The Art of Night Flight
‘Into the Night’ Magazine Issue
By Larry Fields, FAA Flight Standards Service executive director
Welcome to our first issue of 2025! As we embark on a brand-new year, it’s the perfect time to reflect on our recent accomplishments and identify a few areas to improve or challenge ourselves with in the months ahead. Some may look to improve their health or read more, while others might resolve to spend more time with family and friends. All are noble pursuits worthy of some renewed focus. Pilots may also endeavor to have a separate set of resolutions for the new year; maybe it’s flying a different aircraft, knocking the rust off your instrument approaches, or perhaps focusing on the subject of this issue, night flying.
I’m sure most pilots would agree with the many endearing features of dusk-to-dawn flight — calmer air, quieter frequencies, better performance, and the tranquility that only soaring over moonlit landscapes can offer. But night flying is not without risk. As you’ll read in these pages, night flight represents a small percentage of total flying hours but has a significant number of incidents and/or accidents. Much of that is due to a loss of visual cues pilots use to navigate and maintain the orientation of their aircraft, especially with no moonlight or city lights to help guide them.
Given the smaller margins for error that come with flying in the dark, pilots need to keep their skills sharp by staying both current and proficient. You also need to be aware of the rules and regulations for night flying that apply to both the pilot and the plane. You can navigate through many of these regulations in the article “Vampire Rules: What You Need to Fly at Night,” so you’ll have everything you need to know about being legal and safe when traversing through the dark.
As we highlighted in last year’s instrument flying issue, pilots are prone to several illusions while flying without reference to a horizon, many of which can have deadly consequences if not properly mitigated. Nighttime operations offer many of the same dangers, along with some optical illusions that can completely disorient a pilot and compromise safety. We unravel the mystery of many of these illusions in the article “Your Senses in the Shadows” and provide a few solid strategies to keep these misleading manifestations at bay.
Helping to literally shed light on the dangers of darkness is the advent of LED technology. LED lights provide a host of benefits including increased reliability, lower costs, and more accurate color. You may have noticed the more brilliant glow of LEDs used in some areas of airfield lighting, and soon you’ll see them lighting the way in hundreds of approach lighting systems across the nation. Get more illuminated on the benefits of LEDs in the article “A New Look at Night Lights.”
With the loss of visual cues and terrain visibility at night comes the increased risk of controlled flight into terrain (CFIT) accidents. While extremely deadly, these accidents are also very avoidable with proper planning and preparation. For tools and tips on how to “avoid things that go bump in the night,” be sure to read “Developing Your Night Flight Plan.”
While night flying does have some added risks, there’s a tremendous upside to cruising the night sky. In the article “Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark,” we talked to a few experts to get some night insight on the many benefits this type of flying offers, as well as some takeaways that can help calm any nocturnal nerves.
We hope these articles offer some helpful guidance and inspiration to those pilots who wish to embrace or reconnect with the joy of night flight. With the proper precautions, taking a leap back into the dark can be extremely rewarding and enjoyable.
Safe flying, and here’s to a safe and successful 2025!
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