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Hey, it's Justin.

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Check it out@allworth airline.com Justin I'm Trent Palmer.

I'm a recreational bush pilot and content creator on YouTube and Instagram.

AV Nation.

What is going on?

And welcome back to the Pilot the Pilot Podcast.

My name is Justin Seams and I am your host.

I do apologize if I sound a little under the weather.

We are overcoming a cold in our house and it has kicked everyone's butt in our house right now.

But we're overcoming it.

We're making it work.

This episode is an awesome one.

It has been highly requested.

It is with Trent Palm Palmer.

He is one of my favorite youtubers.

Just the visuals that he's able to create, the stories able to tell, and the type of flying he's able to do is unbelievable.

It's something that I've never been able to do, have the access to.

So to be able to live that out through him and all of his friends is pretty fun to see.

Trent We've been trying to get Trent on for a long time.

We talk about in the episode, and we finally get it to work, and it is as good as I imagined it would be.

So, Trent, thank you so much for spending an hour and a half plus with me and sharing kind of your ups and downs of aviation.

Why you got an aviation?

We talk about his FA battle, legal battles, and getting the FA called on the second time.

So we talk about everything.

It was a great episode and I think we have room for more.

So, Trent, you want to come back on?

We'll do it, man.

And also start your podcast.

That'd be sick.

We have a magazine, as you know, and if you haven't checked it out, go to pilot, the pilot.com mag and get yours today.

It's the highest quality magazine I think you'll ever touch and feel.

The first edition, the first volume, it feels like a coffee table book.

That's the.

The viewpoint that we've gotten.

That's the reviews that we gotten.

Reviews have been coming in.

Every single one is five stars.

So thank you much to everyone that subscribed to the quarterly magazine.

Volume two is in the wraps.

We are working on it now.

It should be done soon, and we're hoping for an end of March, beginning of April release to get it out before sun and fun.

Same nation.

I want to take any more of your time.

So any further ado, here's Trent Palmer.

Trent, what's going on, dude?

Welcome to the Pilot to Pilot podcast.

Awesome.

Yeah.

Glad to be here, man.

Thanks for having me.

Yeah.

I mean, I will say you're probably the number one requested person that I have been.

Constantly been getting badgered on.

Like, guys, we'll get it eventually.

One day we'll make it work.

All right.

That's funny.

Yeah.

I know that we've been trying to connect for a while, I think.

Right.

I know I've gotten messages from you and I. I've just been always out and about, so I kind of blew it on getting back to you.

So sorry for being a moving target there.

It's all good, man.

I think I pressured you through Carson from wherewithy.

I think I was like, carson, dude, I need your help.

Carson, help me.

Carson's like, I got you.

Yeah, that.

I was like, oh, man, I felt like a jerk just for how long I'd been delaying on this.

It's all good, man.

I. I pester.

I like to pester a little bit.

You know, I like to.

Sometimes you have to.

You have to.

You sometimes.

And here we are, we are recording you.

You Started the podcast by saying you're a recreational pilot, a recreational bush pilot.

Is that just because.

Do you not like to call yourself just a bush pilot or a pilot in general?

Do you always add the recreational part at the beginning?

So the bush pilot term is kind of controversial with some guys mostly just keyboard pilots.

Seems like if you say you're a bush pilot, they assume you're working in the Alaskan bush commercially.

So I just try to, you know, differentiate that.

And it's funny too, because there's so many different realms of the kind of stole or backcountry or off airport or, like, where does each thing fit?

And it's like, to me, since I'm landing in places that are completely unimproved and no strip there, I'm like, that's off airport or bush flying.

Right.

Whereas backcountry, there might be backcountry strips.

And I don't just do that most of my flying.

There are no strips.

So, yeah, I don't know.

I feel like bush pilot, bush flying kind of makes the most sense, but it's definitely something that I've had to add the recreational just to be like, hey, guys, I'm not, like, I'm not one of those guys.

They're on a different level.

I'm just doing it for fun.

Yeah.

Have you always wanted to be a pilot, or is this just kind of something that kind of came to.

I knew a lot of people kind of know your background of getting into drones and then kind of getting into airplanes, but was this a childhood dream at all?

Did you ever look up, be like, oh, I'd love to fly that airplane one day?

So, yes, I was always into aircraft and.

And loved the idea of flight, but I was just deathly terrified of it.

So as a kid, I had, like, reoccurring dreams of dying in a plane crash, a commercial plane, um, and a lot of those falling, you know, dreams too.

So I was just terrified of heights and.

And all of that.

Um, so the way I kind of scratched that itch was through RC aircraft.

So, yeah, that was my dog decided to join me.

Good, dude.

Pets are welcome.

Love it.

So I was always ground based.

Just got to experience flight that way.

And then because of the.

The drone stuff and the regulations back in 2012-2014, the FAA required that I got a pilot's license.

So that's what pushed me into actually flying.

I mean, good thing it did.

I mean, where would you think you'd be today if it wasn't for the regulations changing?

Would it just be strictly drones.

Would you be like a drone influencer, still be making videos or what would be.

What would Trent be?

I have zero idea.

And honestly, I don't think I'd be an influencer.

I don't even think of myself as an influencer now.

That's not really who I am or what I'm about.

I just like making videos and that's what got me into the film world.

And in the start, I used to make ski films back in high school and college, and that's what got me hired as a editor for my first real production job.

And then while I was working as an editor, I started doing the RC helicopter, which transitioned to drone.

But at the, at the core, I'm always.

I love making videos.

I love telling stories as, you know, higher, low end as they are.

It's kind of one of my passions.

So, yeah, YouTube's been a great outlet for me to share my passion for aviation.

Kind of scratch that creative itch.

But as far as the, the like, influence side of things and, and like being recognized, that's.

That's never been a driving force for me.

Yeah, it's.

I mean, I. Luckily I've always hid behind audio only, right?

Like, I didn't do video for the longest time, and people wouldn't necessarily know my face, but I talked.

They'd say something like, wait, you do a podcast?

I'm like, it's not me, I promise.

But was it hard?

Or when did you first realize, like, hey, people are like recognizing me.

They know who I am.

Was that weird at first or is it still weird?

Yes and yes.

2018, Oshkosh was the first year that I was like, actively doing YouTube.

And I think I had like 50,000 subscribers going to Oshkosh.

And then by the time I got home, I had a hundred thousand.

So it was like, yeah, that was when things were snowballing.

And yeah, was interesting because just being recognized and when people come up to say hi a lot of times, like, well, that parasocial relationship, they know me.

I just don't know them.

But then there's also the chance that maybe I have met them because when they say, hey, what's up, Trent?

I'm like, hey.

And I'm just trying to process my head.

I'm like, I do not want to be the jerk that forgo this guy.

But I've.

I don't know if I've met him.

So, yeah, it's a, it's an interesting one.

Luckily, it's not something that like, I.

It doesn't happen on any other days.

It's.

It's only at, you know, air shows primarily.

So, yeah, for 99 of the year, I'm just a regular dude that no one recognizes.

So I like that when you came

on, like, I remember.

I feel like I remember watching your first video.

I don't remember what it is, but you could tell it was like a different time.

But before people are making videos, it was.

I mean, they still look good because it's airplanes.

But, like, your quality definitely helped you stick out.

Your quality of the video and what you're actually doing help you stick out.

Did you have a plan at all for, like, making your videos or did you truly just make something like, I think this looks cool.

Let's make this?

Yeah, it really, like, early.

Early on in my channel, I wasn't vlogging.

I was just making little, like, what would be kind of like an action sports edit of flying.

And, you know, people in the kit fox world were watching them but no one else.

And I realized after actually, there's a creator Tucker got.

He flies paramotors.

I don't know if you know who he is.

Yeah, very important.

Yeah.

I saw one of his videos, and it was the first YouTube video that was longer than, like a how to video that I actually sat through and watched, like at 10 or 15 minutes.

And at the end I'm like, whoa, what just happened?

And.

And I realized it was the interaction and engagement of him being a character in it that kept me there.

He was doing cool stuff, but the cool stuff without context or a character was nothing.

So when I started doing the vlog thing, which was like, right at the end of 2017, I think it was a pretty uncomfortable shift for me because I've always been that guy behind the camera, never in front of it, and I don't particularly like my voice or myself on camera or any of that same.

So, yeah, it was.

It was a pretty big shift.

But I realized, you know, I. I guess I thought it was a good exercise in putting myself in an uncomfortable position and see if I can build comfort there.

