I’ll never forget my high altitude training. Watching through a window as the first batch of students went into the hyperbaric chamber I was honestly a bit nervous. Yet my nervousness quickly turned to laughter as they brought the students up through the flight levels.

Upon reaching 18,000 feet they asked the students to remove their oxygen masks, as they passed out simple toys and things for the students to do.
The gentleman nearest to the window I was looking through was given a cube with shape cut outs in it. A toy that we’re all familiar with and understand that you put the proper shape into the proper hole and it falls into the cube.

The gentleman picked up the cube along with the square shape and preceded to jam it into the circle hole over and over wondering why it wouldn’t work.

Across from him a lady was asked to write her name on a piece of paper. After much scribbling and writing mindless jargon. She passed out and the attendants quickly put her oxygen mask on her.

Watching this made me think. What if this really happened in an airplane? These pilots couldn’t even align shapes or write their names let alone fly an airplane!

If you have the chance I highly recommend taking a visit to a hyperbaric chamber. A little know fact, hypoxia occurs the same way to the same person every time. In other words if you get dizzy, then get a headache, then you notice your fingertips turn blue (cyanosis) this onset of hypoxia will occur the same way every time. Going into a chamber will help you realize your symptoms as hypoxia begins to set in.

Think about adding your high altitude endorsement to your flight training agenda. A good pilot is always learning!

Read more from Jason on www.m0a.com and read about my own experience with hypoxia.

The features I miss the most are efficient anti-ice / de-ice systems, on-board weather radar, and an auto-throttle. The two first one to fly IFR in almost any weather, and the later to help reduce pilot workload.

What do YOU miss the most in your light aircraft’s cockpit ?

Once again, I’m writing in “real time” from an airline flight. I’m on my way from Frankfurt to Toulouse in an Embraer 170 operated by Cirrus Airlines, on behalf of Lufthansa. For the time being, we’re VMC, climbing between two layers. Rays of sun occasionally get through the clouds, producing golden purple reflections. By the time I finished this sentence, we climbed through the second layer, which was more turbulent, and are now on top, with the falling sun on my right. I just regret I’m not in the cockpit…

I had a short look in when boarding. I like the clean, very streamlined design of the Embraer cockpit. To be honest, there are many things I like about Embraers. The passenger windows are large and in an almost square aspect ratio. I’m not sure if I must thank Embraer or Cirrus for the largest than usual seat pitch, for a taller than standard passenger like me, it’s very comfortable. I like not having to open my legs to fit in my personal space, and I appreciate not having my knees stuck against the seat in front of me.

It’s not my first Embraer flight, but the first in a 170. It’s a bit noisier than the 135 because the engines are under the wings. The 135 has tail-mounted engines and this reduces the cabin’s noise level. But even seated beside the engine, the level is bearable.

I reckon we took off close to the maximum take-off mass. There are only four empty seats and we refueled before departure. The acceleration was impressive and we were airborne after 30 seconds. As always in jets, the pitch for initial climb was surprising to me. I’m much more used to the 10° nose-up which are typical in light aircraft…

The view on top is great, the sun is slowly disappearing behind the horizon, coloring the sky with all possible nuances of blue, yellow and purple. The ride is smooth up there, and I regret that my camera is packed in the overhead luggage compartment… I just have one photo of our giant winglet – with not less than 6 static dischargers – that I took on ground before take off.

When I talk about my camera, I mean a real one, no the one integrated in my iPhone. I have it with me, not for the conference I’m joining for a couple of days, but because of the event planned on the second day. Our hosts there were kind enough to invite us to visit the Airbus 380 factory in Toulouse. As far as I understood, we’ll see the production halls from above. Stay tuned for more very soon.

For now, I’ll enjoy the sunset, and may take a nap before enjoying Toulouse by night.

