The 1st 500

I'll always remember January 17, 1994.  From a deep slumber I was awakened by something that sounded like a freight train that was about to run through my bedroom.  It's funny how all of your senses can come alive in a split second, even when you're half asleep.  But before I could figure out what was making that sound -- BOOM, it hit.

It was such a violent jolt that I was literally thrown from my bed and landed face down on the floor.  I lunged for the doorway and clung on for dear life.  My door started to slam against me so I threw my foot up to push it open and stop it from hitting me; my back now firmly wedged against the door frame.  Behind the door were a couple of shelves that contained some model airplanes and one model aircraft carrier.  My grandfather used to build models and since we both shared a passion for aviation I just remember how sad I felt to hear them all come crashing down.  There was nothing I could do to stop them.  I couldn't even stand.  I still didn't fully grasp what was going on, I just thought -- not my airplanes.

As I turned my head away from that crashing sound, I heard the sound of glass breaking.  The picture frames that my parents had on the walls.  All of the dishes, the glasses that were in the kitchen, they all came crashing down.  As the house finally stopped shaking and the deafening roar of seismic waves and things breaking ceased, I heard a voice from above call down to me.  No, it wasn't God.  It was my parents.  My mom yelled down from their upstairs bedroom, "are you okay down there?"  I barely got out a short response, "yeah, I'm good. You?"  Then the shaking started again and she yelled, "hang on, here comes more!"

When things finally calmed down, I was able to find some shoes to put on.  I knew I'd need them with all that broken ceramic and glass.  I still couldn't look behind my door.  My parents and I got out of the house and stepped into the front yard.  The ground shook some more.  It would continue to shake for days.  But what really struck us at that moment was seeing the horizon to the west in this weird orange color.  We could hear explosions.  Later we'd find out that it was a major gas line that had erupted and was set ablaze.  My mom remarked, "it's like we're in a war zone."

Cal State Northridge

We lived about three miles from the epicenter of the Northridge earthquake.  Fortunately, our house remained stable so we never had to move out but it did need some repairs.  Lots of things needed replacing.  To this day my parents only use paper plates.  They say, what does it matter, as soon as we buy new dishes they're just going to break again.  Some things you just can't replace, like model airplanes.  I was able to put a couple back together but most of them were damaged beyond repair.  I loved that aircraft carrier.

Near the interchange I'd take to SMO

So what does this story have to do with an aviation blog?  I was in the middle of training for my instrument rating.  I had just completed my private pilot's license at the end of December.  I flew everyday of the week and took weekends to study.  I prided myself on getting things done in minimum hours.  I thought that made me a better pilot but in hindsight I really don't know why I was so rushed.  The earthquake and all of its damage to infrastructure would set back my training by a few weeks.  I ended up getting my instrument in late March.  It felt like it took forever.

Reading about the new joint strike fighter with grandpa

Just about a month after getting my instrument, I took up my first passenger -- my grandpa.  When he was a kid he used to ride his bike to the airports in the Valley to watch airplanes.  A local pilot noticed him coming to the airport and offered to teach him to fly but since he was underage they required his parent's signature.  His mom was scared of flying and refused to sign the paperwork.  A couple of years later he was drafted into the U.S. Army during WWII.  Life happened and he never got a chance to get his license. It was such an honor for me to be able to take him up.  I even let him grab the yolk and take control for a few minutes.

Pic taken Dec 1994 at SMO

At that time I would never have guessed that my life would take so many twists and turns.  For several years I barely flew.  Maybe once or twice a year, if I was lucky.  I made sure to always do my biennial flight review so I could at least say that I had a current BFR even if I wasn't active.  It wasn't until the summer of 2001 that I finally figured out how to fly nearly once a month.  I had SMO-AVX-SMO all over my logbook.
To escape the hustle and bustle of the city, I'd take a Cessna 172 out of Santa Monica airport where I learned to fly and I would head over to Catalina Island.  They have a great airport cafe there and I'd get a buffalo burger.  Just sitting in their outside seating area you could overlook the water and make out Long Beach in the distance.  It was gorgeous and serene.