I also knew that, like, you know, there.

There was a void in high quality or higher quality aviation content at the time.

And so I kind of felt a duty to put some more out and show people how much fun the flying I was doing is.

So those were kind of the motivators.

But as far as the quality side, I still, you know, I come from the film world.

None of the stuff I put out on YouTube would be like, Quality.

I would like to show any of my clients I'm pretty like embarrassed of that because I'm just shooting on toy cameras.

I'm not, you know, not bringing out cinema gear.

I'm not spending, you know, all that much time in posts, like doctoring shots and doing everything like we would on a commercial piece.

So.

So when you go sell yourself, you're like, I know you might have watched my stuff.

I promise you it's better than that.

Yeah.

And luckily, you know, the, the drone thing was around way before the YouTube thing.

So my clients over there, they knew what they were getting.

And at first it was funny.

I was very embarrassed for people to find out I had a YouTube channel.

It's like, oh, he's a YouTuber.

And over time, it actually turned into an asset where there was a couple shoots where they were like, hey, would you want to do a YouTube video of this shoot?

I'm like, yeah, that'd be kind of cool.

So it's been funny how that transitioned and, and shifted this tool and this,

what was just fun eventually either made you money or gave you the ability to expand what you're doing and kind of two birds with one stone, right.

You get to go do your drone thing and make money and then also get a video which could be adsense, it could be anything else or just a creative outlet.

Yeah.

And honestly, it's interesting story.

I don't know if you followed any of what I was doing as far as where I live, my property I bought, or my wife and I bought in 2016, thought we would build on it in like six months.

That was just, you know, young and dumb kind of mentality.

It took us three and a half years to even get started.

So 2019, I owner built my house.

So I was out here 10 to 12 hours a day, every day.

And during that, anytime a film shoot would come up, if it wasn't like a bigger multi day shoot, I'd just say, I'm busy.

And so during that, a lot of my clients I guess that I worked for in the, in the film industry, probably found new vendors.

And then right after we finished the house, Covid hit and the film industry shut down.

Yeah.

And so here I am with a house that went way over budget.

I've got the highest payments I've ever had in my life and I don't have really a job because the film industry shut down.

So that was kind of the turning point where I said, okay, I gotta figure out a way to monetize this YouTube thing in a sustainable way.

And prior to that I'd been getting a lot of emails about, you know, companies that wanted to sponsor videos and I just always felt kind of grimy with the idea of doing that.

But you know, desperate times, I had to change my opinion on that.

So started saying yes to sponsors and pretty quickly I was able to offset most of my income using YouTube instead of just the film industry.

And then so over the past, I mean, what was that?

2020.

So we'll call it six years, five.

Six years I have shifted to primarily now YouTube being my, my job still

that's only off sponsors primarily.

I mean you kind of, you have to diversify and do as much as you can in each space.

But like AdSense, which I'm sure you're aware of, just doesn't pay out enough to even keep the lights on.

So the, the biggest thing is is sponsors of individual videos.

And then that's interesting.

You know, we do like merch drops I've been doing with Carson.

I have my own line of lower end merchandise that you know, does a little bit.

And so it's kind of all over the place.

But yeah, it's kind of.

Most of what I'm doing now is a byproduct of the YouTube as far as work.

Nice.

And would you say is that, I mean when you started this, obviously you had no idea where it was going to go, turn into this and eventually be your job.

But now that you're at this point and you're looking back and, and this is kind of your full job, is that kind of okay with you?

Do you wish you're still doing the drones more?

Like if you could go back, would you have found a way to, to keep the drone company up and running to what you had it or are you perfectly fine with everything's going?

You know, that's a good question.

The industry that I started out in, well, it was basically non existent.

In 2009, 2010, there was just a handful of guys that had RC helicopters with a camera on it that were shooting low range aerials, at least in the film industry.

So when we got into there, I think I had pilot skills that were above average.

And then I also had an understanding of how film worked and I understand set etiquette and I'd been working in the film industry.

So we had a leg up early on and there was a run from like, you know, really late 2010 through 2012 that we were like the guys in Hollywood.

And shortly after that was when a lot of these multi rotors started coming out.

Like DJI had their first, I think it was S800.

It was like an integrated six motor multicopter with a gimbal that was stabilized.

And all the stuff that we spent all our time and energy and money developing was now worth way less.

And then the skills that we had to have to fly, you know, a single rotor RC helicopter is fully manual.

They're not, you know, they're not.

There's no bailouts, there's no auto level, there's no return to home, no gps, none of that.

So every time a new piece of technology would come out, basically the barrier to entry would lower and the market would get flooded with new people.

And it was like a race to the bottom, price wise.

So if it was the industry I started in, yeah, I kind of wish I was still doing it.

But that said, with the availability of drones, the ease of using that technology, you know, all the skills I spent years developing kind of slowly became devalued because the equipment takes over so much of that.

So no, I don't regret, you know, kind of making the shift out of it.

The bigger thing is like, what's next?

I don't know what the lifespan of a YouTube channel is.

I mean, heck, I didn't.

Honestly, going back to the start of this, I never expected to make anything off YouTube.

I think I thought at best maybe it's a good networking tool.

Like it could connect me with brands that I could work with in the future.

I thought from a filmmaking standpoint, like producing commercial content for them.

Yeah.

But I remember the first AdSense check I got, it was a hundred bucks and I was out at.

I made it.

Yeah, I was out at dinner with some friends and I like showed them.

I'm like, dude, I just got paid a hundred dollars from YouTube.

And they're like, what?

And I'm like, yeah, dude, drinks on me.

Like, this is insane, let's go.

And just like it kind of opened my eye to there probably is a way to make a living off this.

But then going back to what I'm saying, I was saying is I don't know how long a content creator, you know, as a career lives.

I'm also not someone that really produces content that I think will get the most views.

I produce the content I enjoy making because I kind of, I've, you know, I've tipped that seesaw in the other direction and really tried to do some stuff that I thought was more clicky and all that.

And it just like felt like I was, eroding.

Myself.

So a while back I decided like, that'll never be a driving force for me.

You know, getting views is great.

It obviously helps add value to how I make my living.

But yeah, I don't create content based on that.

So with that in mind, I don't know how long a creator like me can hold on, you know, without the adapt or die kind of thing.

I'm like, well, we'll see.

Well, it's interesting too, right?

So like, when you're talking about how long does a creator last, it's like, well, yeah, so you were dominant and doing great on YouTube.

And then people start getting to YouTube shorts or Instagram reels or tick tock and it's like, all right, how do I pivot myself from making 1520 minute videos to now a 60 second video?

How do I retain that audience?

How do I get a new, new audience?

Like, how do continue to, to make and improve so I can be where I am today and get these ad views, Right?

Totally.

And the short form stuff, I mean I, I definitely scroll through it, I see it and I see the, the brain rot side of it that can totally just pull you in and keep you there.

My brain doesn't work that way with creating content.

I, I kind of feel like my rhythm is the longer form stuff.

So the short form stuff hasn't been easy for me to kind of make a transition to.

And also the monetization path isn't as clear and it feels worse to me.

So.

So if with the YouTube video, most of the ways that I'm making revenue is through integrations, which is a paid shout out at some point in the video where you talk about the, you know, kind of stop your video and talk about something.

To me, one minute out of a 10 to 20 to 30 minute, you know, long video is not that invasive.

But when you get to short form and it's like, man, how am I going to integrate product when I only have a 60 second timeline?

And at that point it's like they're dedicated, you know, sponsored posts that just feel less authentic, if you know what I mean.

Yeah, no, for sure.

And then your audience picks up on that too, right?

They're like, oh, Trent sold out.

Trent sold out.

He's doing this now.

Yeah, time to find someone else.

Yeah, it's a weird dynamic, man.

And you know, I see the necessity in short form stuff and I've learned to enjoy making some of it.

Still not really chasing views more just thinking like, what, what do I think is the kind of Content.

I like watching what can teach people something or inspire them to get out and go flying.

Like that kind of stuff.

Definitely not just the just, you know, clickable, shareable, ridiculous stuff that.

Yeah, others make.

Yeah.

Not naming anyone, but others.

Yes.

Let's go back to the pivot moment.

Was there a moment at all, like, where you just thought, like, there's no way I could replace my income on YouTube.

I need to get a different job, I need to get in a different industry, or, I mean, you had your license.

