Ready For Takeoff - Turn Your Aviation Passion Into A Career
613 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 1 month ago - ★★★★★ - 136 ratingsThe Ready For Takeoff podcast will help you transform your aviation passion into an aviation career. Every week we bring you instruction and inspiring interviews with top aviators in their field who reveal their flight path to an exciting career in the skies.
Homepage Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed
Episodes
RFT 210: C-21/C-130/KC-10 Pilot Dr. Jannell MacAulay
August 06, 2018 06:01 - 45 minutes - 62.8 MBDr MacAulay spent 20 years in the US Air Force where she commanded the 400 member joint 305th Operations Support Squadron, was a professionalism and leadership instructor, and served as the Director of Human Performance and Leadership for the 58th Special Operations Wing. In this capacity, she stood up a pilot program launching a human performance effort from the ground up, to create high-performing, mindful, and mission-focused warfighters & families. Most recently, she serves as a Human ...
RFT 209: Airplanes As Missiles
August 02, 2018 21:48 - 8 minutes - 13.2 MBAttempting to crash an aircraft into a building was not an entirely new paradigm. Despite Secretary Rice stating, “I don't think anybody could have predicted that they would try to use an airplane as a missile”, there had been numerous prior attempts to utilize aircraft in this manner. In addition, there had been a significant number of warnings suicide hijackings posed a serious threat. For example, a 1994 report for the Department of Defense predicted every aspect of the 911 attack. ...
RFT 208: Vietnam C-123 Pilot/Artist "Doc" Weaver
July 30, 2018 06:01 - 33 minutes - 46.6 MBFrom Doc Weaver's website: Upon graduation from college, Weaver pursued a flying career as a pilot in the United States Air Force. In addition to flying, painting gave him an outlet that added much to his life. His last assignment prior to retirement brought him to New Mexico in 1974. He retired from active duty in 1976 and from that time on he has painted full time. In 1974 Doc Weaver joined the New Mexico Watercolor Society. He was awarded Charter Signature Membership in this society. ...
RFT 207: Bojinka!
July 26, 2018 04:57 - 7 minutes - 11.3 MBFunding for the Bojinka Plot came from Osama bin Laden and Hambali, and from front organizations operated by Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, bin Laden's brother-in-law. Wali Khan Amin Shah, an Afghan, was the financier of the plot. He funded the plot by laundering money through his girlfriend and other Manila women, several of whom were bar hostesses and one of whom was an employee at a KFC restaurant. They were bribed with gifts and holiday trips so that they would open bank accounts to stash fun...
RFT 206: Master Pilot/Author John Graybill
July 23, 2018 06:01 - 22 minutes - 31.9 MBFrom John's website: John O. Graybill has been an active aviator for more than fifty years. He holds a commercial pilot certificate (single- and multiengine rating), glider rating, is a certified flight instructor, is an instrument pilot, has been designated by the Federal Aviation Administration as a master pilot, and has flown private airplanes all over the United States, Mexico, and Central America. He holds an MBA with studies in operations research and statistics. Mr. Graybill is the ...
RFT 205: Density Altitude
July 19, 2018 06:01 - 8 minutes - 13.1 MBFrom the Pilot's Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge: Density Altitude SDP is a theoretical pressure altitude, but aircraft operate in a nonstandard atmosphere and the term density altitude is used for correlating aerodynamic performance in the nonstandard atmosphere. Density altitude is the vertical distance above sea level in the standard atmosphere at which a given density is to be found. The density of air has significant effects on the aircraft’s performance because as air becomes le...
RFT 204: USAFA Superintendent Lt. General Jay Silveria
July 16, 2018 06:01 - 28 minutes - 39.7 MBOfficial Air Force Biography: Lt. Gen. Jay B. Silveria is the Superintendent, U.S. Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs, Colorado. He directs a four-year regimen of military training, academics, athletic and character development programs leading to a Bachelor of Science degree and a commission as a second lieutenant. Prior to assuming his current position, General Silveria served as the Deputy Commander, U.S. Air Forces Central Command, and Deputy Commander, Combined Air Force Air Compon...
RFT 203: It's Not WHO'S Right
July 12, 2018 06:01 - 7 minutes - 11.9 MBUnited Airlines Flight 173 was the watershed event that launched the establishment of Crew Resource Management (CRM) throughout the airline industry. That accident occurred thirty years ago. With the widespread acceptance of CRM in airline operations, one would surmise that crew communication issues would be a thing of the past. Unfortunately, that’s not the way it has worked out. We have no way to determine how many times a Captain has disregarded a First Officer’s suggestions or comments...
