiser's products.

I'd been looking for a forth headset for my Skylane (I have three sets of passive David Clarks, which I love), so when LightSPEED came out with the deal on refurbished, trade-in R20Ks a month or so ago, I bit on one. It arrived yesterday, and I have since put about five hours on it.

I am completely amazed and impressed by this product. The degree of noise reduction that occurs when you push the magic button is beyond belief! But the most incredible part is that you can actually hear the engine. It's almost like putting a long screwdriver on a car motor and listening to the internal parts -- the engine now sounds like the fine piece of machinery it is. And, I believe that if anything bad ever happened to it internally, I'd have a pretty good chance of hearing it early on.

My only regret is that I didn't order four of them.

John F. Navratil recently said [AVmail, 24 Feb 2000] that there have been several "comments from the GA community suggesting that privatization of the ATC system will inevitably lead to a disaster of Canadian proportions."

NAV CANADA has improved the safety of an already safe system with a reduction of 18% in operating irregularities in 1998, as measured by the Transportation Safety Board. Our customers are paying $255 million less than would have been collected from airline passengers under the old Air Transportation Tax, which has been abolished. We are now operating more efficiently, having substantially reduced overhead and administrative costs.

In addition, we have been able to conclude collective agreements with our employees that offer above average salary increases. The average air traffic controller has an annual salary of $85,000, up from $64,000. And the company has invested close to half a billion in new technologies and facilities that have moved us to the forefront of the industry.

NAV CANADA receives 10% of its revenues from general and business aviation, while spending 30% of its budget providing those services. This demonstrates our strong commitment to general and business aviation.

As the first private air navigation services company in the world, NAV CANADA is proud of its accomplishments.

I am 53, in good health, fly a C-182 for business and pleasure (about 300 hours per year) a lot of which is IFR and night work here in the Northeast. I have used contact lenses for 30 years, currently disposables that work very well. I am nearsighted, my contact prescription is 5.50, I have a slight astigmatism.

My main concern is night halos. Night vision over 50 years old is tough enough without adding any further complication.

I just received my AIM Safety SAS-696D CO Detector that Mike Busch recommended in AVweb and was reading the Owner's Manual regarding installation instructions. On page four of the manual ("B. WHERE NOT TO INSTALL YOUR DETECTOR") it reads "This detector is not suitable for use in commercial or industrial settings, recreational vehicles, boats or AIRPLANES." (My caps.) I did not recall you mentioning that the manufacturer did NOT recommend this product for aircraft use.

As an engineer, I find this very disturbing that AVweb would not mention this manufacturer's recommendation in your article. The manufacturer must have had a reason for including aircraft in the "not suitable" category. Yes, perhaps it was just their lawyers that recommended that they did not want to open themselves for aircraft related lawsuits OR could it be that they had done testing and found that the CO Detector was truly not suitable in aircraft?

Did you read the AIM Owners Manual and see this recommendation?

What good does rest do after the fact? You need rest prior to working an extra long day as well as after working one.

This is an old Part 135 carryover that the charter and fractional operators want to keep in order to avoid hiring more crews and respecting the concept that "standby" should be counted as "on duty."

Whoever came up with the idea that 14 hours on duty is an acceptable standard day? Anything over 10 hours on duty, up to 12 hours, should require a 12-hour rest period before, and after, the over-10 hour duty period. No duty more than 12 hours should be permitted, period.

This is a common misperception. The original aircraft was the famous model 367-80, or "Dash 80." It was structurally similar to the C-135. The C-135 design predated the 707 design, although there was some concurrence. The 707 aircraft was developed by a different design team, and was created in order to allow six-across seating. There are several excellent books available on this subject.

There are many differences between the aircraft, including the cross-section of the fuselage (C-135 is oval while 707 is "double-bubble"), length of wings, height of vertical stabilizer, aircraft weights, and system components. While many components of the two aircraft are similar in design, virtually no parts are interchangeable between the two. Both aircraft are four-engine, swept-wing, jet transports, but to call one a derivative of the other is incorrect. I work for the USAF on the C-18 program (militarized B707s).

After all I could probably use the seasoning as my generation only had 10-18 years as engineer and 21 or more years making Captain. By the way, they never flew engineer at all in most cases. But after 35 years or so as Captain, everyone else should wait till they had sucked as much as they could from the seniority system. Some if not most of us behind these guys would have never flown Captain had they won their court cases.

I have no real objection to removing the age 60 rule, but frankly I don't think it would be beneficial to us as a group. First retiring at 60 is a privilege that I appreciate. To accommodate a few that wish to die at the wheel, it would penalize the rest requiring that to have a full pension we would have to work to the same ages 65-70-80. United has engineers in their mid 70s now! No company is going to structure their retirement plans to provide full benefits until the normal (?) retirement age. Nearly 50% of the pilots do not make it to normal retirement age now; how many would make it to 70?

If you want to change the retirement age, make it a system that starts tomorrow with the next pilot hired. A system that does not give advantage to me, who benefited from the last 32 years of retirements, or to those behind me that have had meteoric rise (3- to 7-year Captains). Start fresh so that no one group is penalized or benefits from a new system that was not in place when they bought their ticket and got on board.

For me with almost 700 hours of flying, and completing Level three of the wings program (one level each year), and having only $40,000.00 in hull insurance, with commercial/instrument and high-performance/complex rating, my cost will be between $4,000 and $4,500.00 per year. Based on 400 hours of flying time, that will give me $1,310.00 per month in bills (if 100LL does not go any higher in price).

As for the shortage of pilots, THE INSURANCE COMPANIES are the ones telling the companies who they can hire and cannot hire. When they say you MUST have a certain numbers of hours before you can be hired. However, if you go to their training schools, and pay anywhere from $15,000 to $35,000 for training, they will put you on as a pilot with much less time then I have now. DO YOU THINK THAT IS FAIR? There are a lot of us who cannot afford the high cost of that type of training.

When I want to open a Part 135 Business, I ran into to the same thing. I had to do a credit statement before AVEMCO would give me insurance, and now they are dropping ALL commercial insurance.

Yes, the insurance companies are putting the small businesses out of business. If they are so worry about what the courts are doing, why didn't they do something about it years ago? Or were they just riding the gravy train for what it was worth?

Yes, I am very angry about what the insurance companies are doing, because they are putting us out of business.

One last example: There is a company who went back into rental again. Sun Western in Yuma, Ariz. He is renting two Arrows and a Tomahawk. The Arrows are under 200 HP, fixed-pitch propeller, and retractable. His insurance requires 100 hours of retract time before he can rent to me or anyone else without an instructor in the plane. His insurance company is out of Phoenix. Ariz. They are requiring this, not Sun Western. I have 21 hours, and about a $100 per hour you can see how much it would cost me.

I own one of their motorgliders, and it is a fine machine. I also own four other airplanes, and the Dimona motorglider is probably the safest, has the best visibility, has the most comfortable seating, is by far the most economical and is all around the most fun. Other companies products have a lot to live up to just to get to the motorglider standard, not the other way around.

One of the big concerns with the military is the effect of high-g loading on a cornea that's had refractive surgery. What about aerobatic pilots? Do you know of any who've had the surgery? I'm considering taking some aerobatic lessons and who knows from there, but I know they can pull just as many, if not more g's than military aviators.