Test Pilot

GENERAL

1. There have been several British airplanes named after insects, such as the de Havilland Mosquito. How many American production airplanes have been named after insects?
2. From reader Earl Rogers: Most pilots are familiar with the PBY, a twin-engine Consolidated Catalina flying boat used initially as a patrol bomber during World War II. What was a PBJ?
3. As any pilot who has studied a sectional chart knows, an RCO is a remote communications outlet used to communicate with distant facilities. What is a GCO?
4. From reader Doug Fee: What well-known civilian landplane may land with landing gear retracted during routine operations?
5. What British piston-powered general aviation airplane has been in continuous production for more than 40 years?
6. What legendary sports personality died in the crash of a TWA Fokker F-10A trimotor in a Kansas wheat field on March 31, 1931, an accident that led to the development of the Douglas DC-1, -2, and -3?
7. From reader Richard G. Somers: What is a deceleron?
8. For instrument-rated pilots: Paraphrasing the regulations, a pilot may log actual instrument flight time only while operating an aircraft solely by reference to instruments. How is it possible for a pilot to log actual instrument flight time without physically controlling the airplane (and without using an autopilot)?

TRUE OR FALSE

9. Early Lear Jets have a "knife blade" down the center of the windshield. Its purpose is to dissect birds in flight.
10. From reader Tom Gribble: The Wright brothers tossed a coin on December 17, 1903, to determine who would be the first to fly, and Orville won the toss.
11. From reader Mark Barchenko: After resigning from and selling his interest in TWA, Howard Hughes purchased another airline and named it after himself.

MULTIPLE CHOICE

12. From reader Patrick Mathews: Pilot and inventor Igor Sikorsky arrived in the United States from the U.S.S.R. as a penniless émigré following the Bolshevik Revolution. He initially designed and built seaplanes for Pan American Airlines. His fledgling company was rescued and funded by
    1. Thomas Edison.
    2. Henry Ford.
    3. Charles Lindbergh.
    4. Sergei Rachmaninov.
13. From reader Tony Bill: The total number of warplanes manufactured in England, France, and Germany during World War I was
    1. fewer than 2,000.
    2. approximately 20,000.
    3. approximately 90,000.
    4. approximately 175,000.
14. The scheduled airtime for the world's shortest airline flight is
    1. 1 minute.
    2. 2 minutes.
    3. 6 minutes.
    4. 12 minutes.

TEST PILOT ANSWERS

1. There undoubtedly are others, but the best known are the Cessna A-37 Dragonfly, the Mooney Mite, the Northrop F/A-18 Hornet, the Northrop P-61 Black Widow, the Northrop F-89 Scorpion, and a few liaison aircraft designated as Grasshoppers.
2. During World War II, the U.S. Navy acquired 706 North American B-25 Mitchell medium bombers from the U.S. Army Air Force. These were used by 16 Marine Corps bombing squadrons and designated as PBJs.
3. A ground communications outlet (GCO) allows pilots on the ground at some airports to communicate by radio with IFR air traffic control facilities and/or flight service stations without relying on a cell phone.
4. Some McDonnell Douglas DC-10s have four landing-gear assemblies: a nosewheel, right main, left main, and center main. All must be used for heavy landings, but extending the center main is optional at light landing weights.
5. More than 1,300 of the rugged, twin-engine Britten-Norman BN2 Islanders have been sold. The Trislander (no longer in production) has a third engine mounted on the vertical fin (like the center engine of a DC-10).
6. Knute Rockne lost only 12 games during 13 years as head football coach at the University of Notre Dame and was known for his famous "Win One for the Gipper" speech in 1928.
7. Decelerons on the Northrop Grumman B-2 bomber are ailerons that split open for use as speed brakes. (These ailerons also serve as rudders by splitting less on one side or the other.)
8. FAA regulation 61.51(g)(2) permits an instrument flight instructor (CFII) to log instrument flight time when instructing during actual instrument conditions.
9. True. The center of the original windshield could not withstand a bird strike (simulated by shooting a four-pound chicken carcass from a cannon at 250 knots). The knife literally divided the load and spread it right and left.
10. False. The famous coin toss occurred on December 14. Wilbur won and attempted to fly on that date but crashed. Following repairs to the aircraft on December 17, it was then Orville's turn to try.
11. True. In 1970 he purchased Air West and called it Hughes Airwest, which eventually became a part of Northwest Airlines.
12. (d) Also a Russian émigré, the composer and pianist invested $5,000 and served as an honorary officer of Sikorsky Aero Engineering.
13. (d) According to The Rand McNally Encyclopedia of Military Aircraft, England built 58,144, France 67,987, and Germany 48,537. No U.S.-designed fighters were used in the war.
14. (b) Loganair's flight is between the islands of Westray and Papa Westray in Scotland's Orkney Islands. There is no meal service.

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