RFT 202: President of Metropolitan State University of Denver Dr. Janine Davidson
July 09, 2018 06:01 - 34 minutes - 47.7 MBDr. Davidson grew up in a Navy family in California and Virginia and was commissioned as an Air Force second lieutenant in 1988. She flew combat support, airdrop, and humanitarian air mobility missions in the Pacific, Europe and the Middle East in both the Lockheed C-130 Hercules and the Boeing C-17 Globemaster cargo aircraft, and also served as an instructor pilot at the United States Air Force Academy. She was a Distinguished Graduate of Air Force Squadron Officers’ School and was the firs...
RFT 201: Runway Surface Treatments
July 06, 2018 00:20 - 8 minutes - 12.8 MBFrom Wikipedia: The choice of material used to construct the runway depends on the use and the local ground conditions. For a major airport, where the ground conditions permit, the most satisfactory type of pavement for long-term minimum maintenance is concrete. Although certain airports have used reinforcement in concrete pavements, this is generally found to be unnecessary, with the exception of expansion joints across the runway where a dowel assembly, which permits relative movement of...
RFT 200: Fighter Pilot Podcast Host Vincent Aiello
July 02, 2018 06:01 - 31 minutes - 43.7 MBVincent Aiello (aka "Jell-O") took his first airplane flight when he was 11 years old, and was smitten. He attended UCLA, majoring in Mathematics, and then entered the Navy. He was initially assigned as a life guard while waiting for flight training, then finally started his flying. He flew the T-34, the T-2 and the TA-4 while in training. After his initial training, he flew the FA-18 at El Toro, then flew at Cecil Field. His first deployment was on the USS George Washington. He later atte...
RFT 199: The Berlin Airlift
June 29, 2018 16:24 - 3 minutes - 6.01 MBFrom Wikipedia: The Berlin Blockade (24 June 1948–12 May 1949) was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War. During the multinational occupation of post–World War II Germany, the Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway, road, and canal access to the sectors of Berlin under Western control. The Soviets offered to drop the blockade if the Western Allies withdrew the newly introduced Deutsche mark from West Berlin. The Western Allies organized the Berlin airlift ...
Flying The Hump With Leland Stolberg
June 25, 2018 06:01 - 26 minutes - 37.9 MBLeland Stolberg volunteered for military duty immediately after graduating high school, right after the attack on Pearl Harbor. He was trained as a Radio Operator, and flew in that position on the C-46 aircraft on missions flying over the "Hump", resupply missions flown from Assam, India to China in support of American and Chinese forces. The mission was extremely hazardous because of enroute weather challenges and poor single-engine performance. Altogether almost 1700 American crewmembers w...
RFT 197: Sexual Assault On Airplanes
June 23, 2018 04:08 - 7 minutes - 11.9 MBFrom the Washington Post, 20 June 2018: The FBI in Maryland is warning travelers taking to the skies this summer to be cautious as airlines nationwide have seen a recent spike in the number of sexual assaults reported on commercial flights. The assaults, which typically occur on long overnight flights, are “increasing every year . . . at an alarming rate,” said David Rodski, an FBI special agent assigned to investigate crimes out of Baltimore-Washington International Marshall Airport. ...
RFT 196: Honeywell Aerospace Lead Program Pilot Pamela Mannon
June 18, 2018 06:01 - 38 minutes - 54.3 MBPam Mannon was transfixed by aviation ever since she was a child. When she told her parents she wanted to be a pilot, they were not too happy. In fact, since they were both college professors, they wanted Pam to avail herself of the free tuition at their school rather than attending Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University (ERAU). Pam created a win-win solution by attending their school until attaining all the credits that could be transferred to ERAU, then completed her education at ERAU. She l...
RFT 195: Hydroplaning
June 14, 2018 06:01 - 5 minutes - 8.48 MBDynamic Hydroplaning: Water on the runways reduces the friction between the tires and the ground and can reduce braking effectiveness. The ability to brake can be completely lost when the tires are hydroplaning because a layer of water separates the tires from the runway surface. This is also true of braking effectiveness when runways are covered in ice. When the runway is wet, the pilot may be confronted with dynamic hydroplaning. Dynamic hydroplaning is a condition in which the aircraft ti...