Now it's like, do I keep getting my ratings and go fly for the airlines?

Or was there.

What was your thought process in that moment?

Because it's scary to go full time into YouTube because like you said, there's so many.

How long will people watch me for?

How many times?

Like, how can I keep replicating the success?

Yeah, no, that's a good question.

I. I was very fortunate that I had already had a working YouTube channel.

Right.

It was at that point probably getting more views than I do regularly today.

So the value was there.

And I was, like, I said, getting a lot of emails from basically their creator, influencer agencies that connect creators with brands, and I basically ignored all those emails.

So when that happened, I was like, man, I gotta start replying.

So I didn't reply to, like, emails five years ago.

Yeah.

And so I basically, I. I made that shift so quickly that I didn't spend much time pondering what else.

You know, it was kind of like, I can do this right now.

Yeah.

And supplement some income.

And I'm like, if I just say yes to enough of these, then I'm.

I can make my bills.

So I just got to do that.

And so as far as flying commercial, as a idea or thought, it's never really been something that I. I've had any interest in doing.

And it's funny, the.

The guy I bought my Kit Fox from, David Twyford, he had told me that he.

He's a private pilot, had like 10,000 hours.

And he was just like, I've watched all my friends, you know, shift to airline flying and they lost their love for flying.

So, like, his piece of advice was like, unless you have to, don't do it.

Keep it passionate.

And I was like, okay.

And, you know, from a. I guess financial standpoint might not be the best advice because there's definitely a pathway to make a good sustainable, like, living off of airline flying.

But.

But, yeah, so that's.

No, that, that has never been in the.

In the cards for me.

So, yeah, I Think the.

I mean, I fly professionally and I think I have myself gone through times where it's like, I'm flying too much.

I don't want to fly anymore.

I'd never touch a general aviation airplane.

And then now, currently it's like, oh, I would love to buy an airplane to go fly.

Like, this would be awesome.

Let's go into it.

But you fly with so many people that just, they think GA is just unsafe.

They think that it's not worth it.

And, and I also go through those mindsets whenever I, whenever I swear, whenever I get close to buying an airplane or wanting to buy an airplane, something in the news happens, someone I know, like, it's an accident.

Just like, what am I doing?

Why would I do this?

Why would I put my family at situation?

But I think it's true.

I think in this industry it's very easy to look not down on a general aviation, but look kind of stray away from it and be like, oh, I did that before.

It's not safe.

I'm not gonna do it anymore.

Yeah.

And I mean, the, the statistics will prove that it is much less safe than commercial aviation.

So, yeah, it's.

It's a thing that I've also kind of had to battle with throughout this whole, like, I guess, aviation career of my.

If you could call it that.

Whatever my.

I think we call that.

Yeah, yeah.

Is that I, you know, inherently, and since I was little, was scared of flying and scared of heights, and that stuff's not fully gone.

It's something I still battle with.

And then anytime I, I lose a friend, which unfortunately has happened more times than I like to admit, or anytime that I have even a remotely close call, I just kind of step back and I'm like, is this worth it?

But at the same time, it's kind of like everyone's going to have a different risk assessment and they're going to see different values in other things.

And to me, what I get out of flying is worth the risk.

I understand that there's a chance that, you know, well, it's one of the more.

How do you put it?

It's.

It's not the riskiest thing I do.

It's just the consequences are about as high as, as anything out there.

So when things go bad, they go real bad.

Especially what you're doing when you're flying low to the ground, you're.

You're laying on places people don't land on normally, not necessarily that it's more unsafe, but there's just more risk to It.

Right, yeah.

And it has the optic of that for sure.

It's interesting though, like when I.

There's been times where I'm like, man, if I could have a second plane that I could use to get places, what would it be?

And the more I go down the rabbit hole of different aircraft, not that I can afford one, but I find that I get worried about the idea of a higher wing loading or higher energy aircraft in the event of some sort of engine issue.

And I've had an engine quit on my plane, it happens quick and yeah, man, it, it'll rattle anyone.

As prepared as you are when you have a single engine plane that quits on you out of nowhere.

I mean, it'll get you going.

So.

So I, I see a lot of value in the safety of a low energy airplane that lands at slower speeds and has equipment for landing in rough areas.

It just opens up a lot more options should something go bad.

I mean, crap, my plane stalls at low 30s.

So if you wedge between two trees in the 30s, you're probably going to be okay.

So even over, you know, heavily forested areas and an engine failure, I feel like I have a much better chance of surviving in my plane than I would, you know, a faster moving plane.

Yeah, you're not wrong.

I mean, you need way less room for, to stop your plane and land.

Anything can essentially be a landing strip for you where you get into big airplanes.

You know, you definitely need more room to stop.

Especially flying a 737.

Now.

I used to fly smaller private jets.

I too have had an engine failure and it was in a 206 and oh man, it needs more room than your airplane.

But I'm very thankful that thing was as rugged as it was and it could stop where it stopped.

And we put it.

We're in Appalachia and West Virginia, kind of in the rolling hills area is like mountain e but rolling hills.

And that thing was a tank and stopped us and saved our life.

We were perfectly fine.

But there's something to that.

There is absolutely something to that.

Um, yeah, you did bring this up and I've talked a little bit about my engine failure, but talk about what it's like to be in that moment, what it's like when the engine actually quits, the startle effect.

Just like, what the heck?

Like this is not happening right now.

Was all that real?

Did all that happen?

Oh, yeah.

And mine.

So I was.

It was a gloomy day, which didn't help.

And it was pretty windy and so I was flying from Boise To Reno, which is one of the more remote stretches on the west side of the United.

Like, United States.

There's no services, there's no coverage, anything.

I had my radio turned off because there was no one to talk to.

And I used to have a radio hum on that.

That.

That avionics setup, but I was just basically crossing a ridgeline.

I was listening to music through my headsets and heard a little buzzing noise.

And I was like, is that the music?

And I reached down and pulled the throttle back just a little bit to change rpm, and that's when the prop.

I mean, it stopped so violently, there wasn't even a thought in my head to, like, restart that.

I'm like, something failed that.

So, yeah, but definitely, like, immediately you're kind of like, whoa, that's not.

This isn't happening.

Like, this isn't real.

What.

You know, this is actually, you know.

So you have like a three second of like, oh, man.

Like, okay.

Yeah.

And so pretty quickly, I pushed the nose down.

I'm like, all right, pick somewhere to land.

I found one, liked it, and then kind of second guessed it and was like, oh, maybe I go to this other one.

And then I remember being like, no, I. I've heard of this.

Do not change your mind.

Stick with the first one.

And then I was kind of like, what?

You know, what.

What do I do for a checklist?

I'm like, I'll turn off the fuel.

I want the avionics on because I need to be able to operate my electric trim.

Going through my stuff.

And then I. I took a second, and I was like, man, is it.

This is what it feels like before you wreck an airplane.

And then I remember thinking to myself, is this what it feels like before you die?

And in that moment, I kind of got, like, sort of lightheaded.

Like, I.

It felt like I might faint for a second.

And I remember like.

Like flexing my.

My core and trying to push as much blood to my head, just being like, no, you cannot faint, you die.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So I was like, you know, fly now, be scared later kind of mentality.

And, yeah, I used all the tricks on that one because I slipped extremely hard.

I landed downhill with a tailwind, and the plane didn't want to, like, land.

It was.

I mean, I was gonna blow past my landing site and go down into a ravine.

So the slip got me down, and I got down to ground level, and it was just like the terrain was matching my glide.

So I had to physically, like, as I was getting rid of flaps Push the plane onto the ground and drove it downhill in this, like, kind of tail high wheelie rollout.

As hard as I could be on the brakes, you know, with the tail that high.

But it was like if I hadn't, you know, spent so much time screwing around with that plane, shutting the engine off and landing uphill downhill, you know, with tailwinds, sometimes you have to in the backcountry.

It's not like you can always turn into the wind.

Right.

So all of those little skills that I developed through screwing around in my airplane really paid off that day.

Absolutely.

Did you ever think, was there ever a moment, like you mentioned, if I faint, I die.

But was there ever a moment where you're like, I'm, I'm gonna die?

No, it was just really that thought of, you know, is this what it feels like before you die?

And it was just like, you know, that's what got in my head.

Made me feel kind of, kind of like fainty.

But I never thought I was gonna die.

And again, it happened.

So I would say from the time that engine quit till I was on the ground was like 45 seconds maybe at the.

