On the day of our 40th Wedding Anniversary, Holly and I revisited Florence, Italy, the city we enjoyed so much on our European honeymoon. The first time we visited Florence, the curators had closed the exhibition to work on the housing, and we could not see the original 1504 statue of David by Michelangelo. Instead, we...
Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument and Custer National Cemetery JUNE 25TH 1876 134 years before the Battle of Little Big Horn, the French explorer Chevalier La Verendrye led a string of old-world Spanish horses into the Dakotas from somewhere down in Nebraska. The horses, left to run wild by the Conquistador Spanish two hundred...
Part 5 of: What is the Difference Between a Floatplane and a Seaplane? One of the more questionable quotes I often hear seaplane promoters say is that 71% of the world is covered by water. Ok, but we can land in only 1% of that area 70% of the time. I confess I made...
Part Four of: What is the Difference Between a Floatplane and a Seaplane? In part three, I covered sea states and the importance of operators having seaworthy aircraft and sea-ready pilots. Here, I will look deeper into seaworthiness and how flying boats and amphibians can make a difference. The Pan Am Clippers are the...
Part Three of: What is the Difference Between a Floatplane and a Seaplane? You cannot find the definition of sea readiness in a dictionary. The Navy has an equivalent process called Ship Readiness, which involves assessing whether ships and crew are ready to operate in the waters of the world’s oceans. I do the...
Seaplanes and Seastates In part one, I defined the terms needed to understand the fundamental technical aspects of seaplanes. Now, I will discuss the definitions required to understand the essential technical aspects of operating in the sea. This means understanding sea states and how they relate to seaplane flight operations. After reading this chapter,...
The Real Meaning of Happiness During the aftermath of the 2015 Terror Attacks in Paris, there have been several TV programs presenting panels of experts, including psychologists, attempting to explain the reasons why young men from Europe or America join ISIS or Taliban terrorist groups. The obvious reason for most of the media is that they...
Part One: Floatplanes, Flying Boats, and Seaplanes Richard Quest, a CNN business commentator and aviation analyst, asked me, “What is the difference between a floatplane and a seaplane?” Richard explained that on a newscast, he called an airplane on floats a seaplane, and the know-it-alls bombarded him with comments saying he got it wrong....
