Recent content by deyoung

It depends on your progress more than your logged hours; I'm not sure how fast you're going. For one data point, by the time I had your hours (24-25) I had soloed, done one dual XC (no solo XC yet) and just started night flying. If you're on a similar pace you're probably fine to be done by the...

Dumb question perhaps, but - who routinely files a VFR flight plan, and if you do, why? I generally don't, but I always use flight following, which is easier and seems to have most of the same benefits. I am dumb? Why or why not? :-)

I'm going to take a little bit of issue with this, sorry. Not everyone HAS to be predisposed to be a pilot. If you don't have an ingrained talent for it you can certainly still do it; it might take a little more time and you might have to work a little harder, but I think pretty much anyone who...

Another Lockheed Electra 10, on the ramp in Sedona:

Yeah, when I took this picture there were at least 5 planes dropping water on it. Their round trip time was under 10 minutes, I'd say, though I didn't time it.

Seems sketchy. He wouldn't describe the weather conditions at the time, and (my sense from the article) he was generally not forthcoming. The weather at the time seems like something one could look up to get a better idea whether his story makes sense or not. "[Park rangers] arrived to find...

I'm curious to hear your reasons, mostly because I pretty much always use flight following for anything beyond my local area...

That could happen if you're lucky. I had a musical instrument stolen a few years ago, and I got it back *and* the guy got busted because he tried to pawn it and I had the serial number to give out.

Congrats!! And beyond keeping it current - staying proficient! I don't know, but my gut feeling is that there's a bigger gap possible between "legal" and "proficient" in IFR flying than in VFR for most people (though I'm sure you can find VFR examples that are pretty out there).

Thanks - I was wondering how they loaded water; I happened to be in White Salmon and Hood River right when the "tunnel five" fire started and planes looked like the were almost certainly collecting water from the Columbia river, but the actual collection point and process was out of view for me...

Sorry to hear that, but great way to respond to it! "That 50mm f/4? Yeah that was a business lens. Oh, the 150-600mm constant f/2.8 zoom? Nah, that's just for personal use." :-)

Didn't Harrison Ford have one of those a while ago? :)

I've only landed in Palm Springs once, but the winds were on the sporty side -- 25kt-ish. At the time it wasn't too much of an issue because they were more or less down the runway; I don't know if Palm Springs winds are reliably like that, but if not and you can get that much wind as...

Well, it doesn't, but it increases rudder authority, which you might need if the crosswind is strong enough.

My Hershey-bar winged vehicle will never get much above 13,000 or so... yeah... :)