It felt like an eternity.

But I wasn't all that high.

I would say sub 500ft crossing a ridgeline.

Um, and obviously the train was descending, so I went down.

You know, I glided farther than 500ft vertically.

But yeah, it was a, it was a funny one.

I learned a lot that day, and I gained a whole new respect to having reliable engines.

And I always cared about reliability.

I guess my understanding and reasoning for thinking an aircraft or engine was reliable was just skewed because, you know, I had done a lot of modifications to that engine.

And in hindsight, you're like, of course it blew up.

Like, you took an 80 horse engine up to 120 horse using parts from all these different engines.

It's like, yeah.

And they're not designed at that, that, you know, horsepower.

So I've learned the value of a factory built, you know, reliable engine that's maintained perfectly, which is how I try to run all my stuff now.

Yeah.

You're like, oh, there's a reason why there's regulations on the other side and not the experiment.

Like, there's a reason why they do this and they rate it at this.

Yeah.

And it was just funny because I just had this false sense of security that I'm like, no, I mean, it's all the parts in that are great and they were, but just the combo of everything and the un undesigned load on that engine and the components is what led it to fail.

So just, you know, one thing that was about my engine failure that I was surprised about is like the chaos that's on the ground too.

Like, yeah, you're glad you're alive.

It's like, all right, now you got to call someone.

You had no cell service.

Probably like figuring out how to survive after being in losing your engine and landing it.

And we both landed remote places, but it took five hours for EMS to find out where we were to get anyone to a police officer there for any of that.

Kind of probably similar for you.

Some mountain man.

He literally, like, when I say mountain man, like, I mean as mountain man as you can imagine.

Whatever comes to your head, yes, that's the answer.

He drove by.

I thought y' all were gonna die.

I thought, there's gonna be a big flame.

Can't believe you're alive.

He brought us to his house and I was like, I'm not going to your house, sir.

I'm sorry.

I will die if I go to that house.

Yeah, yeah, but what talk about landing on the ground.

What did you do?

Did you have like a sat phone?

Did you have any way to communicate?

Talk about that part.

Yeah, and this, this part was funny.

I knew I was way out there.

I knew that there was a road to the south of me, like a highway within 10 miles or so.

So worst case, I was like, I'm gonna hike or walk 10 miles.

So I grabbed my water bottle.

I had a spot locator, you know, one of the SOS things.

And, and on that I didn't have the one you could type out on.

I just had like, you hit SOS they're sending, you know, everyone.

Um, there was another one that said, like, it was like the helping hands send help.

And I think my program message was non life threatening emergencies come up, please send help.

So I pushed that button.

Um, and it also said to coordinate through my wife, Haley.

And I hadn't really discussed with her, like, hey, this, you know, I'll push this for this reason and you know, blah, blah.

And so, so when she got it, her assumption was Trent hasn't died yet, but he is, and she could track my location.

So she saw that I was moving.

But basically I set out on what I thought was going to be a very long hike.

And I would say a half mile from where I landed was like the top of the plateau.

And I looked down and there's a little reservoir just surrounded with campers, like RVs.

And stuff.

And so it was like right there.

So I walked maybe a mile and I found someone that had cell service.

He was on Verizon.

I was on AT&T.

And I was able to call and, and get help coming at least.

But it was funny.

Like, you know, I walked maybe a mile and then I hung out with this guy for a while, and then I ended up running into another friend of mine that just happened to be out there fishing this random reservoir.

He's like, yeah, yeah.

He's like, come fishing, man.

And so, like, I hung out and went fishing waiting for John, the owner of Kit Fox brought a trailer out and came in and helped me get that out of there.

But there was definitely a moment that I was like, you know, this could be.

It was early in the morning, so the survival side I wasn't too worried about.

I just thought it was gonna be quite a.

A pain as far as a long walk and then probably a long hitchhike into somewhere comfortable.

And you know, all things said, we had the plane loaded on a trailer like five hours after the.

The engine out, and I had a new engine hanging on it the next day and flew it home the following day.

Oh, so you felt comfortable enough.

Like, you were like, this is when I.

Like, it's because I did this.

Or were you just like, that's not gonna happen again?

No, I mean, I was terrified.

I just knew if I didn't get back in the plane, I probably never would, like, get back on the horse thing.

And the funny thing was this other engine, a friend of mine, well, hal Stockman, had one, a stock 100 horse Rotax sitting on a plane that was getting built a couple hangars over from Kit Fox.

So he said, just go grab that engine.

I don't know when it was ran last.

And we put it on.

It seemed to run good.

And on the first takeoff as I started, like, positive rate of climbing, and mind you, I'm at this small private strip that does not have options around it.

And the engine tried to quit on me on takeoff, and I think I had that happen twice.

And then just took the carburetors off that engine and grabbed the ones from my old engine and put it on there and it fixed it.

So it was a.

It was a carburetor issue.

But yeah, if you want to know how to get your blood pumping again, is the, the, the flight after an engine quit it, have it quit again or try to.

Yeah, I think that'd be enough for me back.

Yeah, I don't think I know this is what I'm.

How I'm gonna make my money.

But it's not for me.

There's other ways.

This is.

Well, before I was making money, this was.

Oh geez.

This was just fun.

Yeah.

And yeah, the flight home too.

I followed roads like within gliding distance the entire way.

I took a three and a half hour flight and made it like a five and a half hour flight.

But do what you gotta do.

Yeah.

What was the phone call like to your wife?

Hey, her name's Haley, right?

Yeah, yeah.

Oh, I called and she was just bawling and I could tell she was.

So I was like, hey, I'm fine.

Like I'm sorry I scared you.

And she was like, I thought you were dead.

The thing said non life threatening, but I get it.

And she was just really worked up.

So yeah, it was an emotional phone call.

But then, you know, once she realized I was okay, yeah, it was a lot better.

And then.

So since then I've had to hit the sos.

My friend Nick crashed when I was there and I did use the SOS function.

And basically immediately after it happened, because we had other people on the ground, I was like, you guys go stabilize Nick.

I'm gonna go and make contact with emergency crews and get someone coming.

So I hit the sos.

I jumped in my plane.

Where we were at, there's no service on the ground, but you'd get a couple hundred feet up and you could get cell service.

So took off, called the sheriff department because I knew that's who would be sending a heli or at least could help dispatch something out there, and.

And all that.

But then immediately called Haley and just said, hey, you're gonna get a message from Spot.

And it was not me.

You know, Nick's in bad shape, but he's alive.

So I called to let her know prior to her getting that message.

So that helped a little bit.

What was it like going through that?

Not being the one that got in the accident, like being the friend to watch that happen.

Was it almost.

I mean, sounds dumb asking if it was harder but like, was it more difficult for like emotion wise or getting back in the airplane later or is it about the same?

Yeah, well, I've never been in an accident, so I don't know how it compares to actually being the one.

But like it was not a fun experience, man.

And when he hit the ground, I like he was dead.

I there.

There was no way that was survivable.

I've seen enough videos.

Like he didn't have Any horizontal movement, like, it was a crater.

And from like 100ft up, like, you just.

You don't survive that.

Yeah.

So his dad was there.

His dad made the most gut wrenching scream I've ever heard.

And I'm like, you know, and I had my spot locator, but I didn't push the SOS right away because I'm like, why?

You know, if I was like, for a dead body, you don't do that.

And so I took a second and regrouped and said, trent, you need to be ready to be there for Nick's dad.

And got my stuff and started walking over.

When they ran over, I was like, why are you running?

You know, see a dead body first.

But then I hear Nick kind of moaning and he's awake.

And then I'm like, oh, crap.

Then it was like, jump into action.

And it was like, I didn't know if, you know, he was gonna die from injuries because, I mean, dude, again, that was like a.

A gnarly crash.

And his limbs, like every limb was broken.

He was very crunched up in the cockpit.

How he was so alert, I have no idea.

But yeah, that was a.

That was a tough one.

That one definitely rattled me pretty good.

I think the only thing that made me me not like, quit flying over.

It was for one, I would have thought for sure that was fatal.

So if that's survivable, all I gotta do is not do anything worse than that.

I'm like, that's.

That's doable, like, you know, Cause that kind of impact is insane.

Um, and also it was very preventable.

So just kind of managing air speed, especially that load of ground, doing more aggressive of a base to final turn, like, all of that stuff I can easily account for.

Yeah.

So when it's preventable stuff and he survived in a way that I didn't think he would kind of, you know, helped at least me justify why I'd keep flying.