RFT 194: F-16/Airline Pilot Scott "Hurler" Weaver
June 11, 2018 06:01 - 45 minutes - 63 MBScott Weaver hails from a long line of pilots, starting with his grandfather, Leo Purington, who had a 4-digit pilot certificate number. Scott was immersed in aviation from a young age, but had initially aspired to a career as a professional baseball player. Finally, the flying bug bit him, and he entered the Air Force and attended Undergraduate Pilot Training (UPT). Following UPT, he stayed in Air Training Command as a First Assignment Instructor Pilot (FAIP), instructing student pilots. ...
RFT 193: D-Day Airpower
June 06, 2018 16:50 - 4 minutes - 6.88 MBFrom Flying Magazine: "In all, an estimated 13,000 Allied aircraft participated in the D-Day operations. It remains the single largest aerial operation in history. As it was an unprecedented action, it was a learning process, and there were fundamental misunderstandings about how aircraft would operate and interact. The operation was so critical and so complex that commanders made clear early on that they were willing to accept great losses in order to establish a beachhead." From History ...
RFT 192: WASP Kay Hilbrandt
June 04, 2018 06:01 - 29 minutes - 40.8 MBKathleen (Kay) Hilbrandt started taking flying lessons in 1942, and in 1943 was accepted into the Womens Airforce Service Pilot (WASP) program. She attend Army Air Corps flight training (the same course as male pilots) in 1944, flying PT-17s, BT-13s and AT-6s. Then she served as a safety pilot in Eagle Pass, Texas, for aviation cadets performing instrument flights "under the hood". After the war, when the WASP was disbanded, she joined the Ninety Nines and returned to New Jersey to work fo...
RFT 191: VOR Discontinuation Program
May 31, 2018 06:01 - 3 minutes - 6.37 MBAs part of ATC modernization (NextGen), the FAA will be shutting down 308 VORs of the roughly 1000 in use right now in the United States. They will continue to operate VORs that provide coverage above 5000 feet over the entire continental United States (CONUS). This will provide Hazardous Inflight Weather Advisory Service (HIWAS) continuity. They will also retain VORs that are used with VOR, localizer and ILS approaches, and those in mountainous terrain and those used by the military. This w...
RFT 190: Tuskegee Airman Ltc. George Hardy
May 28, 2018 06:01 - 38 minutes - 54.3 MBGeorge E. Hardy in March 1943, at the age of 17, passed the written and physical examinations for the US Army Aviation Cadet program. In July 1943 he was called to active duty and sent to Keesler Army Air Field, Biloxi, Mississippi, for basic training. In September 1943 he was assigned to the 320th College Training Detachment at Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. His group was scheduled to take college-level courses, at Tuskegee Institute, for a period of five months. This training was cut sh...
RFT 189: WGF Veterans Writing Project Trip
May 24, 2018 06:01 - 4 minutes - 7.75 MBThis past weekend I attend an outstanding workshop in Los Angles. Forty-eight veterans were selected to participate. The selection process was fairly intense - I had applied last year and was not selected, so I felt very honored to participate. I was there to see if I could develop a theatrical treatment of my Hamfist series. The workshop was held at the Writers Guild Foundation. The Foundation describes itself as "a non-profit organization that serves as the premier resource for emerging ...
RFT 188: Airshow Performer Jacquie Warda
May 21, 2018 06:01 - 32 minutes - 45.7 MBFrom Jacqui's website: Jacquie traces her love of flying her to her earliest days, when, as a newborn, her first outing was to the Los Angeles County Airport Air Show. Her pilotfather’s interest in airplanes and flying inspired Jacquie to want to dream of flying. Jacquie spent many years dreaming of flying but was unable to do much about it until years later after working and saving her money. By the time she was 32 years old, she decided she was tired of hearing herself say “I wish I coul...
RFT 187: Easy ILS
May 17, 2018 06:01 - 10 minutes - 14.8 MBIn Episode 149 we discussed how to fly a 3-degree visual approach. In this episode we talk about how to fly a manual ILS approach, i.e., an approach flown without a flight director. If you are planning to fly to an airport with an operable ILS, a little flight planning goes a long way. You can check weather forecasts for your destination and determine the probable runway that will be in use when you arrive, along with the forecast temperature and wind. You need this information to plan you...
RFT 186: Ageless Aviation Dreams Foundation
May 14, 2018 06:01 - 35 minutes - 50 MBAgeless Aviation Dreams Foundation is a manifestation of the passion of the Fisher family for seniors and for aviation. To understand this passion and the history of the Foundation, you need only look at the personal and professional legacy of the Fisher Family. William L. and Dorothy Fisher started the family’s aviation heritage in 1940. Their love for the freedom of flight now transcends through four generations of pilots. William purchased a Stearman for $1,200 but later sold the airpl...
