Month: December 2023

My Amazing Experience at EAA Air Venture (Oshkosh) and EAA Advanced Air Academy

Both the F22 Raptor and the Piper X-Cub  images are credit to my friend Sean Albanese. The rest are all credit to the Air Academy staff.

Hi again Flying Musicians Association! I hope you are all having a great holiday season! Christmas is just around the corner! This article will be focused on the wonderful experience I had at EAA Advanced Air Academy back in July-August which I was honored to receive a full ride scholarship to through EAA Chapter 393 and VAA Chapter 29. Before I get started, I want to give a big thanks to these two chapters as well as Mr. Scott Cameron and his wife Julie Cameron, the camp directors, and everyone else who took time out of their summers to give me such a wonderful experience!

For those who don’t know what EAA Advanced Air Academy is, I have linked it here. It is a nine-day summer camp tailored to honor aviation from all aspects. It is wonderful experience where for the first three days, Air Academy participants like me, had the whole day to explore AirVenture and eat juicy, flavorful, and cheap Bratwursts (German hot dogs popular in Wisconsin). During the remaining seven days of Advanced Air Academy, we utilized the airfield and surrounding facilities of KOSH/OSH and the Air Academy Lodge to hold a wonderful summer camp in which we learned a great deal of aviation from aviators, aircraft mechanics, schoolteachers, welders, and more. Everyone came together and volunteered their time to share their common passion for aviation, teaching us for no personal reward. I can’t thank them all enough and will indefinitely be in debt to them for the kindness and all the hard work they put into Air Academy for us. Together, these volunteers and our amazing camp counselors who were all college aviation students, welded mugs and structures, built airfoils, made kneeboards, learned about university flight teams and opportunities, and so much more. Perhaps one of most thrilling aspects, was the fact that we all lodged together in the Air Academy lodge, creating a sense of community as we flew on flight sims, watched movies, ate delicious meals, and played pool together.

Now focusing on the famed EAA AirVenture, I loved it. It was a wonderful experience. I walked from booth to booth and met with Delta Air Lines recruiters, sat in the Cirrus SR22 T, Cessna 182T, the Cirrus Vision Jet, Bell Helicopters, flew a Boeing 787 Dreamliner simulator, spoke with Airbus representatives, and even sat in a few prototype jets that are set to debut later this year. Among those in attendance were also our wonderful sponsors: Honda, Foreflight, BOSE, Gleim Aviation, Hartzell Propeller, Sporty’s Pilot Shop, MyGoFlight, and more! They really had a wonderful showing.

Beyond the countless booths, I watched many airshows in awe, observing teams to the likes of the F-35 and F-22 demo team as well as the Ghost Writer Airshows crew perform their amazing death-defying acrobatic stunts showing the utmost degree of airmanship, unlocking previously unimaginable capabilities of flight. I also spoke to tenured commercial airline pilots and private owners, and even German Air Traffic Control professionals who were ground and center controllers in Frankfurt and Cologne, demonstrating just how diverse and international of a community EAA AirVenture attracted. The best way to describe Air Venture is to say it’s a Disneyland of aviation for three thrilling days.

EAA Air Venture is a celebration of aviation. It demonstrated to me just how powerful, tight-knit, passionate, and unique the aviation community us. You get to experience all the facets of aviation from prototype planes, to airlineners, and mom and pop businesses like newly invented parachute gear and arobatic harnesses. It’s an excellent way to meet people, to familiarize and enter yourself into the aviation lineage which is full of rich tradition and passion. AirVenture is what you want it to be, it can be a chance for you to meet airline recruiters or speak with an aviator with 50 years of experience flying and about the Super Decathlon he just restored. As long as you immerse yourself in the booths, activities, and people there, you will have an excellent and enriching time. It demonstrates the unimaginable strength and companionship unparallel to anything that you feel from being an active member in communities like the aviation community and FMA. I will forever think about those delicious $2 Bratwursts (hotdogs) and I will without a doubt be back in Oshkosh for EAA AirVenture every year I can!

Coupled with the amazing efforts of the EAA Air Academy volunteers and camp staff, my EAA Air Academy experience taught me so much about not just flying but the engineering and handiwork behind what it takes to maintain, build, and comprehend the system of mechanics which make an aircraft fly. During my nine days in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, I lived, breathed, and ate aviation, and I loved it! It is the best representation of aviation there is, and I highly recommend you all go to EAA AirVenture, and if you are an EAA member contact your local chapter or apply online for the EAA Advanced Air Academy scholarship. I also highly recommend our wonderful FMA community take a look at what EAA (Experimental Aircraft Association) has to offer. This is one of the many great opportunities they have (i.e. flight scholarships, weekly/monthly chapter meetings and Free flights and fly-ins with delicious food and wonderful like-minded people!).

