Brad, in a word, no. The time delay depends upon whether the radar site operator has selected “clear air mode” or “precipitation mode.” My G1000 book goes into more detail about these modes. Minimum age by the time data hits your screen in precip mode is probably around 8 minutes. In clear air mode, it's probably around a minimum of 13 minutes old. You would need to add these numbers to the "Age" shown on your screen to estimate how old the data is.

Couldn't get it to work with IE 8, but downloaded Firefox and was able to set it up. See www.maxtrescott.com Question: If I click on Admin Page, will I see a list of everyone who has clicked "Like", or just the list of my friends (and perhaps their friends) who have clicked Like? I'm thinking of running a contest to encourage people to Like my blog, but to award a prize, I'd need to see the full like of people who clicked Like.

Finally figured it out, but this page didn't help either! http://everything.typepad.com/blog/2003/11/adding_a_banner.html Both pages should be edited to change Design > Styles to Design > Theme or Design > Theme Builder for the new Typepad

I keep trying to change my banner, but this article http://www.sixapart.com/typepad/news/2003/11/adding_a_banner.html refers to the old design, not the new one, so I can't figure out how to change it in the new design. I'm switching back to the old design just so I can change my banner

Tyson, The Ford TriMotor is an amazing piece of history and great fun to fly. I was lucky enough to fly from the right seat for awhile last year. I talked about it in this prior post: http://www.maxtrescott.com/max_trescott_on_general_a/2008/08/oshkosh-update--flying-a-1929-ford-trimotor.html Max

MJ, I'm sorry if I wasn't clear. I wasn't talking about the passing grade required to get a pilot license. 99% is of course more than adequate. I'm was talking about in-flight decision making--something which the PTS doesn't test very well. My point is that if in flight, you make a decision which has only a 99% probability of success, than on one out of every one hundred such flights, you will have an accident--which is totally unacceptable in my mind.

RJ, Good for you! CFIs should always stand up for what they know to be right, even if the boss doesn't want to hear it. Candidly, that's what you're being paid for--to teach good judgment, to exercise it yourself and to defend that good judgment when others may try to trample upon it. Howard, as a well known airline pilot and author wrote to me today, “How will this look at the hearing when you are sitting at the end of the long table and everyone else has a glass of water?” A great phrase I'll try to remember the next time I even contemplate doing something unwise. McGowan, you challenged me to "Get 'em right" and I contend that I did. No where in the article did I use the word limitation. Median is a type of average so it's not incorrect to use the term average in this context (though I admit, median would have been more accurate, which was the type of average I was thinking of). Of course you did exactly the same thing in your comment--you used the word average while describing "the mean." However if we used the mean, if every pilot scored a 100 we would all be perfect pilots, which isn't a very useful concept. Using the median is a far more useful concept, since half the pilots will always better than the other half. That 80% of the pilots think they're above average suggests that 30% of them have overestimated their skills, which could lead some of them to overestimate their ability to handle difficult situations.

I was just reading through some of the comments people posted while taking our GPS survey and I loved this one so much, I had to post it for everyone to see: "There's too much miscellaneous information on too many different screens. It's like trying to use TurboTax to do your taxes while flying IFR, and you don't even get a mouse and full keyboard!" Thanks for the great analogy!

Mark, I sure hope breaking FARs isn't normal for any pilot. My personal standard is to never knowing break an FAR; I hope others do the same. Regarding Russian Roulette, my point was that even a 99% probability of a favorable outcome--which is sufficient in many other areas of life--is totally inadequate for flying. I agree we cannot convert idiots. Hopefully we can give other pilots additional decision making tools early enough in their careers to prevents them from getting into trouble. I think there are licensed pilots who were never told of the risks of say, flying in the mountains, IFR, at night. That doesn't make them idiots (though perhaps they lack curiosity to have not figured that out), but it does indicate that we have a pilot training system which sometimes fails to give pilots all of the tools they need to become safe pilots. Sadly, a lot of training is geared to meeting the minimums standards outlined by the PTS. But the PTS barely addresses decision making and judgment. Yet these factors address 80% of all accidents. So yes, some idiots can never be helped. But many newly minted and even experienced pilots can learn a few new tunes while being preached to in the choir.