The visit starts with a replica of the telemetry room used during the test flights. The aircraft under test (in our case an A380) transmits a lot of data to a reception network covering all of France and nothern Spain. The data sent are the dream of any aircraft incident investigator: almost all flight and system parameters plus live audio and video from the cockpit under various angles. For visitors, the replica of the room is fed with data from the Airbus 380 maiden flight. We can hear the crew discussions (in French, naturellement) and we learn that shortly before take-off the flight engineer lost one of his pens. Because of his flight suit, parachute and helmet (mandatory for the first series of flights) he can’t pick it up, but as it’s in sight, it’s not a hazard for the flight. Never loose a pen in a cockpit before a flight…

The screens reproduce all the system and flight parameters. We can see the power rising on the four engines. The flight engineer gives his go and aircraft starts to roll. The telemetry screens reproduce the flight instruments, we see airspeed increasing. The co-pilot calls “V1″ and “Rotate” almost at the same time, and the biggest airliner in the world leaves the ground… There’s magic in the air. One of the first remarks of the Captain is typical of the impact of technology on aircraft design: “Comme au simu”, “like in the simulator”. The crew had so much simulator sessions before the maiden flight that it made it look extremely usual.

One of the screens shows a 3D model of the aircraft in flight. High-technology? No, a good old Microsoft Flight Simulator fed with live data from the aircraft. For the rest of the demonstration, we see pictures and data of flight number 56. At this stage the crew no longer needs the survival suite, the parachutes and the helmets. This is a fascinating flight with a lot of stalls. As the pilot pull the nose up, the flight engineer periodically announces the value of the angle of attack, up to 22 degrees. A good review of aerodynamics. The instruments on the screen show both the pitch and the angle of attack, and the difference is clearly visible. I never had the opportunity to see this kind of aircraft stalling before. As for modern light aircraft, it’s totally unimpressive. No abrupt reaction, no spin, nothing.

I missed my camera during this part of the visit, but much more during the second part. We took a bus to the assembly halls. There’s not a lot of references nearby so it’s hard to realize how big these buildings are. Visitors are not allowed inside the halls themselves but there is kind of a gallery, dominating one of the halls. From there we could see three A380’s being assembled. Here again, the lack of references makes hard to evaluate how big they are. A three (was it four?) story assembly of offices in containers by the nose was almost at cockpit height.

The people moving around looked so tiny… There was also a kind of golf-cart which looked like an abandonned toy. There was no A320 in the hangar but our guide explained us how to build one. Take an A380 engine – it’s as wide as an A320 fuselage. Put the tailplane on the A380 on top, it’s as wide as an A320 wing. By the way, the engines are the last step of the assembly, because the supplier wants to be paid on delivery, and they represent almost a third of the price.

After the hangar we visted a full-scale “model” of the cabin with economy and business class fittings. No private suite for this mock-up but two bars, some room to walk freely, emergency exit doors… and a couple of jumpseat for the flight attendants. The same old jumpseats that already equip the A320 family. I sincerely hope for all flight attendants that will work in the biggest airliner in the world that they’ll get a bit more room and comfort.

The airbus visit shop in the end was full of goodies. Well, before we bought everything: ties, caps, mugs, tee-shirts, pens, umbrellas, notepads, keyrings, plush aircrafts, stickers, magnets, models, books, DVDs, … I don’t even dare to say how much money I spent there. Anyway, a great thank you to the conference’s organizators and to the visit crew at Airbus. If you’re once in the vicinity, this visit is definitely a must.

Meteorology: ever wondered what causes seasonal changes in weather patterns? Why drizzle can last for days while showers of rain come and go? Why white puffy clouds grow bigger in the late summer afternoon? And what’s that funny cloud above the mountain? All the answers can be found in PPL textbooks, but be warned: trying to understand weather is very addictive!

Mechanics and systems: being a software engineer by trade, there was a lot I didn’t know about the hardware side of things: internal combustion engines, hydraulics, gyroscopic instruments and fluid mechanics. All fascinating stuff that will help you impress your petrol-head friends. I also learned a lot by following aircraft construction blogs. My life is more complete now that I know what a cleclo is.

Safety: learning to fly shapes your brain to think safety first. You will find yourself pre-flighting rental cars. Your partner will get upset when you refuse to drive into an unknown section of the countryside without a current map. When she points at the GPS on the dashboard you will answer that you don’t have a RAIM prediction.