RFT 185: NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System
May 10, 2018 03:30 - 8 minutes - 12.5 MBFAR 91.25 briefly discusses the NASA Aviation Safety Reporting Program. In many respects, it's a "get out of jail" card to avoid enforcement action. The program is explained in Advisory Circular AC 00-46E. Enforcement Action. When determining the type and extent of the enforcement action to take in a particular case, the FAA will consider the following factors: (1) Nature of the violation; (2) Whether the violation was inadvertent or deliberate; (3) The certificate holder’s level of ...
RFT 184: Christina Olds Tells The Robin Olds Story
May 07, 2018 06:01 - 37 minutes - 52 MBChristina Olds is the daughter of Robin Olds, an American fighter pilot and general officer in the U.S. Air Force. He was a "triple ace", with a combined total of 16 victories in World War II and the Vietnam War. He retired in 1973 as a brigadier general. After her father's death, Christina spent years combing through her father's notes, diaries and unfinished memoir to complete a captivating, intimate memoir of the consummate fighter pilot. The son of Army Air Forces Major General Robert ...
RFT 183: FOQA
May 04, 2018 18:57 - 7 minutes - 11.8 MBFOQA is a voluntary safety program that is designed to make commercial aviation safer by allowing commercial airlines and pilots to share de-identified aggregate information with the FAA so that the FAA can monitor national trends in aircraft operations and target its resources to address operational risk issues (e.g., flight operations, air traffic control (ATC), airports). The fundamental objective of this new FAA/pilot/carrier partnership is to allow all three parties to identify and redu...
RFT 182: Airline Pilot/Author Emilio Corsetti III
April 30, 2018 06:01 - 41 minutes - 57.5 MBEmilio Corsetti took a flight in an airplane as a teenager, and he was hooked! He started taking flying lessons, and received his Private Pilot license before his driver's license. He paid his dues at numerous flying jobs after becoming a CFI, and flew night check deliveries for four years before getting hired as an airline pilot. During his journey, Emilio was unemployed a total of ten years as he moved from one company to the next, experiencing terminations and furloughs numerous times. ...
RFT 181: Explosive Decompression!
April 26, 2018 02:37 - 12 minutes - 17.3 MBDuring qualification training, airline pilots learn to deal with depressurization, engine failure, and emergency descent. It's a straight-forward process in training. Each of these are memory-response items that must be completed correctly. The training and checking for these emergency procedures evaluates each of these events separately. In fact, compound emergencies are not permitted to be evaluated. Unlike a "routine" decompression, an explosive decompression is a much more serious eve...
RFT 180: Fighter Pilot/Airline Pilot Russ Goodenough
April 23, 2018 06:01 - 57 minutes - 80.1 MBRuss Goodenough is one of the few people on the planet to become a member of the caterpillar club from both seats of the F-4! Russ attended the United States Air Force Academy in the second graduating class, and then went on to Air Force Undergraduate Pilot Training (UPT) and followed that with qualification in the top-of-the-line F-4. During his combat tour of duty at Cam Ranh Air Base in South Vietnam he was shot down, exactly 52 years ago on the date of this recording, April 21, 1966....
RFT 179: AOG/MEL/CDL
April 20, 2018 17:59 - 7 minutes - 10.9 MBAircraft on Ground or AOG is a term in aviation maintenance indicating that a problem is serious enough to prevent an aircraft from flying. Generally there is a rush to acquire the parts to put the aircraft (A/C) back into service, and prevent further delays or cancellations of the planned itinerary. AOG applies to any aviation materials or spare parts that are needed immediately for an aircraft to return to service. AOG suppliers refer qualified personnel and dispatch the parts required to ...
RFT 178: Air Disasters Writer Samme Chittum
April 16, 2018 06:01 - 36 minutes - 51.1 MBSamme Chittum is an award-winning writer of fiction and nonfiction, and is currently a writer for Smithsonian Channel's Air Disasters series. She has a PhD and two Masters Degrees. Samme started her journalistic career as a police reporter, covering crimes and accidents. Her first nonfiction book about an air accident was The Flight 981 Disaster: Tragedy, Treachery, and the Pursuit of Truth, the story of the Turkish Airlines DC-10 air disaster that occurred in 1974. Her book Southern...
