Ask the Pilot

As an airline pilot and Salon.com's air travel columnist, Smith has both aviation expertise and the ability to write with sassy intelligence, which turns out to be a winning combination for this book on the weird and fascinating world of commercial flying. While Smith has no special love for tiny seats or half-ounce bags of snack mix, he is nonetheless awed by the concept of flight: ""Okay, flying sucks, but if you can't value the idea of zipping to Hong Kong in twelve hours in a million-pound machine, there's a problem."" Having revised and organized his columns, Smith sets this book up in a loose Q&A format, and answers questions on the physics of flying, the wonder of autopilot, the treatment of pets below deck, air-ground communications and the degree to which passengers should worry about terrorism. Smith clearly possesses a wide breadth of knowledge about engines, takeoffs, weather patterns and other important aspects of flight; best of all he's realistic without being alarmist. For example, when addressing the sudden change in the direction and/or velocity of the wind, known as ""windshear,"" and whether or not it can ""rip the wings off"" a plane, he writes, ""It's like asking if a wave can break a ship in half. Theoretically, yes. Practically speaking, no.""