But I definitely took a big step back.

Every time something happens, it's like a big step back.

Yeah.

And knock on wood.

I've been fortunate to have not had too many lately.

I had one close call with a near midair just recently, but, man, the FAA stuff, though, that.

That's probably what took the wind.

Like, I almost quit flying because of that.

That would probably be the.

The thing that got me the most.

So that's what I was going to come up to next.

I had one more question about all this, and then we're gonna go into that.

But you mentioned how you were able to kind of talk yourself into, like, all right, this is why this happened.

That's why this happened.

But your wife was probably like, yeah, I don't really care.

Just don't do it anymore.

Right?

Like, was it harder to talk her into it?

Or you're just like, look, this is what I love to do.

And she's like, that's what you love to do.

You're gonna do it.

I think it's the later.

I. I.

You know, Haley's a pretty supportive one.

It's.

It's incredible that even if things scare her, if she knows that I love it, she supports it.

So I think it was one of those, like, hey, I've.

I've known the risk this whole time.

I feel pretty confident that I'm able to mitigate most of the risk.

And I'm learning every time something happens, and, you know, as long as I continue to get better and be aware, then I think it can be done safely.

So, yeah, it's good.

Shout out to Haley.

Yeah, definitely.

I mean, it's important to have a good partner, whether it's a husband or a wife.

If you're an airline pilot or just a pilot in general, just because it takes a different breed.

Like, your person that you love is risking their life and your kind of future by going up in airplanes.

Right.

Like, I mean, it definitely takes someone that can really put up with a lot to put up with this.

This industry in this career.

Yeah, definitely.

Yeah.

And then, as you're talking about the faa, too, you also have to worry about people watching you that just might not.

I mean, maybe they're jealous.

Maybe they don't like you.

Maybe you made them mad you didn't remember their name at Oshkosh.

Right.

Like it finally came back to bite you in the butt.

But, yeah.

What talk about that.

And, like, you mentioned that it almost made you want to quit.

Is it still worth it?

I mean, obviously still worth it because you're doing it, but is it still worth it?

Yeah, dude.

And.

And I don't know how familiar you are with that whole story, but it was weird.

The first interaction I had with the FAA was with an FAA inspector who has since retired.

But he had it out for any.

Pretty much any young person, but especially if you had big tires on your airplane.

He was just convinced that we're just out violating regulations and trying to kill others in the process.

So the first thing he ever contacted me on was a photo that was sent in of me water skiing my plane on Tahoe.

Which was funny because I had, I had actually talked to multiple inspectors asking for clarity on the, like, the interpretation of how that is affected by the regulations.

Like where does this fall?

You know, skimming tires on water.

It's like there's nothing defined in the regs that say that it's not illegal or you know, whatever it was his opinion, it was.

He gave me a letter of warning which put me on probation for two years.

Now this next event, a friend of mine that lived, he actually moved after this, but just about a mile north of me.

He had a little, I don't know, it's like a field that he'd fly RC airplanes out of.

And his son was begging me to come land my plane there.

And I'd kind of looked at it from up high a few times.

But the day that this, this whole fiasco started, I, I made one low approach at it.

It just to kind of get an idea of, you know, how feasible it was.

Really didn't like it.

I knew that like on short final, so accelerated and climbed out.

Well, the neighbor of my friend had an issue with him flying his RC airplanes and he was convinced that my friend was dive bombing him with drones.

So he'd called the, the police on him multiple times.

But he had a security camera mounted on his garage facing up.

So he was like ready prepared to catch someone doing something.

And I was that guy.

And so he got a hold of the right inspector, the one that had it out for me at the Reno Fizdo.

And it was just like green lights for that guy.

And so it was funny because I didn't go public with any of that for, I mean, the first like three years.

Oh really?

Just, yeah, I was just kind of quiet about it.

And that whole time it's like you have this looming case, there's a ton of lawyer fees involved.

Like, none of it's fun, but this feeling that you're like genuinely a bad person and that you're, you know, violating regulations and all that, like, it sucks.

It's just like.

And then also like the freedoms I thought I had in aviation clearly weren't there.

If this is illegal, because the way I interpret the regulations, it is.

So there was definitely a point where it was like I felt overly burdened by regulations.

I felt like they were, you know, out to get us.

It just, it sucked.

It put me in a weird mental space with flying.

So I was still motivated to go out.

And you know, I like making videos.

I love going on camping trips and adventures.

But just going out to fly.

Like, I kind of lost that for a bit with all that.

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Explore ownership@txttav.com that's txt.com when that inspector got that phone call from the, the neighbor, he's probably like, we got him.

He was probably so excited.

100%.

Yeah.

Yeah.

When they first sat me down, it was crazy.

They, like, there was a short phone call.

Did you fly that day?

Yes, I did.

Okay, do you mind coming in to talk to us about it?

And I was like, sure.

You know, I'm, I'm a very agreeable guy.

I know the compliance philosophy is supposed to reward that within the faa.

So I went in and they had like their whole like conference room filled and they had people like recording and all this and like, like three or four inspectors in there.

And they showed me the video and I was like, whoa, that looked way worse than what I remember doing.

Like, and so then he's like, here's what's going to happen.

You're losing your license, you're blah, blah, blah.

And it was like, like all this stuff just as aggressively as you can.

I got scolded.

Like, I was like a high school son that just got caught sneaking out or stealing for his first time.

Like, the way that they talked to me was like, oh my God.

Like they, they were like yelling.

And all I said was, well, I mean, I don't know if it's of any value, but I was invited to land there and I was looking at that landing site and then he kind of took a step back.

But at that point he, I think he was already off to the races.

And then it was crazy.

Whatever.

The, the FAA attorney that got given this case, when we had a informal conference, my lawyer explained, like, well, he was inspecting a landing site just like you guys say to do in the off airport ops guide didn't like it and he elected to carry on just like it says to do.

And all she could come up with was, well, I don't understand why that landing was necessary.

And then my lawyer was kind of like, there's no requirement for a necessity for a landing.

Like, if anything we're taught, you know, you can go around at any time, the only necessary landing is a true emergency.

Right.

So he was a little bit like, I don't know what.

And she's like, I think we're gonna have to go to a hearing.

So our assessment after that was a lot of these attorneys for the FAA are pretty new and they don't get a lot of hearing time.

And so a lot of times they just like going through the motions even if they, they don't have a case.

And that was our assumption.

But then with my luck, the alj, the administrative law judge, that's with the ntsb, which is who checks the faa, they're one in the same, but they're technically separate agencies.

It was his first hearing, and from what I've heard since then, that he's been pretty level headed.

But, but the only assumption we have is that on his first hearing he was, he was too scared to rule against the FAA right out the gate.

And whether that's true or not, who knows?

I feel like we had a very strong case.

I had some incredibly strong appeals with support from, you know, aopa, eaa, the Alaskan Airmen's Association.

I had, you know, congressmen appealing on my behalf and all of it with, with really good merit.

And they didn't even seem to spend any time looking at it.

That's even, that's once we were outside of the ALJ or the ntsb.

That was in the ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in, in Washington.

So dang.

So he was for the faa.

That ruling means you lose your user ratings.

Right?

You can't fly anymore.

Correct.

Except for you can appeal beyond them.

And that's when you go to the, the appeals court.

And we went there and again, I think, you know, and maybe this is just me trying to like, justify why things like happen, but part of one of our appeals was that it, it's, it's illegal for an agency that checks another agency to defer to the initial agency's decision.

So in the ruling the ALJ did on my case, he said that he was unsure on exactly how to, you know, punish this or whatever, so he was going to defer to the faa.

So that deference to the FAA is not what his job is.

His job is to oversee and, and make the decision above them.

There was a thing called The Chevron doctrine that was in the Supreme Court that was about to go through, that dealt with government deference, and it basically said, that's not legal, and if that would have gone through, my case would have gotten thrown out.

Out.

And they pushed my case through like two days before that.

So the kind of assumption we have is just like, that was horrible timing and they just wanted it off their desk before things changed.

So they just didn't spend any time deferring on it and just said, no, we'll just rule with the government.

So, yeah, so I lost my license for four months.

It was a pain.

In hindsight, I wish I would have just accepted the suspension in the first place and just, Just, you know, taken it and carried on.

But instead I fought for four years and spent ungodly amounts of money on it and still lost my license and got public.

And, man, that, that was a.