Back then I was working retail, a Group Sales Manager for Macy's Beverly Center.  I managed a couple of departments that included shirts and ties.  In June 2001, I was awarded the Tie Department Manager of the Year by the Neckwear Association of America.  Truth be told, I had never heard of that organization but hey, if you want to give me an award and fly me to New York for the ceremony then I'm your biggest fan!

During the trip I got to take the Circle Line cruise around Manhattan.  I have pictures of the old skyline in the background and one with a close up shot of me and the twin towers right over my shoulder.  It was an impressive sight.  Back to reality and California I went.  Less than three months later I'd see those same towers come crashing down. I had that same feeling of helplessness that I had during the earthquake.  I wanted to do something but wasn't able.  That's when I started thinking about my next move.

Job perk: touring Air Force One

I knew all along that I wanted to be in aviation.  I just didn't know how to get there.  About three months later I would leave my hometown of Los Angeles and head east and start pursuing my career in aviation and government.  From Embry-Riddle in Florida to Burbank to Kansas to the mid-Atlantic (for a short time) and then back to Kansas.  All along I've been chasing my dream.  In real life you don't have a magenta line to follow, there is no "Direct To" button.  And without an industry mentor, you forge your own path -- if you really want it.

Even though most people don't know what a state director of aviation does, I know that I'm blessed to be where I am.  I'm living the dream, doing the things I knew that I've always wanted to do.  I'm also an active pilot with a commercial license that's just about to cross the 500 hour threshold.  It may have taken me a while to get here, but I wouldn't change a thing.  As John Wooden said, "success is a journey, not a destination."  These are just my first 500 hours of flight, spread over 21 years.  Even if it takes another 21 to get to 1,000, my journey continues.  This is what I do.  This is who I am.

"Keep Swinging"

I recently attended a leadership conference where the theme focused on Challenges and Perseverance.  I wasn't sure what to expect but I was really grateful I was able to attend.  Ed Hearn, a former major league baseball player that won a world series with the New York Mets, had his career cut short by injury.  Later, he faced life threatening health issues and has since received three kidney transplants.  His message was simple: life will throw you curves but you need to stay in the batter's box and keep swinging.

It's really easy to identify challenges in your life.  It's not so easy to count your blessings, especially when you're going through some tough times.  So is there a secret to living a happier and healthier life?  Heck no!  The answer lies within you.  The only thing you can control in life is the way you react to it.

So why am I writing this blog if I'm not going to promote any secret to success?  Because it's a message that should be shared and is relevant to our aviation industry right now.  If you step out of the batter's box you will never ever get a hit.  But, if you step up to the plate and take a few swings...who knows?  You may just hit one out of the park.

Never stop swinging.  Don't give up, especially on yourself.  If you have a passion in life, pursue it relentlessly, even in the face of adversity.

This past month has been a tough one for aviation and aerospace.  We lost three good doctors in a plane crash outside of Chicago.  We lost more good people when a plane crashed into a building in Wichita.  And we lost another when SpaceShip Two crashed in California.  This last event was followed by stories in the media that questioned the safety of flight and the pursuit of space travel.

If you choose to live, then you accept risk because there is no way to eliminate it completely.  If you choose a career in an industry that you are passionate about, then adversity cannot become an obstacle but a building block.  From each others mistakes, tragedies and setbacks, we learn new things about our machines, processes and most importantly...ourselves.

As an individual how do you respond to adversity?  As a collective whole, how do we respond?  It's not in our nature to give up.  We are an optimistic nation, even if we need to remind ourselves of that from time to time. We keep swinging.

When I heard of the recent rocket explosion and then the questions of Virgin Galactic's space pursuits, I had to go back and re-read President Kennedy's speech when he challenged us to go to the moon.

I've heard this speech before, as I am sure many of you have.  But it's still relevant and timely.  Our energies and skills are measured by our ability to achieve goals.  We have a willingness to accept challenges (risk) in order to accomplish goals.  And we do these things because we're not just optimistic but very competitive.  We like to be first.  We like to be best.  We can be neither if we aren't willing to step into that batter's box.

