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Salon: Technology & Business
Original reporting and commentary on the latest stories from the business world, the technology industry and the Internet.

Ask the pilot: The gut-churning trials and tribulations of making the grade w...
by Patrick Smith
5 Sep 2008 at 10:25am
When it was finally over, at the end of Day 3, my sense of relief was exceeded only by a renewed resentment for those who believe that flying planes is easy. If I had a dollar for every time some smart-aleck flier or pundit has remarked that pilots are nothing but "glorified bus drivers," or that modern aircraft "basically fly themselves," I wouldn't need to go through this every six months.

Recurrent training, it's called -- a mandatory, biannual rite of study and stress, culminating in a multihour simulator session during which a sadistic instructor dutifully inflicts all manner of potential catastrophe. Assuming it goes OK, you're signed off and sent back to the line.

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Ask the pilot: Who cares what planes look like? I do! Why do they have to loo...
by Patrick Smith
29 Aug 2008 at 10:53am
This column was slated to run in last week's slot, sidetracked at the last minute by the plane crash in Spain. Apologies to those of you hoping for something newsier -- oh gawd, not another rant about liveries and aesthetics! -- but hey, it's a holiday weekend and I'm trying to keep it light.

We begin with a quote: "Who cares what it looks like?"

That was the sentiment of a certain David W in Salon's letters section two weeks ago, responding to my opinion that the goliath new Airbus, the A380, is possibly the ugliest commercial jetliner ever built.

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Ask the pilot: Avoiding speculation, the pilot weighs in on the Madrid plane ...
by Patrick Smith
21 Aug 2008 at 11:00am
At least 150 people were killed on Wednesday when the Spanair MD-80 veered off a runway during takeoff at Madrid's Barajas Airport. Spanair is a low-cost carrier headquartered on the Spanish resort island of Mallorca. Founded in 1987, the company is today owned by Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS) and is a member of the Star Alliance. It has been dealing with an ongoing financial crisis and possible pilots' strike.

Details from the scene are sketchy, and it's probably best, with the investigation barely out of the blocks, to go easy on the speculation.

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Ask the pilot: What do U.S. carriers need to do to regain their status as wor...
by Patrick Smith
15 Aug 2008 at 10:21am
I don't like hype. I especially don't like hype when it involves big, ugly, overrated airplanes that have, by this point, garnered more than their fair allotment of attention. You know the plane I'm talking about.

The puffery got going in the spring of 2005, when the Airbus A380 took to the air for its maiden test flight. "The most anticipated flight since Concorde leapt from the pavement in 1969," cried one news report. "Straight into the history books," said another of the "gargantuan double-decked superjumbo." Oh the humanity. Over on the Airbus Web site they were channeling Neil Armstrong, inviting visitors to listen to the "first words of chief test pilot Jacques Rosay."

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