That was definitely not a great thing for my public image.

It wasn't a fun thing to go through.

So in hindsight, I definitely wish I would have just accepted it in the, in the start.

But what would have happened if you would accepted it?

What would have been like, the actual.

What would have gone down?

Just lose your ratings, get him back later or.

Yeah, and it's, it's.

It's just a suspension.

So you send your certificate in for the prescribed period, they send it right back at the end, and you have full privileges again.

And at one point, I think they even dropped the suspension to like two months and I didn't accept it.

You're like, no, this is, this is a whole different thing.

Yeah, but I want to be that person.

Right, but you, you had to, you had to fight this.

I feel like.

Yeah, and.

And a good portion of it is because when rulings come out like this, that's what's used in the future to judge.

Yeah, it is, exactly.

So in case law, so it was like such a ridiculous precedent that I felt like I had to fight for this.

Like, no, they can't just say, because you didn't land, that wasn't necessary for landing.

You know what I mean?

Because then every go around that comes within 500ft of a vehicle, vessel, person, or structure is now illegal.

Yeah.

So that was part of why we fought it was the precedent.

That was probably the strongest part of why we fought it.

But, man.

Yeah, since I lost, it's like, for what?

But, you know, it is funny too, though, looking back, I'm.

I'm glad things went the way they did.

The transition.

I was able to make into a new airplane was forced because of the, the need to.

For a project basically, while I couldn't fly.

So, yeah, with the Kit Fox, I loved that airplane and I had a lot of fun with it, but I kind of, you know, I did everything I could with it it.

And I feel like I told every story I could with it.

I was ready for something new, you know, something just to reignite my, my passion for aviation, a new project.

So I probably never would have made that move if it wasn't for the suspension.

So in a weird way, I'm grateful for that.

Yeah, that's a good way to look at that.

I mean.

Yeah, you never, you got to pivot, right?

You've pivoted twice now.

Yeah, you got to pivot.

Exactly.

Or the friends moment.

Pivot.

Yeah.

Yep.

You mentioned that you, you think that it hurt your image.

Do you still feel like when people hear kind of your name or your YouTube, like they just assume that you did something wrong based on all that, or do you think that's kind of cleared and it's gone now?

There's a certain demographic or group of people that definitely still believe that.

And it's interesting.

I, I see, you know, comments and random things online where I get brought up and people will be like, oh, that Trent guy, he's, he's a dick.

Or he, you know, and all these things about me.

I'm like, have you ever met me?

And if so, I would like to know when and how I acted that way.

Because I don't think that you have.

I think you're, you're drawing conclusions based off something you saw online and it's probably not true.

And like, again, so much of, of what you see with any person's social media is, is, it's edited, it's through, you know, rose colored glasses and.

Right.

And what I try to go for is, you know, high energy entertainment, flying.

I'm not making super educational content.

So I think there's an assumption by a lot of people that I don't care about safety, that I don't brief, I don't pre flight, I don't do all this stuff.

But it's like, just because I don't show it doesn't mean I don't do it.

So I think that lends to the, the side where people think I'm reckless in ways is just because they don't see what they don't see.

And then the other judgments of me having not met me, I'm just like, man, I don't Know, but again, I. I've been doing this long enough that I've learned that you're gonna have haters if you are doing something right.

And you can't make waves without rocking some boats.

So if that's part of it, I. I don't like it.

Obviously, the negativity bias.

I'm sure you're aware of that.

It's like one negative comments worth 20 good ones.

It's an interesting thing to kind of, you know, balance and manage when it's.

Especially for someone like me.

That's like.

That's not why I'm doing this, man.

Yeah, I don't want.

I don't want to be an influencer.

I just like making content and flying an airplane.

Right.

Was it hard for you to kind of.

Because, I mean, before that, you know, I mean, everyone.

I'm not saying.

I mean, I don't.

I assume, like, everyone's like, oh, Trent's so cool.

Like, this is awesome.

Was it hard to see a shift like that because you're like, that's not me.

That's not who I am.

This is.

I'm like, this isn't me at all.

Was that kind of mentally draining on you?

Was that, like, to a point where you're like, screw this.

I don't need this anymore?

Yeah, that was definitely.

I mean, during some of the FAA stuff, when it got really public and when the video got released out there, which I don't know if you've seen it, but like I said, it looks bad, man.

It looks way worse than.

Than what I remember doing.

We've never seen the.

The raw footage, though.

It was all off an iPhone and someone, like, up close to a monitor filming something.

But, yeah, it definitely.

That's when there was a lot of negative stuff, you know, spinning around out there about me, which, again, prior to that, I. I'd had had a fair share of that with people just making the assessment that I was, you know, reckless or, you know, like a. I don't know, in over my head, flying in ways that you shouldn't, doing dangerous stuff, like, all of that.

So I. I'd had criticism before, but that was definitely on another level.

Yeah, it's.

It's super interesting.

I mean, putting yourself out there, making these videos, like, essentially, eventually you do become a target.

Whether it's people are jealous of what you do, whether they want to do what you're doing, doing, or just people are bored.

Right.

And they think it's fun.

They think it's fun to.

To essentially ruin someone's life.

Right.

And put them through a bunch of crap and people will come back and say it's like, well, you're putting yourself out there.

You're making the videos, right?

You are creating yourself as a target.

It's not fair to you, but it does happen.

Like, I wanted to get back to the.

To one point about the fight for your license.

In this fight, did you feel like you were fairly represented?

You feel like, you know how AOPA is always like, you know, we're here to help you.

Ea.

Did you feel like all resources were like, we're gonna help this, we're gonna make this happen?

Or was there anything surprised you about support at all that you got?

Like, I don't want you to talk bad about companies or.

Yeah, but, like, did you feel like you supported well in that fight?

I feel like the intent was there.

I. I do feel like they wanted to help.

I don't know how much help I really got.

I was part of the AOPA's Pilot Protection Services, and that did save some money.

I just recently found out it wasn't quite as much as I originally thought it was, but it still probably saved, you know, upwards of $10,000 in.

In lawyers fees.

So it was worth the hundred dollars a year to have that, that coverage.

And, and just from the base level, having access to legal counsel, if you need to call and talk to someone with the.

The AOPA's Pilot Protection Services, I think is of value.

But also my case was, you know, very unusual that it went as far as it did and it just used way more resources than most do.

And that's what got it to be so expensive.

And I think the.

A lot of those organizations were dealing with a balance of trying to make sure that they helped out but not giving me too much preferential treatment.

So I do feel like they wanted to do more than they were able to do, if that makes sense, so.

No, it does make sense.

Yeah, it's.

It sucks, dude.

No one wants to see anyone go through that.

And you talk about the expense.

Like, I'm sure people, like, understand it's expensive.

When you say, like, it saved me 10 grand, like, I mean, that means there was multiple.

Multiple other 10 grand figures.

Yeah, I mean, I think I was in the.

The realm of about 50 grand.

Yeah.

And my lawyer was really good to me.

He cut some serious deals, so it should have been a lot more than that.

That.

But, man, you got to figure I bought my Kit Fox for 39 grand, so I spent more in lawyers fees trying to fight that little thing than I did on my first airplane, and it just like.

And I still lost.

So it was like, not laughing because just like, I'm laughing in pain with you.

Just like, yeah, it was not.

Yeah.

And man.

Yeah.

Like I said, Hindsight 2020.

I would have just taken the suspension and.

And carried on, but here we are.

So do you think, like, you have a fair, clean slate with FA now, or in the back of your mind, are you always thinking, like, some.

Like, they're gonna come after me again?

I think I'm clean with them.

I. I do think the vast majority of the FAA guys are just by the book and they just want to do their job right.

The guy that was coming after me, that had, you know, a bit more of a vendetta and.

And ego and attitude portion, they've seemed to have done a good job, at least in my local office, of getting rid of that.

I will say I always feel like I have a bit of a target on my back.

Like, you know, I don't know if you saw.

Just recently.

Yeah, I debriefed my near miss, and someone called me into the faa, and it was funny because I called them that.

That our FAA office, prior to producing that video and just said, hey, like, is there anything I need to do?

Like, there was a near miss.

Can we.

You know, we had briefed, we debriefed, you know, no harm was caused, but it was.

It was close.

Do I need to report it?

And they're like, no, you did everything right.

I mentioned that I was going to make a video, and I'm like, I'm sorry if someone, you know, reports me for it.

It was.

That's.

