There’s not a lot of air traffic at night. So some air traffic control towers close altogether. Any landing aircraft is on its own. Other air traffic control towers are staffed with just one controller. Not surprisingly, lone controllers working the night shift tend to doze off.
That little secret is now out. That led
A McDonnell Douglas MD-82 crashed in August 2008 while taking off from Barajas Airport in Madrid. 154 on board were killed and 18 were injured. The injured passengers and the families of those killed filed lawsuits in the US against Boeing, which merged with 
McDonnell Douglas in 1997, claiming that the aircraft was defective.
Here’s what
Senator Leahy of Vermont is pushing for a law that would insulate volunteer pilot organizations (such as Angel Flight West) from liability for injury the organization’s pilots cause to its passengers. If the bill passes, it means that those injured by the negligence of an organization’s pilot would have no recourse against the organization. Rather
The Death on the High Seas Act applies to certain airplane and helicopter crashes as well as to shipwrecks. The Act limits the claims that family members can bring. For example, in most cases the Death on the High Seas Act does not allow a parent to sue
for the loss of a child. And though a wife can
It used to be impossible for an American injured by a foreign government to sue that government in the US. If the American tried, the foreign government could assert “sovereign immunity” as a complete defense. But now the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act sets forth a few important exceptions to that immunity. For example, a victim can sue the
I wrote here that the door on N146CK, the Cirrus SR22 that crashed August 4 at Deer Valley, opened in-flight. Yesterday, Fox News in Phoenix aired video from a security camera that captured the impact. Here are frame grabs from the video showing the open door.
Usually, when a door pops open in flight, aerodynamic forces keep
That’s the question I’m asked most often about the case filed by the family of the passenger lost in the Tesla plane crash.
The reason T
esla wasn’t sued is simple. Neither a passenger nor his family is allowed to sue an employer for a work-related injury or death. Instead, they are stuck with the meager workers’ compensation
The family of one of the Tesla employees lost in last year’s Cessna crash at East Palo Alto has filed suit against the estate of the Cessna’s pilot. The suit alleges that the pilot’s decision to takeoff in foggy conditions was negligent.
The air traffic controller told [the pilot]: "The runway is not visible so
The FAA has issued a new rule requiring that charter airlines and helicopter operators train their employees in “crew resource management,” or cockpit teamwork, just as the major airlines do.
The FAA estimates that complying with the rule over the next 10 years will cost the charter industry $12 million. But it also expects
Some pilots refuse to fly piston-powered helicopters, insisting instead on turbine-powered machines. Turbine engines, their argument goes, are much less likely to fail in flight than piston engines. Though more expensive to purchase and to operate, the reliability of turbine-powered helicopters makes them safer than their piston-powered counterparts.
Does that mean the new Robinson R66, with its Rolls-Royce turbine engine, will