Sporty's PIREPs

One of the many features normally found on premium aviation headsets is Bluetooth, a wireless technology that allows two devices to communicate with each other. This is great for listening to music or making a phone call on the ground, but it can also be used to get audio alerts from your favorite electronic flight bag app. Here's how it works.

After a lifetime of riding on airplanes, economist Patrick Chovanec decided to learn how to fly them. In this episode, he explains how a combination of Covid-19 and Microsoft Flight Simulator started him on a path to earning his Private Pilot certificate, and what he learned along the way. He explains how flight training can be lonely, why modern flight simulators are much more than a game now, and why airplanes are so expensive. In the Ready to Copy segment, Patrick shares the biggest myth in flight training, his preferred flight sim equipment, underrated countries to visit, and his favorite economics joke.

The point of an accident investigation is “to find out what happened, so that we can prevent it from happening again,” says longtime airline pilot and former NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt. He shares what he's learned after decades of working this process, including: how pilots should read an NTSB report, why flight path monitoring matters, what professionalism means for GA pilots, and how flight data monitoring can improve safety. In the Ready to Copy segment, Robert talks about landmark accidents, why NOTAMs are often useless, and his favorite food from South Carolina. 

Cold weather can mean better airplane performance and some beautiful winter sunrises, but it can also mean potential danger from the airplane's heating system. Here's what pilots need to know about carbon monoxide: where it comes from, how to prevent it from entering the cockpit, and what tools are available for detecting it.

Garmin is well known in the fitness world for creating high end smartwatches for tracking all of your activities: biking, hiking, swimming, running, gym workouts, and more. And of course our favorite activity, flying, can be tracked too, using their line of D2 smartwatches. I've spent the last two weeks testing the latest model, the D2 Mach 1 Pro, and it can do it all.

Mist swirls as a yellow Cub touches down on a grass runway—Joe Costanza (better known as @Bananasssssssss on Instagram) is the man behind those viral videos, and in this episode he takes us behind the scenes. He explains why stick and rudder flying is a nice break from his day job flying an Airbus, how to have fun flying with kids (he has four), and the good parts of social media. He also shares his slightly controversial advice for new airline pilots and how training is changing to adapt to a new generation. In the Ready to Copy segment, he describes what it’s like to land on a grass strip, what the Cub teaches him about flying the Airbus, and how to take better aviation photos.

The most common question we get about headsets is one of those classic “Coke or Pepsi” questions: should I buy the Bose A30 or Lightspeed Delta Zulu? It’s a natural comparison—both are the latest top-of-the-line headsets from leading aviation headset companies—but the good news is that there’s no wrong answer. Having said that, there are some important differences. Whether these are important depends on your personal preferences and your typical flight. We’ll lay out all the details in this article and even offer some of our opinions, but the ultimate decision is yours.

Loss of control accidents are a problem, but longtime pilot and engineer Ed Wischmeyer says there simply isn’t a miracle cure. He explains why angle of attack indicators, stabilized approaches, and energy management are all overrated—and the concept he teaches pilots instead. As he says, “You want pilots to have a large comfort zone, so that when they’re flying in normal operations they’re not anywhere near the boundaries of their comfort zone.” In the Ready to Copy segment, Ed talks about the most absurd FAA regulation, how to prevent runway incursions, why slow flight is underrated, and flying the AirCam.

At the conclusion of every quarter, we like to reflect on some of the more notable products that joined Sporty’s offering. Below are the top ten new products we’re excited to offer to our customers from the third quarter of 2023.

As a professor, Sidney Dekker has spent his career studying safety processes in industries like healthcare and mining. As a pilot, both for an airline and in his Carbon Cub, he has put those theories into practice. In this thought-provoking episode, you'll hear what he's learned, including: how much risk pilots can actually quantify, why we should study what went right and not just what went wrong, and what it means to drift into failure. You'll also learn about the beat up Cessna 172 he restored, whether autopilots are a positive or negative for safety, whether pilots should read accident reports, and what an "automation surprise" is.