So the first call I got from them, they were kind of laughing about it.

They were like, we knew it, but it just sucks.

It sucks that people feel they got to be that way.

You know, that again, the.

The assumption that everything you see on screen is the full truth, which is never the case.

So if they thought they were ahead of everything and thinking of what the creator didn't.

In my case, I was very well aware of both opening myself up to criticism for the mistakes I made, but also that.

That people were going to call me into the faa.

So I knew I was signing up for that, but I decided that the learning moment outweighed, you know, the nuisances I might have from it.

So I decided to post it.

But then it's still.

You got people that just got a call.

So, I mean, I. I don't want the FAA to know who I am.

I would never want to call them ever.

Like, I just.

I can't imagine doing.

I remember.

Do you remember Premiere One Driver?

Do you ever watch him or do you ever hear about his name?

I remember he.

I don't think he makes videos anymore because someone called FA on him for turning off a Runway, saying he was clear of the Runway before he was actually clear.

And he's like, screw it.

I'm not making these videos anymore.

But it's like, you're gonna call over that?

Like, are you kidding me?

People are.

Yeah, it's insane.

And, like, you know, there are some times that maybe it is warranted if someone is.

Is legit doing something reckless, and it seems like the only way to get a hold of them.

I've just.

Those times are few and far between, and more often than not, it's just, you know, someone getting their panties in a bunch and wanting to make noise online and try to bring someone else down.

So it's an interesting one.

It is.

And now that you've gone through this twice, or not really twice, but once was way enough.

And the other time you're probably like, oh, my gosh, not another time.

But are you gonna change the way you do things, making content, or are you just like, you know what?

I got through this.

I got it back.

I'm gonna keep doing my thing.

Yeah.

I mean, again, from the start, I've never been one that was trying to bend rules or get away with things.

I'm just not that guy.

So it doesn't really change anything for me, aside from the way I would handle an interaction with the FAA moving forward.

Because my nature is to just open line a conversation.

Let me be compliant.

Let's talk this through.

We can sort this out.

That's not always the best bet with an interaction with them.

You know, it depends.

You get a phone call, that's normally a good sign.

It means that they're just trying to get something off their desk without having to do too much paperwork.

If you get a certified letter, that means you're under investigation.

And at that point, I probably wouldn't talk to them at all anymore.

I would just get a lawyer.

And that's the mistake I made, because right off the gate, I said, yes, that was me flying.

Yes, I was within 500ft of, you know, a structure, but it was part of a landing procedure.

But because I right out the gate admitted it was me and that I was within 500ft, they basically just had me.

And any good lawyer would be like, I don't know, can you prove it?

And it's just like, was he in the plane?

We don't have any records of him being in the plane.

And even if it was that I was in the plane, how there was no proof that I was within 500ft, except for I said I was.

So it's just little things like that that you don't think of.

I'm like, yeah, I'm trying to be compliant.

I'm trying to just, you know, be genuine with them and trying to do the right thing.

Right.

Yeah, yeah.

Yep.

And that doesn't always work in your favor.

So.

Yeah, it's, it's interesting.

Such a crappy thing.

It's like.

Yeah.

I will say, though, it does feel like there's, there's movements in the right direction.

You know, the compliance philosophy, I think was the first.

I don't know if you know what that is, but 2015, I think that came out that the FAA could no longer go directly to legal enforcement action if it was the pilot's first interaction.

They had to allow the pilot to try to comply.

As long as they're being compliant and they're not, you know, egregiously breaking regulations on purp, you can always, they, they can only do a corrective action.

Like, worst case, you need to take a little check ride to make sure you're safe.

Yeah.

Or some recurrent training.

But yeah, so that was a good push in the right direction.

And then I don't know, there's, there's.

I don't know if you know who Senator Ted Bud is, but didn't you

just post him today?

Yeah, yeah, I clicked on your story today.

There you go.

Ted Bud, get a shout out.

He is out there fighting for our rights like no one's business.

And all these protection acts for aviation because he did the Backcountry Aviation Protection act, which was awesome.

It didn't get pushed through in full, but basically just that act alone should stop what happened to me from happening to others.

Basically, the regulations put in that the FAA cannot enforce 91119 in a way that would force a pilot to conduct a landing that's unsafe.

Yeah.

So if you say this was an unsafe landing, they can't use that rule against you.

Theoretically,

you just have to have a lot of money to pay your lawyer.

Yeah, exactly, man.

Dang.

Yeah, it's.

You know, I've, I've obviously heard the story, but hearing it being told from you, how it affected you.

Right.

Like the personal, like your person.

Right.

How this personally affected you whether it was dealing with image or dealing with just like I didn't like, like I was trying to do the right thing multiple times.

Right.

Like I wasn't trying to do anything wrong.

That's not me.

It's tough, man.

And it's a real shame to see that happen.

Ever since you started, kind of, I feel like people knew this was cool flying.

Right.

This was fun flying.

But I feel like your videos really kind of turned it to another level where now a lot of people are getting into it, are more interested in making content like this, videos like this, this.

What's your recommendation to someone that sees you and is like, I want to be just like Trent or I want to fly like this.

I want to do other airline pilots doing on the side, whatever it is.

But what's your recommendation to them when they want to tell these stories?

They want either maybe even just on a level being a safe, good pilot and doing this.

Yeah, you mean from a content creating

standpoint though, both so like content creating and even just like the flying can have its risks that we talked about.

Like they're different risks, different flying.

But I guess both from a content creating side side because everyone loves to take their iPhone and wants to have YouTube views and also just on flying and being safe in general.

Yeah.

You know, the, the funny thing that I learned a lot through YouTube is, is storytelling.

And even though I'm not directly writing or telling a story, I'm assembling one of what happened in the past and understanding what key things you have to make sure to cover when you're filming a video as well as understanding what truly is important or interest people is probably the thing that took the longest to learn.

But I would tell most people for one, don't over complicate it.

A lot of times we like to think that we have to have every piece of camera gear and have all this, you know, high quality equipment to make high quality content.

But really the quality of the content does come from the story and maintaining people's attention.

Now this doesn't mean making crazy quick clickable stuff, but I try not to waste viewers time time.

So I think that comes from, you know, the commercial days where, you know, we were making 30 second TV spots and you don't have a lot of time to tell a story.

So I've always been aware of, of trying not to drag things out.

But I do think that is important.

And as a viewer of other content, there's definitely some that I watch that it's like if you find yourself Skipping forward, it's just probably a sign that they were spending too long talking about something that they didn't need to.

So understanding how do you connect all the dots of this story with the least amount of words?

A lot of times you can tell story without saying it right.

You can show it.

That's what visual storytelling is.

So just kind of working on saying, what's the story here?

What are the components?

Where's.

What's my take on it?

Like the character piece, but keeping it brief and concise and all that.

And yeah, I think two, I would not recommend anyone get into it with the goal of making it a career.

You know what I mean?

I think that's the wrong reason to get into it.

It could be a, maybe a partial driving force.

But you better love making content because I will tell you, I don't care what level you're at in this thing, Burnout is real.

You get tired.

It's just, it's, it's, it's a lot, man.

Putting out that much content, you know, that's not guaranteed to perform and might not pay out in any sense.

Like, you got to do it because you love it, not, not because you're looking for a dollar sign.

So love that you said that.

I've done this podcast for eight years.

Took me five years to make a dollar off it.

Like, so there's five years.

Five years.

I just edited my own.

I did everything on my own.

I bought 120 microphone, that's all I used for in free editing software for five years to build it up.

Now I have a nicer microphone, a nicer setup.

But I mean, content burnout is real.

And when you start getting paid for it, it changes the dynamic of your relationship with the content too, because now you view it as more of a job.

And unfortunately your mind shifts too.

Like, I have to make this video.

I have to do this, this.

It's not like, all right, we're going to go fly, have fun.

Let's go with our boys and go enjoy or go with our friends and go camp.

It's like, all right, no, what we did camping last Tuesday.

So now this Tuesday, I need to make sure that I show this and this brand.

You know, it just, it complicates things.

It does for sure.

And there's two sides to that too, because, like, I've been very fortunate.

I'm sure you're aware.

Squarespace, they, they've been a longtime sponsor.

They book multiple videos a month on a yearly basis.

So it's the first Time in my adult life that I've had a kind of guaranteed income come as far as like knowing there's work with the drone industry.

It was like the phone stops ringing, you're unemployed until it rings again.

So from that part it's been nice.

