Author: Dave English

Nerves of Steel book review

By Dave English

Remember the Southwest 737 that had an engine explode in cruise and a passenger die? The incident was much worse than we might have first guessed, much worse than a simple engine failure at altitude in the simulator. And turns out the captain has a wild backstory more interesting than most airline pilots. This new autobiography has all the details, and it’s a surprisingly great aviation read. When Tammie Jo Shults was growing up, girls didn’t become pilots. The inside story of what it was really like to be a woman in US military flight training during the ’80s is … Continue reading Nerves of Steel book review

Out of this nettle

By Dave English

I live in Phoenix, Arizona. So the picture isn’t of English stinging nettles, but the top of a big prickly saguaro cactus. However, Shakespeare’s line from 1591 still rings true today: “’Tis dangerous to take a cold, to sleep, to drink; but I tell you, my lord fool, out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.”

The sea is always ready

By Dave English

“We must remember that the sea is no respector of ships or persons. The sea is always ready, at the first sign of failure, to rush in and destroy the very craft it so readily supports upon the surface of the water. The sea is only safe and harmless so long as the ship is safe and seaworthy and ably handled.” Felix Riesenberg, Standard Seamanship for the Merchant Service, 1922.

Officer’s Aide Memoire

By Dave English

During WWII, the Royal Navy expanded at a great clip, which required staffing hundreds of ships with new officers. The shore training camp that turned civilians into Royal Navy officers was HMS King Alfred, in Hove, Sussex. It was commanded by one Captain John Noel Pelly, who was recalled from retirement at the start of the war. A few years later, in September 1943, he wrote a short book titled Officer’s Aide Memoire that distilled hundreds of years of sea-going knowledge from the Royal Navy into words. It was widely read among the over twenty-two thousand naval officers that eventually … Continue reading Officer’s Aide Memoire