Year: 2013

  • Eastern Michigan University Graduation

    I always thought college graduation would be like high school graduation; a happy day that goes by too quickly.  But in many ways, my college graduation stretched over two months filled with celebrations, gifts, studying, and so many exams that I’ve lost count! Over the past two months, I’ve had several new experiences and accomplishments: Attended…

  • College Admission & Advising

    After deciding which flight school to attend, the next step to becoming a pilot is to get admitted to the school.  At smaller schools, this process may be as simple as signing a couple of forms and making an initial payment. When I decided to attend EMU, the Office of Admissions there refused to review…

  • St. Ignace Fatal Flight of Amazon.com Exec

    Last month, the NTSB published a factual report on the St. Ignace, Michigan accident of 2011 that killed an Amazon.com executive. Here exists an opportunity to analyze the available information in great detail and to try to answer more questions about what happened.

  • Symposium a Success

    My research presentation was very popular this year.  One has to be prepared for anything with an 8 AM audience, and I was pleasantly surprised by the number of people who expressed interest in my work. This was my third appearance at the EMU Undergraduate Symposium.  Drawing on experience from previous years, I created a…

  • Choosing a Flight School

    The first step into flight training is to go flying.  Many flight schools offer a discounted first lesson as a taste of how exciting it is to be in the airplane.  I paid $29 at the local flight school for my intro flight in 2008.  That’s practically free, and it was one of the best…

  • Hypoxia Incident Audio Released Last Week

    Air traffic communications recorded on 16 November 2012 and released in a new audio file on 6 March provide an edge-of-the-seat experience of hypoxia incapacitation. The aircraft involved was a Piaggio P180 Avanti twin turbo, tail # N501PM, which had just departed Dallas, Texas (KDFW) heading to Michigan. The recording begins with Fort Worth Center (ZFW)…

  • Survey Results to be Previewed at Symposium

    The results are in from my survey about airline passenger misconduct!  Participants recruited from popular aviation websites helped produce over 16,000 data points that need to be analyzed.  It is a great amount of new information to sift through. I am working on several pie charts and other fun display items for a general audience.…

  • Do You Want To Be a Pilot?

    I’ve decided to start my articles about university life with a series called the Flight Training Survival Guide. This first installment looks at what it takes to be a successful flight student before committing yourself to a costly endeavor.

  • Air Rage and Pilot-Survey.com

    My new survey website is up and running at: Pilot-Survey.com Airline pilots, flight attendants, and passengers: Have a look at that website!  I am encouraging everyone to help out by taking 10 minutes to complete the survey and pass the website address along to colleagues. The current research project involves the topic of airline passenger…

  • Introducing CaptainsLog.aero

    Welcome to my new website! This introductory post describes the mission and plans for CaptainsLog.aero. Please read, comment, and subscribe to get the most out of my new content.