RFT 177: Laws of Learning
April 13, 2018 04:56 - 8 minutes - 12.2 MBReadiness The basic needs of the learner must be satisfied before he or she is ready or capable of learning (see Chapter 1, Human Behavior). The instructor can do little to motivate the learner if these needs have not been met. This means the learner must want to learn the task being presented and must possess the requisite knowledge and skill. In SBT, the instructor attempts to make the task as meaningful as possible and to keep it within the learner’s capabilities. Students best acquire ...
RFT 175: Airline Drug Testing
April 06, 2018 17:53 - 14 minutes - 20.5 MBAnyone in a safety-sensitive position in transportation must be tested for drug use, both pre-employment and on a random basis, as well as for suspected drug use. In airline operations, the following positions are subject to this testing: Flight crewmember duties. Flight attendant duties. Flight instruction duties. Aircraft dispatcher duties. Aircraft maintenance and preventive maintenance duties. Ground security coordinator duties. Aviation screening duties. Air traffic cont...
RFT 174: Free Flier Heath Owens
April 02, 2018 02:59 - 27 minutes - 38.9 MBHeath Owens is not the typical professional pilot Ready for Takeoff guest. In fact, Heath is not yet a pilot. But he is an aviation fanatic who has broken the code on how to fly for FREE, and his enthusiasm is contagious, and he has some great ideas for our listeners who want to learn how to get in the air without spending a lot of - or any - money. And Heath explains how he got started in aviation insurance. I think you're going to find his story fascinating.
RFT 173: Upgrading Right To Left
March 30, 2018 19:54 - 17 minutes - 25.4 MBEven if you are type rated the in the airplane, there is a lot more to upgrading than learning how to fly the airplane from a different seat. You'll find that most of the real-life challenges you face as Captain have nothing to do with engine failure on takeoff! At many airlines, when it took more than 10 years to make Captain, copilots would have a lot of exposure to good and bad Captains, and would have the opportunity to see countless airborne decisions and evaluate their results. With ...
RFT 172: Robert "Cujo" Teschner
March 26, 2018 06:01 - 32 minutes - 46.1 MBRobert "Cujo" Teschner served as the U.S. Air Force's debrief expert during his time as an F-15C instructor pilot at the U.S. Air Force Weapons School at Nellis AFB, NV. He personally designed and taught the first-ever core debrief fundamentals course to all Weapons School students across all disciplines. He authored the paper "The Vocabulary of the Debrief," which was published in the Weapons School Review, and served as the subject author and senior adviser on a paper presenting the fund...
RFT 171: Airline Upgrading
March 23, 2018 16:55 - 13 minutes - 19.9 MBUpgrading from airline First Officer (copilot) to Captain involves more than simply moving from the right seat to the left. If a new type rating is required, there will be ground school and simulator training, and the ubiquitous check ride. Simulator training may consist of traditional Appendix H Training to ATP Practical Test Standards and the newer Advanced Qualification Program, and will be conducted in a Level C or Level D simulator. After training is complete, the new Captain must c...
RFT 170: Afterburner President Joel "Thor" Neeb
March 19, 2018 06:01 - 29 minutes - 41.5 MBFrom the Afterburner website: As an F-15 pilot, Thor escorted the U.S. President through the sky and flew missions to ensure the safety of the country after the attacks of 9/11. He was the tactical leader of 300 of the most senior combat pilots in the Air Force and he oversaw the execution of a $150M/year flight program. Thor was named the Top Instructor Pilot at the Air Force Flight Training Headquarters and he’s flown thousands of missions teaching pilots from 25 countries around the wor...
RFT 169: RTO
March 15, 2018 06:01 - 16 minutes - 23.7 MBIn aviation terminology, a rejected takeoff (RTO) or aborted takeoff is the situation in which it is decided to abort the takeoff of an airplane. There can be many reasons for deciding to perform a rejected takeoff, but they are usually due to suspected or actual technical failures, like an engine failure such as a compressor stall occurring during the takeoff run. A rejected takeoff is normally performed only if the aircraft's speed is below the critical engine failure speed (sometimes c...
RFT 168: Senior VP Folds of Honor Jim Ravella
March 12, 2018 06:01 - 27 minutes - 38.3 MBFrom The Anchor of Hope website: Col Ravella is a 1983 graduate of Texas A&M and served over 26 years in the USAF as an F-15E pilot with over 3700 hours and command at the Squadron and Group levels. Jim is a father of seven children, a writer and a speaker. Jim married Andrea Fuller in 1983; they had two wonderful sons, Nic and Anthony. They lost Andrea in 2007 after a four-year battle with breast cancer. During their fight with cancer, Jim documented their journey in a blog, Journey to ...