Human factors: you will learn useful facts about human physiology, but it’s the psychological side of human factors that I found most helpful: recognising patterns of thought that may lead to unsafe behavior, learning to give and accept feedback when working as a team and prioritising tasks in stressful situations. I cannot think of one area of life where those skills do not apply. As was said on this blog before, flying can improve your life. You may even develop specific personality traits.

Aviation is so strongly connected to a large number of other disciplines that you just never know what you will end up learning. I didn’t expect that at all when I first pushed the door of my aero-club, and this was one of the nicest surprises of my flying training. And of course your airline flights as a passenger will never be the same again.

Most of the unread posts were not from personal blogs but from news source like AOPA news, aviation in Google News, Planetalking.com, AvWeb current issue and Aero-News network. In this section, I used the “Mark All as Read button” a lot…

The hottest topic in the aviation blogosphere recently is the NWA flight 188 which lost radio contact and overflew its destination by 150 miles. There’s a lot of speculation around this incident. You can read more about it from Airlinerblog. Aviation-safety.net confirmed that the licences of both pilots were revoked. As often, the voice of reason and experience can be heard on flightlevel390.blogspot.com. Both Jetwhine and Cockpit Conversation listed their top 10 reasons why the crew missed the destination. Max Trescott also brings interesting arguments in his post on the NWA flight 188.

Another incident got my attention: a Cessna 400 cruising at 23.500 feet had a problem with oxygen and the pilot got incapacitated. The non-flying passenger got help from ATC and other pilots flying in the area. A great lesson of solidarity. Click here to read more about this incident and the dangers of hypoxia.

Still in the aviation accidents category, the Brazillian investigators released the final report about the A320 runway excursion at Sao-Paulo Congonhas airport. Click here to read more about their findings, and here to read an older post about this accident.

Lots of good posts also have to do with pilots training. Here are a lot of tips and training stories, in no particular order:

• Useful icing resources for pilots
• Why flight planning matters even more at night
• Holding pattern entries made easy (podcast)
• 72 years young lady gets her pilot certificate
• List of aviation don’ts

By the way, I noted that two blogging instructors I like have a new design at their blogs: www.askacfi.com and www.m0a.com. Congrats guys, nice job.

One impressive video appeared in several blogs. It shows a VFR aircraft entering IMC and continuing. At one point, the wingtip hits terrain, in the closest call I ever saw. I’m not sure this pilot learned anything from this mishap, but I share Rob’s opinion: be very afraid of this pilot.

MyFlightBlog.com also has a great, but not scary, post on flying in the Rocky Mountains. Todd made his first mountain flying experiences, and came back with nice pictures, a great video and big smile.

Sylvia, from fearoflanding.com, found incredible picture of a Piper Supercub attacked by a bear. But the most incredible part is that the pilot repared it with duct tape. Lots of duct tape. Click here to see in which state this aircraft flew back home.

Technical problems also occur at the other side of aviation, in the airlines. Dave from flightlevel390 related how one of his departures got delayed twice, because of two different problems. On the same day, he got an alarm about a thrust reverser, making an interesting link to the accident at Sao-Paulo Congonhas airport. Click here to read Dave’s post about how he handled technical problems with his maintenance, co-pilot and dispatcher.

Finally, with Chritmas in sight, the season of product reviews started. AviationMentor made a review of ForeFlight mobile for iPhone. I like his reviews because they are always very deep, detailled, and rather objective. Max Trescott has read Captain Sullenberger’s book, “Highest Duty”. Max also had a personal meeting with Sully and tells all about it in this post.

The G3000 is a big step forward. Compared to the G1000, the softkeys below the screens are still present, but there are no knobs on the side. The screens are bigger, and of a different aspect ratio. The touch-screen control units seem to be like bigger versions of my iPhone. Lists scroll smoothly, and the infrared technology used by Garmin reduces the risk of error in turbulence. Actions are not triggered when your finger touches the display, but when you remove it. If turbulence makes your finger shift, the impact and end of contact points won’t be the same and the controller will take no action.

