I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday. This week, I’ve put together a round-up of interesting articles from the press that you may have missed while enjoying some good food and drink.
Mendel brings holiday cheer with a fun video for us.
You may be wondering if an old man traveling around the world in a vintage sled is safe, the FAA has you covered:
May the holidays light a spark of brilliance in the darkness of winter!
The big news is plane that landed alone. On December 20, a Beechcraft Super King Air B200 made the first emergency landing using Garmin’s Emergency Autoland system. The aircraft experienced a rapid decompression ascending to 23,000 feet, in IMC conditions in mountainous terrain, activating the Garmin Emergency Autoland. The pilots put on their oxygen masks and remained fully conscious but decided to trust the Garmin and allow Autoland to continue tracking both pilots.
Garmin Autoland chose the nearest suitable airfield, configured the aircraft for landing, and contacted ATC.
The audio is chilling: Pilot incapacitation. Automatic emergency landing in nineteen minutes.
The plane landed safely, the first proof of concept of the technology that took Garmin years to achieve through certification.
Air India has found a forgotten Boeing 737-200 which seems to have completely disappeared from their records. VH-EHH was delivered to Indian Airlines in 1983, leased to Alliance Air in 1998 and then converted into a freighter in 2007. It was grounded in 2012 and parked in a remote corner of the Kolkata airport. There was no paper trail and when Tata Group acquired Air India, it was not included as an asset.
Now Air India has received a parking bill of almost 10 million rupees (US$120,000). Kolkata Airport charged standard parking fees for the thirteen years the Boeing 737 was parked there, although when they initially contacted Air India, the airline said it was not their plane.
The Boeing 737 has been transported to Kempegowda International Airport in Bengaluru, where it will serve as story with a moralTraining platform for aeronautical maintenance technicians.
Kolkata Airport says this is the 14th abandoned plane to leave Kolkata Airport in the last five years.
A Airbus A321XLR remains grounded in Dublin after a forced landing on December 13. The Aer Lingus A321 was flying from London Heathrow to Dublin and encountered gusty crosswinds when landing on runway 28L, which is shown in this incredible planepotter video.
A normal landing would register between 1.1G and 1.4G. The aircraft was found to have suffered a landing load of 3.3G, well above the structural certification threshold for the A321XLR’s reinforced landing gear. The plane, one of five in the Aer Lingus fleet, now requires a complete landing gear replacement; a complex and expensive operation.
This VAS video using audio of a pilot reporting an unknown object went viral during slow news week.
The pilot reported that they had just passed a “small silver boat.” ATC had no other reports and no idea what it could be. In the end, they left the pilots with this worrying message. “Good luck with the aliens.”
Finally, this Five-minute video of the Irish Air Corps saving Christmas for Santa Claus posted by Mendel will surely make you smile.
And with this I take the rest of the year off. Thank you very much for all the condolence comments and I’m sorry I don’t have the emotional energy to respond to all of them. But I read them all and they reminded me how much I love this community. When Cliff died, I wondered if he would continue with Fear of Landing. Now, I can’t imagine doing without it.
Please have a happy transition and see you in 2026.
