The face of a birb who has SEEN some shit and will take a drag off his cigarette while muttering, “now that’s a name I ain’t heard in a long time…”

​This is not one of the breeding pair. Showed up yesterday. I reckon he's about 300 years old. He's mostly standing by the railing and watching television, by which I mean me.

A training flight in Argentina ended with a student pilot returning alone after her instructor left the aircraft. I have attempted a reconstruction of the contemporary Spanish-language reporting. fearoflanding.com/accidents/de...

"There is a parachutist in front of you on the runway, you must go around." There was no parachutist. But that wasn't actually the cause of the crash. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ac...

I walked across a bridge into Mexico for a cheap flight and ended up playing an elaborate bilingual game of airport bingo. sylviawrigley.substack.com/p/stamp-of-a...

"We have beer," he says helpfully. It's 10am. The F-16s are taking off in the distance and I haven't had coffee yet. My day at Holloman's Legacy of Liberty airshow: fearoflanding.com/airshows/leg...

Traditional Latvian food, English version according to a man with 7% battery and Google Translate.

China Eastern flight 5735 killed 132 people in 2022 but the CAAC never released a final report. Now a FOIA release has put the recorder data into the public domain. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ch... #ChinaEastern5735

A beautiful day to celebrate a beautiful couple.

The ferry flight for the brand new Cirrus SR22 had a 2,100 mile water crossing ahead. Unfortunately, there was only enough fuel for 1,900. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ac...

Everything about her face says fuck you for putting me in this fucking stupid dress.

Wednesday walk: 3km

You know how I said I would never do one of those extreme day trip things? Istanbul would like a word. Filed under: things I did not plan, things that worked anyway, raki. open.substack.com/pub/sylviawr...

Got woken up in the middle of the night by an alert to take cover if any drones sighted, preferably in a basement.

The FAA offered LaGuardia free transponders for their fire trucks. LaGuardia didn't take them. Ten months later, the safety system couldn't see the truck on the runway. fearoflanding.com/accidents/a-...

A PA-28 loses power before rejoining the circuit at Prestwick. The man who takes control isn't legally allowed to fly. This week on Fear of Landing. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ac...

Hungry crows in the fog.

Baltic morning in March.

Old-time tower climbers say that if you hang next to an FM antenna radiating 50 kW, you'll feel heating in your eyes first. This balloon stopped 43 feet short of an antenna radiating 100 kW. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ho...

The green-speckled mounds of dough looked deeply unconvinced about their prospects. open.substack.com/pub/sylviawr...

Lasers shooting down the wrong drones. Laptops vanishing through the floor of a passenger jet. A bullet hole nobody noticed until landing. It's only February. fearoflanding.com/crazy/lasers...

Airport #2

Airport #1

The Century 2000 autopilot doesn't trim for you. It flashes a light and expects you to do it. If you trim the wrong way, it flashes faster. The NTSB final report on the TNFlygirl Debonair crash is out. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ac...

Happy friendship day.

"We knew we had to get down quickly," the passenger wrote. But did they? The video shows a prop spinning normally, a runway ahead, and then a collision. "Fortunately our pilot with 20+ years experience was able to set us down." fearoflanding.com/accidents/ac...

Boeing says the switches work fine if you use the correct technique. The Federation of Indian Pilots says there's an electrical failure mode. The UK CAA wants to know why Air India flew after two switch failures. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ai...

Well, I did not have "presidential threat to ground 5,000+ aircraft" on my 2026 bingo card. fearoflanding.com/crazy/trump-...

I don't know if I'm proud or embarrassed that this is the first job in a while that apparently I'm specifically qualified to do.

Someone left a 1-star review for Goose Bay Airport because the pilot "blocked my access to oxygen". Another gave credit for "hot stewardess susie q for good sandwiches." This is what happens when 127 people review an airport in Labrador. fearoflanding.com/history/four...

I just woke up from a nap and somehow while I was asleep, everyone on the bus has figured out we are not going to the right place

"We have high RPM now and will try to make it to the shore." They didn't make it to the shore. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ac...

All eight main landing gear tyres exploded on impact. That doesn't just happen. fearoflanding.com/accidents/la...

Five aircraft, three days, Buenos Aires to El Paso via Tallinn. I looked up each registration between connections and found their histories. fearoflanding.com/flying/five-...

Evening walk

Crushing hard on Buenos Aires.

Ecoparque Buenos Aires is amazing and I how I can spend more time there

Some men build bridges. Some insist there was never a bridge to begin with. Mine had a taxi and very strong opinions. open.substack.com/pub/sylviawr...

"I'm unable to move forward." The Delta captain sat in the deicing area, engines running, refusing to taxi. He was following the airport's own safety rules. Minutes later, his decision would be vindicated in the worst possible way. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ac...

Sitting at the river's edge instead of working.

The girl who used to be my sister is the featured short SF this week in Nature! Vridia vanished into the cross-chain relays. Now her sister is following her trail, armed with nothing but an analog notebook and their grandfather's cryptic warning: "Ink never forks." www.nature.com/articles/d41...

ATP fired him for pulling circuit breakers and cutting mixture during a student's flight. Eagle Aviation took him on immediately without checking his story. Six weeks later he was dead. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ac...

The Trouble with Tranquility open.substack.com/pub/sylviawr...

Something not quite right about the crow outside of my window this morning.

Did I mention that I sold a story to Nature? Started writing flash again this year and glad to feel like I still have skillz. :D

I still feel like someone in the marketing department at JAL might not have approved this page on the JAL website: www.jal.com/en/safety/ce... "Accidents JAL has caused other than Flight 123 Accident"

A student pilot's training flight turned into an unplanned hangar inspection after their instructor interpreted "best speed across the runway" differently than air traffic control intended. fearoflanding.com/accidents/ac...

Might have made a bit much.

Dinner is in progress

I wrote about the flight here: fearoflanding.com/accidents/i-...