Episode 40 covers a broad mix of recent accidents, preliminary reports, and final NTSB findings, but the episode’s strongest theme is one that many pilots may underestimate: medications and drugs that can impair performance even when they are legal, common, or available over the counter. Max Trescott and Rob Mark begin with a fatal nighttime crash of C-GPTO, a Cessna 172 in Saskatchewan. The airplane, was on a VFR night cross-country flight that departed around 2:30 a.m. The airplane had been

The U.S. Army is opening the door to as much as $7 billion in counter-drone spending through a massive IDIQ contract covering a wide range of detection and defeat technologies. We look at why the Pentagon is spreading the work among numerous companies and how the program could support both military operations and the Domestic Drone Shield. Video of the Week: SF startup develops terrifying drone that stalks people. We also discuss plans to protect Cape Canaveral with laser-based counter-drone sy

Boston provides another reminder that rapidly deploying new technology inevitably produces operational lessons. The Boston Police Department launched a Drone as a First Responder program in partnership with Motorola Solutions and BRINC. Within days, one of the drones came down onto a parked Mazda 3, causing more than $500 in damage. Fortunately, nobody was in the car. The owner returned home to discover a note explaining that the police drone had struck his vehicle. Max emphasizes that accidents

The Amazon Prime Air Boeing 767 crash in Miami remains the lead story in this episode as new information from the NTSB provides important details about the final seconds of Flight 7598. The Boeing 767 ran off the end of the runway at Miami at more than 100 knots. In the previous episode, Max Trescott analyzed the aircraft’s ADS-B track and found that the airplane initially appeared to be descending normally before leveling at approximately 1,600 feet. That left the Boeing about 500 feet above