To this day people still ask me why I fly.  I can never give a good answer that satisfies their curiosity, especially when their perspective is one from concern.  "Flying is so dangerous", they say.  But if I were to let those challenges and fears overwhelm the positive benefits I receive from flying, I would never leave my house.  Instead, I choose to live.  I choose to fly.  I choose to step into that batter's box knowing full well there are times I'm going to swing and miss.  Heck, I may even get hit by a pitch.  But you know what?  I'm willing to take my lumps, and first base.  I'm not going to step away.  I'm going to keep swinging and I know our industry will continue to do the same. 

Aviation is for everyone!

Aviation is for everyone!  That's what we kept telling all the kids we talked to during the Fly Kansas Air Tour and the Kansas Aviation Expo.  Never take no for an answer and never let someone else set limitations on what you can achieve.

Those are great messages. Hopefully it resonated with at least a few of those kids, because we certainly turned several heads.  It's hard not to look when you're traveling around the state with 40 different aircraft and 60 volunteer pilots.  It's hard not to notice when you're standing with two earth-rounders in Barrington Irving and Amelia Rose Earhart.

The last time I wrote a blog post I talked about creating an atmosphere that may foster chance encounters and hopefully spark the aviation bug in some of these kids.  I called it Planned Serendipity -- the act of putting someone in a position to discover something on their own and maybe experience something they weren't expecting.

The Fly Kansas Air Tour went to 9 different locations in 3 days and reached out to over 600 kids. Then we had another 300 kids in Wichita experience the Flying Classroom and heard some very inspirational speeches. That's nearly 1,000 kids in just 4 days of outreach efforts, thanks in large part to all the sponsors that believed in the vision and the volunteers that shared the passion.

But there was one little boy that stood out in the crowd, a 9-year old named Jack.  When we arrived at Pittsburg we were greeted by 250 kids, most of them around 13 years old.  There was also a reporter there who told me about her 9-year old son that loves aviation so much he reads WWII warbird encyclopedias to bed.

She asked me if this was an event that her younger son could participate in if she were to pull him out of school.  Of course I responded affirmatively and with encouragement.  When she returned little Jack got to experience the thrill of a lifetime...he got a ride in a Stearman bi-plane!  His mom wrote a great article about his experience and gave credit to the pilot for remembering what it was like to be 9-years old and discovering a passion for aviation.

And that, folks, is why we do it.  Not because we remember what it was like to be 9, but because we never really grew up.  Deep down inside, we're all still a bunch of little kids that get to run around and play with the toys we love.  Of course, some of our toys have grown in cost and unlike a kite that could take and survive a dive into a tree, we take great care in playing with, cleaning and putting our toys away for the night.

After so much planning, anticipation and nerves, the Kansas Aviation Expo 2014 has concluded.  What a blessing it was to have been a part of the third ever air tour to go across Kansas!  Making friends and enjoying the camaraderie of so many other pilots was amazing!  Reaching out to that many kids across the state was our goal but to see it come to fruition was incredible!

I even got to share a little of my own story.  I recalled growing up in an area of Los Angeles that doesn't look like Beverly Hills and told them that I once took a field trip to the local McDonald's.  There they gave us a behind the scenes look at working there and then left us with a simple message: don't do drugs, stay out of gangs and one day you can work here with us.
Some people asked me later if that was a true story and the answer is yes.  But even back then I never really listened to what others had to say about what I should be doing with my life.  I mean, really, who in LA would have thought that I'd end up in Kansas!  Here I am, though, living the dream.  Living my dream.  And when you do what you love, you're never really working.

At the end of the week I was logging all of my time in aircraft and I realized something.  My first discovery flight took place on September 25, 1993.  21 years later I was standing in front of a large group of students telling them to pursue their dreams and encouraging them to learn to fly.  It doesn't get much better than that.

Planned Serendipity

When I started this blog I named it my Aviation Passion Bucket.  I came up with that name because aviation isn't just a job to me, it's in my blood, it's my passion.  The term "passion bucket" also comes from an interview that former head coach of UCLA football, Rick Neuheisel, said during an interview with Dan Patrick.  He said that you had to have your passion bucket full in order to play against your cross town rival.

