Max Trescott

4 days ago | flyingmag.com | Max Trescott

If you’ve flown in a Garmin glass cockpit with synthetic vision, then you may have seen the “Pathways” feature, a series of constantly moving rectangles on the primary flight display (PFD). Candidly, I’ve never liked Pathways, so I was delighted to recently find a good use for them.

4 weeks ago | flyingmag.com | Max Trescott

On July 26, 2024, about 1:04 p.m. MDT, a Pilatus PC-12/47E was destroyed when it was involved in an accident near Recluse, Wyoming. The pilot and six passengers were killed. Before the crash, the pilot reported to Salt Lake City Center the loss of the autopilot and declared an emergency. The pilot then advised he was trying to get control of the airplane, and the controller asked if he needed additional assistance. There was no further response from the pilot.

1 month ago | flyingmag.com | Max Trescott

One of the major ways that pilots learn about safety is by reading about accidents. And years ago, I noticed a number of aircraft accidents involving newly purchased aircraft. So, I did a search of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) database using phrases such as “recently purchased,” and sure enough, I found a boatload of accident reports.

1 month ago | flyingmag.com | Max Trescott

Last month I wrote about my preference for RNAV approaches versus ILSs in most but not all situations. Earlier this year there was a fatal accident in a Cirrus SR22 in Bar Harbor, Maine, in which the pilot’s choice of an ILS versus an RNAV approach had a direct impact on the outcome.

2 months ago | flyingmag.com | Max Trescott

Major inflection points in GA are rare and only occur every couple of decades. GPS and glass cockpits are two examples from the past 40 years, and both have provided profound, long-term impacts on safety and efficiency. Skyryse’s SkyOS, which it describes as an operating system for flight, has the potential to be another transformative change for helicopters and possibly fixed-wing aircraft as well.