On March 8th, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, with 239 people on board, disappeared into the dark of the night, never to be heard from again. The disappearance of MH370 has been described as the "greatest mystery in the history of aviation". Despite the efforts of an international investigation team, and millions of dollars spent searching the ocean bottom for the wreckage site, no one has been able to determine what really happened. Until now...For this book, three pr...

If you have ever wondered what a transportation safety investigation looks like from the inside, or aspire to be an accident investigator yourself, this book is for you.Nearly four decades ago, I transitioned from being a full-time pilot to become a professional aircraft accident investigator. In my work solving aircraft accidents, I have two main missions – to provide valid information to the loved ones who are left to grieve – and to put in place safety barriers that will prevent...

If you have ever wondered what a transportation safety investigation looks like from the inside, or aspire to be an accident investigator yourself, this book is for you.Nearly four decades ago, I transitioned from being a full-time pilot to become a professional aircraft accident investigator. In my work solving aircraft accidents, I have two main missions – to provide valid information to the loved ones who are left to grieve – and to put in place safety barriers that will prevent...

"A staggering, meticulous and frequently spine-chilling work of longform journalism." Trent DaltonSomewhere deep beneath the wild seas of the southern Indian Ocean, perhaps in the eerie underwater canyons of Broken Ridge along the Seventh Arc satellite band, lies the answer to the world's greatest aviation mystery.Why, on the night of 8 March 2014, did Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 suddenly U-turn, zig-zag up the Straits of Malacca, then vanish with 239 so...

A New York Times bestsellerFor millions of people, travel by air is a confounding, uncomfortable, and even fearful experience. Patrick Smith, airline pilot and author of the web's popular Ask the Pilot feature, separates the fact from fallacy and tells you everything you need to know...How planes fly, and a revealing look at the men and women who fly themStraight talk on turbulence, pilot training, and safetyThe real story on conge...

The smash-hit bestseller about the world's worst air crashes and the disaster detectives who pick through the wreckage to find out why they happened - now fully revised and updated, with 30% new material.From the early tragedies of the Comet and the DC10 to the modern-day horror of the Concorde catastrophe in Paris and the mysterious loss of an Air France Airbus over the Atlantic, Faith painstakingly recreates the accidents, explains what went wrong and discusses how they can be pre...

"Sit back, relax, and enjoy the flight," our pilots still intone. But who are they kidding?In Full Upright and Locked Position, former FAA chief counsel and senior aviation policy official Mark Gerchick unravels the unseen forces and little-known facts that have reshaped our air travel experience since September 11, 2001.With wry humor and unique insight, Gerchick takes us past the jargon, technicalities, and all-is-well platitudes to expose the new normal of air t...

The long-awaited memoir of a trailblazer and role model who is telling her story for the first time.Eileen Collins was an aviation pioneer her entire career, from her crowning achievements as the first woman to command an American space mission as well as the first to pilot the space shuttle to her early years as one of the Air Force’s first female pilots. She was in the first class of women to earn pilot’s wings at Vance Air Force Base and was their first female in...

As with the Air France Flight 447 tragedy, much of the time air crashes are a confluence of events; a cascade of bad luck, bad decisions, inappropriate airline company policy, the failure of aviation regulators, and sometimes insufficient training, or various combinations of all five.But why?Seconds to Disaster will demonstrate that part of that bad luck is often aided by the airline industry's own endless and aggressive pursuit of bottom-line profit. It contributes to a cre...

Are you amongst those who fly because they have to, yet dread it? You are in good company. There are many like you who reluctantly fly, perhaps because of work or due to the fact they won’t allow their fears to curtail their enjoyment of life. Statistics are of no help. What can help, though, is a better understanding of exactly what is happening during a typical flight from the only vantage point that counts, your passenger seat. This eBook uses friendly language and terminology to clearl...

DANGEROUS LESSONS AND GUARDIAN ANGELS is an action packed true adventure book that spans thirty-five years of airline flying. Stories about transporting guns to Biafra, flying cargo up and down the Berlin corridor during the cold war, and flying sensitive missions, deep into Russia.Fasten your seatbelt and get ready for exciting,sometimes funny,and ocassionally death defying true aviation stories. Many of the stories in this book will put you on the edge-of-your seat; for example when the ...

March 8 1990: An intoxicated three-man crew including Flight Engineer Joseph Balzer fly a Northwest Airlines Boeing 727 with 91 passengers aboard from Fargo North Dakota to Minneapolis Minnesota. July 25 1990: All three pilots stand trial for flying a commercial airliner while under the influence of alcohol; all three are convicted and sent to federal prison. July 26 1990 present: Joe Balzer fights for redemption and to regain all that he has lost. Flying Drunk is his story. Since he was a...