This message is so important in the way you attack life.  If you have a passion for what you do, it's obvious to everyone around you...and it's infectious.   This is why I love my job.  I get to work with people who share my passion.  We love aviation!  We love it so much that we want to share it with others, which is why we've been so focused on creating events and activities that reaches out to our non-traditional partners and to the younger generation to try and help inspire them towards a career in aviation.


The Kansas Aviation Expo is about take-off in exactly one month from the day I write this post.  We're not just building another industry conference.  Oh no.  We're doing much more than that.  We're going to fly around the state with a group of pilots to talk to kids about aviation careers, educational programs and scholarship opportunities.  We're trying to inspire the next generation of aviation leaders!




The Fly Kansas Air Tour will allow students from across the state to experience portions of the Kansas Aviation Expo that they wouldn't have otherwise experienced without having to make a trip to Wichita.  This is important outreach as aviation is the second largest economic driver in the state, second only to agriculture.  Speaking of, Kansas farmers can attribute over $1 billion in crop value to the efforts of aerial applicators so we're going to have an ag spraying demo at our first air tour stop.

We'll also have Amelia Rose Earhart and Barrington Irving come out to talk to the crowds.  After talking with Amelia in Oshkosh I sat with some friends and we started discussing how we could fly around the world.  We didn't realize it until later but hearing her stories inspired us to think about pushing our own limits.  These are great opportunities for kids to learn about all that aviation has to offer.

Sometimes it's hard for me to think about myself as a career role model and I'm pretty sure I'm not alone.  But more of us need to think about that passion bucket that we have, the one that drives us to take on the tough challenges of our industry and continue to persevere with our dreams.  We need to think about sharing that passion and helping fill someone else's bucket.

I was recently watching the old John Cusack and Kate Beckinsale movie from 2001 called Serendipity.  At the end the main character's best friend tries to support his decision by stating that the Greeks never wrote obituaries.  Instead, they just asked one question after a man died: did he have passion?  This is totally fabricated by the way as the Greeks wrote pretty extensive eulogies, but for the sake of my blog post I'm going to go with the underlying message.

As you look back at your career and life, can you answer that question affirmatively?  Did you live with passion?  Did you follow yours?  Did you share it with the next generation to help carry on the legacy?  When you were a kid, who inspired you?  Where did you find your passion?  

We're hoping that with the Kansas Aviation Expo we help these kids make fortunate discoveries by accident.  That after all, is the definition of serendipity.  Some of these kids may not know they have a passion for aviation unless we show them what it has to offer.  

Don't forget this message: there is something for everyone when it comes to aviation.  It's not just about being a pilot, a mechanic or riveter.  There are so many more options than that.  

Getting kids to the airports, interacting with passionate pilots and learning about aviation, hopefully, will put them in a position to make a very fortunate discovery.  

Aviation is cool and you can do it, too!

Pilot shortage or a new state of normalcy?

I was at an airport meeting recently with several pilots in attendance.  We went through several of the normal questions related to airports and pilot issues, then came the off-the-walls.  Those are the questions that you get during public speaking that are completely inconsistent with the theme of discussion.

Of course, it doesn't take much to get me to opine on matters related to aviation.  I'm always open to engage in hypothesizing some of our challenges, like the pilot shortage.  Or is it?

Leading up to our discussion on the alleged pilot shortage issue we first talked about the proposed third class medical revision. Someone in attendance made an observation that the average age of the pilots in the room was somewhere around 65.  I hadn't even noticed until he said something because that's just our normal audience.  Pilots are an aging breed.

I made the comment that I think that the third class medical is going to keep the old-timers flying longer, but will do little to help with new pilot starts.  Keeping the older generation flying isn't a bad thing; we just need to keep in mind what problem we're solving with this third class medical change.

Then I thought of something.  If this is seen by most pilots as a good thing for our industry, yet it doesn't address the issue of new pilot starts, what will?  What is driving the shortage?  What has changed?  Why does it seem critical for this generation?  Perhaps we don't have a pilot shortage at all.  Maybe we're just reaching a state of normalcy in the industry.  I'll explain.