Below are some videos shot during EAA Oshkosh. Enjoy a C-5 Galaxy rocketing out of Oshkosh, and a helicopter flight over the airfield after EAA Oshkosh concluded! Enjoy!

 

Achieving the Dream

Fellow pilots and musicians,

I know this is long overdue, but I thought I’d take the time to update you all on what has been going on since the last time I posted. Let’s pick up where we left off. After my last post, I studied, flew, and worked hard to end August with a CFI, multi-engine certificate (not MEI, just commercial AMEL/ASEL), and a bachelor’s degree in science in aviation. Then I got a job as a flight instructor in Council Bluffs, Iowa. I was living the dream, getting paid to fly, living off Taco Bell and energy drinks, and having non-stop fun. After a couple of months, I ended up getting back to work myself and passing my CFI-I check ride in February of this year. With that, I gained a lot more students and started flying quite a bit more. My record was 42 flight hours in one week (I don’t suggest this, it is extremely taxing on yourself). In June, I interviewed and got a job offer with SkyWest Airlines, but I still had about 150 hours left until I hit my 1,000-hour minimum requirement. Those last couple of weeks of instructing were by far the hardest. In three weeks, I had 12 students take private, instrument, commercial, and CFI-I check rides. This meant dozens of hours giving ground lessons and never-ending check-ride prep flights. With that, I had 11 students pass on the first try and only one student had to do a retest and then passed with no problem. Although, that student taught me a great lesson on the effect of fatigue. We had started the day with a last-minute plane swap which meant checking the maintenance logs, documents, and changing paperwork on IACRA. Then, we flew two hours to the airport where the check-ride took place. After a two and a half hour oral, they went and flew. So you can imagine why it was easy to make a simple mistake.

Now begins the next chapter, the airlines. The hardest training I’ve ever had. In late August, I started the incessant training process to become an airline pilot. First was ATP/CTP in Dallas, where we learned the information required to take the written test for my R-ATP certificate. After passing that, I flew to Salt Lake City, Utah, where I had about a month of classroom training. The first week was indoc, learning about the company’s policies, exemptions, and regulations, followed by a test at the end. The second week was all on the computer, learning about the CRJ’s systems, then two weeks of ground training in the classroom with three validation tests at the end. Once I made it through the classroom training, I flew out to Cincinnati for a month to do all of the simulator training. After roughly 44 hours in the simulator, another validation, and a flight back to SLC, it was time to take my LOE. The LOE is the check ride for the type rating, and R-ATP in my case. All two months of training, weeks worth of studying, six different tests, and nights of little sleep led up to this. On October 28th, I passed my LOE with a few minor mistakes. Nobody is perfect, right? I now had a type rating for the CRJ and my R-ATP. But the training doesn’t stop there. After a quick two days of differences training for the CRJ-700/900 (all of my training was on the CRJ-200), I did my first IOE trip. That first flight was terrifying, but so much fun. All I could think about when we first took off was “holy crap this is really fast”. As for my first landing, I slammed that CRJ so hard into the runway in South Bend, Indiana, I thought I left a crater behind me. I landed so hard, that passengers were complaining in the back. By the end of the trip, I had gotten the landings down a little better. At least the passengers weren’t complaining now, just the flight attendants. As of now, I’m done with training and on reserve (on-call) based out of Denver. I moved back home to Montgomery, Texas, right before I left for training and am commuting to Denver until I can hold an IAH/DFW base.

So, I’ve been pretty busy in the last year or so, but where does music fit in with all that? Up until I went to training, I was playing a lot of guitar and drums with my best friend in Omaha. We had plans to start playing small gigs but sadly, I had to move. I’m still playing when I can, but with commuting, and being away from home all the time, it is difficult to find time. I’d also like to get back into playing piano as I haven’t played consistently in years.

And now you’re all caught up. If you’ve read this far, thank you for the support. Thank you to everyone in the community, my parents, and instructors for helping me get this far. It’s a dream come true. And a big thank you to Bose. I’ve been using the A20s that they were kind enough to send out for almost two years and still use them today at the airlines with zero issues. If you have any questions about flight training, airlines, or anything else, feel free to reach out. Happy holidays!