Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Out of the gate

I'm sitting here at the airport this morning, having a cup of coffee and listening to chatter on the control tower frequency. This is going to be another good day.

As of today, I've been a CFI/CFI-I for two weeks. I'm actually much busier this early in the game than I thought I'd be. So far, I've given about 6 introductory flights, 2 flight reviews, and have one full-time student. The full-time student is working on his instrument rating, so doing the CFI-I is definitely paying off. It's still weird to think that I was working on that rating less than 6 months ago!

I think it's made a huge difference just being here to answer the phone, and we're seeing more business already because of it. We're getting an ad ready for October's issue of the Wacoan, and expect to see more business out of that too. Really, this is a matter of doing discovery flights and bringing students on until we reach a critical mass---for me that would mean flying 8 hours a day---and I expect that should happen sometime near the end of this year.

And, my demand is building at more than one airport! I've already given one flight review in Victoria, and the Cub will be ready very soon for me to begin giving tailwheel endorsements. I'm seeing some good, serious interest in that already, and I think that will only increase.

So far, I've seen some beautiful mornings and some equally beautiful sunsets, flown with some interesting people, and some interesting airplanes (the flight review in Victoria was in a Cessna 175 Skylark---very cool airplane if you've never seen one). And we're just two weeks in!

Alisa and I leave on the 5th for a much-needed vacation. She's put up with a lot this year, and I've done nothing but work since January between grad school and making my seemingly ridiculous progression through my pilot ratings. We're going back to Germany to see some of our best friends, and it's going to be great! What will be even greater is that fact that, this time, I can actually look forward to what I'm coming back to. It will make the vacation even more of a vacation!

I'm off now to walk down to the FBO (Texas Aero's office) to meet another prospective student for a discovery flight. It's clear outside today, and not blazing hot yet, so it should be fun. With any luck, I'll get a student out of it!

"All flying involves risk. That is part of the glamour of flight, but reducing the risk does not reduce the glamour."
-Sparky Imeson

1 comment:

  1. Good post, Aaron. Sounds like things are going really well. I'm glad you're able to get some time instructing on instruments. I didn't get to very often, mostly primary for me.

    Have a great time in Germany!

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