Most of our aging pilot population are baby boomers, or products or WWII.  Why is that?  I think we can see a direct correlation to the activities of WWII and pilot starts from that era.  Not only did we have very large military air forces, but several WWII veterans were able to use their GI Bill to learn how to fly.  Because we were a manufacturing mecca, we had plenty of flying assets in the national fleet.

But did we, as a nation, create an artificial market?  Without the assistance of government funding, most of the pilots from that generation may not have been able to afford pilot training.  It's a similar state that we are in now.  Without some level of financial assistance, the cost of learning to fly is keeping several people on the ground.

Not everyone can afford to fly, and maybe not everyone deserves the privilege to fly.  So maybe we've reached a state of normalcy with our pilot population.  I think this is similar to the concept of the airline industry.  Because of government subsidy, everyone was afforded an opportunity to travel by airline.  However, the ticket price didn't correlate to the true cost of operating an airline.  To this day, everyone feels entitled to travel yet not everyone would be able to afford  the ticket price if it was solely based on operating cost.

Have we been too coddled by our government all this time?  As goes the military, so goes our industry.  And right now you can see a trend in downsizing our military and shifting some flying missions to drones.  Don't get me wrong, I believe there will always be missions for manned flights, but we can't deny the correlation between our industry and the military trends.

And let's be frank, this administration has not been entirely friendly to general aviation.  When business tools, such as aircraft, are systematically demonized then it impacts us all.  Those corporate pilots started somewhere.  Not everyone can or does enroll at a university to get into a pilot program.

Taking a purist viewpoint of a free market, one can argue that any industry that can't sustain itself without government intervention shouldn't be in the game.  It's clear that in our current political climate, we aren't likely to see assistance from either side of the aisle.

With that said, it's all up to us.  What are we willing to do to help develop general aviation pilots?  Are we content to sit back and accept that we've reached a state of normalcy in the market?  Or will we rise together to start tackling these challenges head on with creative solutions?  What say you?

Lucky '13

I've been trying to figure out why I feel a little anxious today.  It's almost like that feeling you get when you think you've forgotten a deadline.  Then I realized what it was.  Today is the last work day of 2013.  Sure, it's a bit of an arbitrary deadline.  I mean, we'll have one day off then back to work on Thursday, but still, I feel like I should be doing something.  Instead, I'm going to reflect on this past year and then leave early to watch UCLA football play in their bowl game.

Twenty years ago I passed my check ride and got my private pilots license.  Two years ago I got my commercial ticket.  And yesterday I passed my biennial flight review by flying a near perfect ILS approach into Lawrence and greased my landing.  It doesn't get much better than that!  Unless, of course, you get to fly a PT-17 Stearman.  Been there, done that!

I still can't believe that I've been a pilot for over 20 years.  I started flying before GPS was common.  I still have my first wall poster of the panel of a 172.  When I look at those old steam gauges I wonder how the heck did I ever fly IMC with that panel?!  But I did, and I lived to tell about it!  And each time I tell one of those stories they get better and better.

After all these years, my passion for aviation still burns deep.  Duke Ellington used to say that music was his mistress and she plays second fiddle to no one.  I know exactly what he means because aviation is mine and forever will be.  That's why I feel so blessed to be able to do the things that I get to do.

Never say never.  Growing up in LA, I never thought that I'd be living in Kansas.  But here I am and loving every minute!  Kansas has such a great history of aviation pioneers and continues to remain on the leading edge of the industry.  Just look at your GPS device.  If it's a Garmin, it was made in Kansas!

2013 was great!  Not only did I become the director of the state aviation office in the state that is the birthplace of general aviation, home to the air capital of the world; but I also was a part of something special when a group of us launched the first-ever Kansas Aviation Expo.  What a great event and we're going to do it again!  #KSAvExpo2014, where dreams come true!

So, what am I anxious for?  I can't wait until Thursday!  I want to start this new year and get the ball rolling.  For now I just need to relax for a minute, cheer on my Bruins, take a day off and then it's back to work.