Garmin presented the G3000 at NBAA, and several reports are available from there. Click here to read more from AOPA. As mentioned in this article, the G3000 will initially be certified for light turbine aircraft, read King-Airs and light jets. With the G1000, Garmin used a different approach, starting with light aircraft to step up into turbine. I’m not sure why they use a different approach this time, but I guess the cost of the two controller units – required for multi-crew and redundancy – as well as the required space make less sense in a light aircraft. They could gain some room by using touch screens the PFD and MFD. Got it, guys ?

It’s not easy to describe a glass cockpit system with words, so I selected for YouTube videos for you.

Finally, from the GarminBlog, a spectacular but short history of glass:

Do you have a political orientation ? Are you more left-ish or right-ish ? For US readers, Democrat, Republican ? Ecologist ? Without specific political orientation ?

And finally, does this impact your flying ?

Towing and playing hangar Tetris
Most of my flying was in a flying club having a hangar for its whole fleet. On the plus side, there was no need for aircraft covers. I hate aircraft covers, and if you already tried to put one in a 20 knots wind, you know why. But this hangar was quite deep, and I often had to tow two or three other aircraft out, on top of the one I was flying. We also used to tow the aircraft to the fuel pump. Not that far away, but towing a PA32 is a lot of effort.

Short term flight cancellations
Canceling a flight is never fun, specially at short time. There are many reasons to cancel, and this is possible at any time. The latest of my cancellations was during the take-off roll, as the heading bug was blocked. But the worst is to cancel late on the day before because the weather forecast for an early flight is looking clear, and find glorious VFR weather the on the next day.

Weather suspense
Spending lot of time checking each and every weather report, building scenarios and alternatives is not always fun. This can create interesting discussions, but I hate spending half a day of hardly gained overtime to end up non flying because of fog dissipating later than expected, or thunderstorms building earlier than expected.

No plane – no fun
Rental pilots know that one: a perfect day, a short-term plan for a great flight but no plane available. An even more frustrating variant is when the guy having the reserved the plane before is not back on time, whatever the reason.

Staying current
National and club regulations require a certain number of flights per year or even per month. Keeping all privileges current (aircraft types, single engine, multi-engine, night VFR, IFR, …) is sometimes a source of intense worries.

I hoped that writing a post about the less funny parts of flying would help me dealing more easily with my non-flying situation. It does not.

When a force is applied to an object, it makes it move, and / or rotate. If the object can move freely, like an aircraft in flight, it will rotate around its center of gravity. The farthest the point where the force is applied, the higher the rotation. The so-called “moment” is the force multiplied by the distance to the center of gravity. This is nothing else than the good old lever principle: “Give me a place to stand on, and I will move the Earth.”

Because the center of gravity of an aircraft is never located at the center of gravity, the lift generates a moment. In light aircraft, the center of lift is typically behind the center of gravity, so lift generates a nose-down moment. This moment is compensated by some aerodynamic forces generated by the horizontal stabilizer. To compensate for the nose-down moment, the stabilizer generates some downward forces which create a nose-up moment. Because this force is far away from the center of gravity, a minimal magnitude is sufficient.

So the moment of lift (upwards, behind CoG, nose-down) and the moment from the stabilizer (downwards, behind CoG, nose-up) compensate for each other, making the aircraft stable, easy to control, and reduce the required control forces. But the distance between the center of gravity and the center of lift is not that big…

If the center of gravity moves behind the center of lift, the direction of the moment created by the lift changes direction: lift is still upwards, but it’s now in front of CoG, creating a nose-up moment. The force from the stabilizer is still downwards, and still behind the center of gravity… and still creating a nose-up moment. There is no more compensation and the sole way to compensate for the moment is to use extra control forces, but it’s not granted that the aircraft will remain stable and controllable…

Flying with passengers in the back seats of a PA28 or C172 makes quite a difference in the required control forces. This is why the typical differences training for a new aircraft type includes a flight at maximum take-off mass.

Nobody will check that you’re flying with a properly positioned center of gravity before you go flying. It’s one of the numerous duties of pilots to ensure the plane is loaded correctly, before and during each and every flight. As soon as you operate with a center of gravity outside the approved limits, you become a test pilot.

Insurance companies don’t like test pilots at all.