RFT 167: Deep Vein Thrombosis
March 09, 2018 17:32 - 6 minutes - 10.3 MBFrom Wikepedia: Deep vein thrombosis (DVT), is the formation of a blood clot in a deep vein, most commonly the legs. Symptoms may include pain, swelling, redness, or warmth of the affected area. About half of cases have no symptoms. Complications may include pulmonary embolism, as a result of detachment of a clot which travels to the lungs, and post-thrombotic syndrome. Risk factors include recent surgery, cancer, trauma, lack of movement, obesity, smoking, hormonal birth control, pregna...
RFT 166: Aviation Artist/Airline Pilot Lance Lockhart
March 05, 2018 07:01 - 32 minutes - 44.1 MBFrom Lance's website: Lance is a full time pilot for Southwest Airlines. With aviation as his profession and inspiration he wanted a name that captured flight. Lance and his wife Jamie coincidently named their children Lucas Wylde and Judah Byrd. He combined their names to create Wyldebyrd. Prior to the establishment of Wyldebyrd Art, Lance grew up in Northern Ontario Canada, in Sioux Lookout. His Father Howard was a pilot and his mother Sandra a school teacher. His parents s starte...
RFT 165: Traveling With Lithium Ion Batteries
March 01, 2018 20:05 - 7 minutes - 10.6 MBLithium-ion batteries are common in home electronics. They are one of the most popular types of rechargeable batteries for portable electronics, with a high energy density, tiny memory effect and low self-discharge. LIBs are also growing in popularity for military, battery electric vehicle and aerospace applications. Lithium-ion batteries can pose unique safety hazards since they contain a flammable electrolyte and may be kept pressurized. An expert notes "If a battery cell is charged too ...
RFT 164: B-130 Pilot/Airline Pilot Don Mrosla
February 26, 2018 04:43 - 29 minutes - 40.9 MBDon Mrosla attended the United States Air Force academy in the same class as his twin brother. While there, both Mrosla brothers became champions at boxing, but hung up their gloves their last year to prevent any potential boxing injury that would disqualify them from attending Air Force Undergraduate Pilot Training. After completing pilot training, Don qualified in the C-130 Hercules, and continuously cycled to Vietnam. One of the missions he was qualified in was to drop a 15,000 pound bo...
RFT 163: IOSA
February 23, 2018 00:32 - 9 minutes - 14.7 MBThe IATA Operational Safety Audit (IOSA) program is an internationally recognized and accepted evaluation system designed to assess the operational management and control systems of an airline. IOSA uses internationally recognized quality audit principles and is designed to conduct audits in a standardized and consistent manner. It was created in 2003 by IATA. The program is designed to assess the operational management and control systems of airlines. The companies are included in the IOSA ...
RFT 162: Air Force/Coast Guard/Navy Pilot Rich Jackson
February 19, 2018 07:01 - 1 hour - 84.4 MBRich Jackson is a true Renaissance Man of aviation. He has flown in the Air Force, the Navy and the Coast Guard, and after retiring from 22 years in the military he flew in several combat zones as a contract pilot. Rich started out as a helicopter pilot in the Air Force and served as an H-53 Aircraft Commander, based in Sembach Air Base, Germany. He then transitioned to fixed wing in the Air Force. After another helicopter stint in the Air Force as an HH-65 Aircraft Commander, he transitio...
RFT 161: Safe Airline Travel
February 16, 2018 05:38 - 10 minutes - 15.5 MBSooner or later, you're going to be flying as a passenger on an airliner. There are numerous steps you can take to ensure your safety as a passenger. Preparation for an airline flight starts before you leave home. One basic step is to make sure the identification on your luggage tags does not provide information to anyone with nefarious intent. Your luggage tag should only have your first initial, last name and telephone number or email address. Using an initial rather than a name should b...
RFT 160: Fighter Pilot/Author Ed Cobleigh
February 12, 2018 07:01 - 32 minutes - 45.3 MBFrom Fast Eddie's website: I was born in New Orleans at a very early age and raised in Chattanooga, East Tennessee. I earned an engineering degree from Georgia Tech and a Masters in Management from USC. I was a designer for Piper Aircraft. As a USAF fighter pilot, I flew the F-104 Starfighter, the F-4 Phantom II, the A-4 Skyhawk, the Anglo-French Jaguar, and F-16 Viper aircraft. I instructed and flew with the USAF Fighter Weapons School, the US Navy Fighter Weapons School (Top Gun), the R...