EP170 - Information Whiskey: A Nothing Sandwich in the Clouds

Midlife Pilot Podcast

An Information Whiskey edition where Ben loses his Sears and Roebuck HSI in the clouds and flies a partial panel ILS into McCollum like it's just another Tuesday, Brian takes his first solo IFR flight and discovers "the tape hiss of saturation" that nobody tells you about, and Ted goes up in an Arrow where the gear lights have a mind of their own. The Thaden Invasion is 12 days out and the weather looks terrible — which is exactly how we want it.

Listener emails from a student pilot in Frederick and a "chef" who soloed at 53 remind us why we do this, and a five-star review from Scotland teaches us the word "scunnered." Also: a spirited debrief on whether Ben should have declared an emergency, and what the whiskey compass is actually good for.Mentioned on the show:

* Seth Lake's Thaden/VBT arrival notes: https://arflightsafety.com/VBT.html

* FLY OZ VBT Airspace Review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KAJldTQ8LhM

* Seth's podcast on VBT airspace: https://open.spotify.com/episode/0r3rDFPNyUdYtYEfbVBqyl?si=as-NYQ99R5-F9qgAhSSoig

* WINGS registration for Enhanced Preflight seminar: https://www.faasafety.gov/SPANS/event_publicregistration.aspx?eid=141537&type=1

* Game Aero, gamebird aerobatic plane: https://game.aero/gb1-gamebird/

* Thaden Invasion event page: https://midlifepilotpodcast.com/thadeninvasion

* Air Safety Institute, 178 Seconds to Live: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7t4IR-3mSo

* Infamous drivers ed scare film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HAv1pfJqgU

* Sandel HSI: https://avweb.com/features_old/sandel-avionics-sn3308-electronic-hsi-efis-becomes-affordable/

* Sandel teardown video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjWIXHL0G1M

* Blairsville Airport - DZJ: https://www.airnav.com/airport/DZJ

* Angel Flights: https://www.angelflightsoars.org/

* SWTEE "sweet tea" arrival: https://aeronav.faa.gov/d-tpp/2602/00469SWTEE.PDF

* OVPEW fix: https://opennav.com/waypoint/US/OVPEW

* RYY's ILS 27 approach: https://aeronav.faa.gov/d-tpp/2602/06424IL27.PDF

* Garmin GPSMAP 296 on Ben's yoke: https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/6399/

* MPP's Ultimate Guide to Becoming a Midlife Pilot: https://midlifepilotpodcast.com/#guide


2026-03-03 77 min

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