I'd be remiss if I didn't take this opportunity to thank each and everyone one of you in the aviation community for helping make 2013 spectacular.  A special thank you to those that risk their lives helping save others.  If you haven't spent time with an air ambulance operator, I'd suggest you take some time to learn what they do.  Our meeting with Lifeteam was an eye opener.  Working in aviation isn't just about being a corporate fat cat.  We're much more than that.  Aviation saves lives.

Here's to blue skies and smooth landings in 2014. Cheers!

The Dreamcatcher

We've all had nightmares.  Some involve public speaking with your pants down, while others have that final exam that you didn't study for.  Whatever it is, it's always embarrassing and stressful when you know everyone is watching you.  I imagine this is how the pilots of that modified Boeing 747 Dreamlifter felt as they sat on the runway of Wichita's Jabara airport instead of McConnell Air Force Base, their intended destination.  Oops.

photo by V.White

I first heard the story on NPR as I was driving in to work.  I honestly didn't think it was that big of a deal, and had no idea just how much buzz it would create across the world.  Indeed, we are living in a globalized world and once the media picked up the story here it didn't take long for media around the world to follow suit.  When I got to the office this story was just blowing up all over social media, too.  I had aviation friends from California, Chicago and Florida all calling to talk about this guy's mishap and we all wondered how the heck were they going to get that plane out of there.


Following the story was a cross between watching a beached whale and waiting for a shuttle launch.  There was nervous anticipation in my office.  This great big airplane just sat on the runway of this itty bitty airport as the world waited to see if it would depart successfully.  A side note is deserved here.  Jabara has a six thousand foot runway that's one hundred feet wide.  When put up against most other Kansas airports, it's not that small.  But, it makes for a more exciting story to describe it as such.

I have two monitors on my desktop, each was streaming a different live shot of the scene at Jabara.  When the plane fired up the engines, my two staff members came into the office with a visitor from accounting that had stopped by to actually work.  Little did she know she'd get a show, too!  As the plane rolled down the runway, the three pilots in the office started to cheer and shout out words of encouragement like, "come on baby, pick up airspeed!"  I think we all shouted "rotate" at the same time as there was lift off.  One of the first response posts on Facebook was someone that said, "Well, that was uneventful."  Exactly!  Uneventful is what we wanted. Uneventful was success.  Uneventful meant everyone was safe, including the crew.

To get back to a point I made earlier, it wasn't that big of a deal.  It's not uncommon for a plane to land at the wrong airport, especially in general aviation.  For those non-aviation folks that may be reading this blog, let me assure you that this doesn't mean we pilots aren't safe.  It just happens.  And that it happened in Wichita isn't that surprising, either.  There are around 80 landing locations in the greater Wichita area.  For any pilot that isn't familiar, that can be a rather intimidating statistic and visual perspective.

Now think about this.  What if you were flying at night, in the clouds, and this was your first time to the area?  You're on an instrument approach to your intended destination; you break out of the clouds while on your final approach and you see an airport.  This airport you see is nearly as wide as the airport you're aiming for and you proceed to turn off the autopilot and manually fly the plane down on a visual approach.  You land successfully.  You land a ginormous plane, one of the world's largest cargo planes, successfully on a smaller general aviation airport.  Great job!  But wait, there's more.  It's the wrong airport.  Doh!

If it was a different airplane, this story never makes the news.  The plane would just turn around and take off again.  But it became a big story because it's a big plane.  There was no hiding this mistake.  Just like walking into that classroom in that nightmare, you just got caught with your pants down.  I really feel bad for the pilot.  With only four of these airplanes flying in the world, there aren't many crews or pilots qualified to fly these things.  And by all accounts, except for navigation, this pilot was skilled.

The irony in the story is that he went manual and didn't over rely on technology.  Right now pilots are getting called out for not having enough stick and rudder skill to fly because of an over reliance on auto pilot, GPS and the like.  Then here comes a guy who disengages the GPS and successfully lands that behemoth on a relatively short runway.  Instead of getting kudos he got 15 minutes of fame (or shame) and got to sit and watch another crew depart out of Jabara.  Hi wound, meet some salt.  I for one would love to meet this pilot and buy him a beer.  I'd pat him on the back and tell him he did a heck of a job landing that plane...and then I'd proceed to make fun of him.  Cheers!