Obviously there is the weight.

I got to put out content.

Whether it's the content I want to make or not, I still got to put it out.

And sometimes you have to put out content that you don't feel as proud of as some of the other stuff.

But what's been really good about that is it's forced consistency with me.

Me and taught me to push through a lot of videos that I probably wouldn't have made because I kind of felt like I had to.

But those were the videos that I learned so much and it was kind of like you build new skills through all of those.

You know, it's easy to tell a story about a super awesome adventure.

Right.

It's harder to tell a story about something that's less exciting.

Right.

And so that's, that's where those obligations have helped.

But they're definitely like going back to the burnout thing.

It's, it's no joke and you kind of start feeling the weight of it and, and all that.

But you know, I guess going back to the recommendations too with the, the simplifying shooting on an iPhone is great.

You just really want to make sure you have a ways to cover the story.

And if it is flying, you know, having camera angles that show your aircraft the environment and you are probably the, the key three if you wanted to get crazy and start putting a bunch of camera mounts on your plane.

But I think yeah, yeah, don't over complicate it.

You can really shoot a whole video just on your iPhone and just see like can I tell this story?

Well, it doesn't have to be produced super high quality looking.

I mean these phones have such good cameras anyway.

So I shoot a lot on the iPhone for my current YouTube stuff too.

So anyone that thinks they need a fancy camera, you know, out.

Yeah, I mean I got a fancy camera recording these and it's like, I mean I'm sure my iPhone do just as job cuz I don't know everything that goes into.

It's like a cinema level camera that I just used for this shot.

I can't do anything other than the setting that my editor told me to put on there with that.

Yeah, it's one thing I wanted to touch on too is I, I.

There's been so many People have tried to start podcasts.

You might feel the same with the YouTube and videos, and you're like, oh, dude, that's actually really good.

Like, keep it up.

Like, keep going.

And you've probably seen this in YouTube as well.

The number one thing for me that I think people that make it and don't make it is the consistency.

If you just 100 post, if you, as soon as you stop, like, you just shoot all the momentum down and you never know when you're gonna finally hit it, but you just gotta keep going and don't stop.

I mean, there's been a million YouTubers that you watch and then they don't get the money within a month or two months or the views start dropping down.

They get one video that goes super viral and then they have 10 that don't go anything.

So like, all right, well, I'm done.

But just keep posting.

Be consistent is the, the number one advice I'd give everyone.

I'm guessing it'd be the same for you.

Yeah.

And you know, again, the.

How hard you make it on yourself is something you can choose.

So that's where I think a lot of people try to produce content at such a high level that they're pouring their heart and soul into each video, which is great.

And if you're enjoying that process, continue to do that.

But, but if you're just doing that because you feel like you have to, you're gonna burn out.

It's just, it's not sustainable.

So finding a way to keep it fun and, and easy at the cost of what, you know, people might think is quality, I think is, is a worthwhile compromise.

And it's funny, it's.

It's similar to anything, right?

Like trying to be healthy.

If someone just says, I am going to go on this insane diet and I'm going to work out, like, yeah, sounds great, but you're not going to stick to it because that's not sustainable.

So, like, figuring out what you can continue to do and build the, the routine and be able to show up and be consistent is going to be the best approach.

Absolutely.

And you mentioned earlier where you've like, you put on, I mean, not necessarily like a character or show, but this is you edited down to 15, 10, 20 minute videos.

What's something that people might be surprised about you about, Trent, personally, in your own personal life that they don't know about you, that you can't put off in those videos is.

I don't, I don't, I'm, I'm more of a smart ass than I probably show on video.

And I think I have more of a sense of humor than I know how to.

To film of myself, if that makes sense.

Yeah.

At least that's the feedback I've got from some friends.

They meet you like, oh, dude, you're actually funny.

Yeah.

I thought you were just like, yeah.

So that part's interesting.

And I never know how to take that because it's a compliment that they think I'm.

I'm.

I'm better in real life than on video, which is a compliment.

But it's also saying, like, well, I'm doing myself a disservice in my videos because I don't know how to be me well enough to communicate that.

So it's interesting.

But it is really interesting.

And then you're gonna start making jokes and you're like.

They're gonna be like, oh, no, he's a funny guy.

Yeah, exactly.

You know what else is funny?

The podcast thing.

I have been meaning to start a podcast for six years.

I have shot the first episode three different times.

Was unhappy with it.

Yep.

I've got it all set up.

I have all the gear and I just clearly.

Yeah, so it's one of those things I need to, you know, just do it.

It's.

It's a.

It's an uncomfortable space for me.

This unedited, you know, raw nature is not in my comfort zone.

So I find that I. I think a little too much.

Like right now I'm, you know, try not to sound stupid when you're talking.

Whereas if I'm just shooting a vlog, I can just.

Just, you know, do another take.

So it's funny that side of things,

it's totally different than video because I feel way like if I. I've tried to do, like, vlogging moments.

I made a couple videos and just like, when I go like this with a camera, I just immediately just like change.

Like, I'm not the same person.

Like, I talk different, I look different.

It's like, what am I doing?

Like, I don't know, but this is more comfortable to me.

It's like, all right, well, I mean, I'm obviously the one interviewing too, so that's a little bit easier for me.

But.

But it, it definitely is interesting how it's so different and how it.

Not necessarily.

It's not going to translate, but how immediately it doesn't translate.

Yeah, yeah, it is funny.

And like I said, it took me a long time to get comfortable in front of camera, and I still have days that, like.

Like you said, holding it out, selfie mode.

It's like.

It's weird.

I'm like, I can't get into the right head space.

The weirdest was that first year at Oshkosh when I would just started vlogging.

And I was vlogging the whole trip to Oshkosh and Oshkosh itself.

And so I land and a whole bunch of people come up to see us.

Like I was with the flying cowboys.

So it was like a thing.

And then I pull out my camera and I watch everyone just turn and watch me vlog.

Like, they're like, oh, this is how he does it.

And I'm just like, I feel so dumb right now, man.

Like.

Like, I'm the guy selfie mode, talking to his camera in front of people.

And back then, I think it was less common, you know, like, it seems like now people are pretty used to it.

It.

And also the.

The way that most people know me is through the YouTube thing.

So it's more, you know, accepted.

Early on, when I was just starting it, and the guys I used to fly with, they see me pull out a camera and start filming myself, and they're like, what's this kid doing?

Exactly.

So, yeah, it just comes with practice.

I went on.

So Aviation 101, Josh.

We met up.

We flew to Garmin together.

It was a great video because he almost killed me in a thunderstorm.

So you haven't watched it.

I recommend you watch it.

It was great.

I actually did watch that one.

Did you?

All right, well, yeah, we met up.

What I was very surprised about the whole scenario is I thought.

I'm guessing you were probably the same.

I thought it was going to be kind of a production, but it was truly just like, we're going to go fly, and we will pick the moment and the story that it tells.

There was no pressure to do anything.

I felt like I was really impressed with how professional everything was and how much this was like, we're going to go fly.

We're going to fly safely, albeit through a thunderstorm, and this is gonna be good.

Uh, but I was just very impressed.

And I'm guessing that's probably how you run things, too.

I hope so.

Yeah, I would.

It would be interesting to see if you were around me with my process, but I would think so.

One of the biggest things for me is trying to be low impact to my friends that are out there for the experience.

So when we're out in the back country doing a camping trip, I try not to, like, slow down our adventure by saying, hold on, I need to film this.

Or hold, like, I need to get the drone out.

Can you guys wait?

And they're just sitting twiddling their thumbs.

So I'm.

I'm very cognizant of trying to be, you know, more of the fly on the wall and I'm running gun and they shouldn't.

I'm hoping I don't screw up things and.

And change their experience by.

By making my videos.

So I'll get.

I'll get everyone on that you fly with be like, how is Trent?

Does he do this?

Or better yet, I'll just come out.

You mentioned we can do this in person.

I wish we had the time to do that.

That'd be sick.

But I. I'll take you up on offer one day and I'll let you know.

Just.

Yeah, no, I. I avoid that stuff.

I'm terrified of weather.

Yeah.

I always joke.

I always joke with Josh.

So there was no mal intent in those jokes that I said.

I. I think I'm funnier than I actually am.

So someone's going to do this.

Like, oh, we actually almost did die.

It's like, no, but it was not fun.

No, dude, I had a gnarly one going into sun and fun, which I. I haven't really talked about.

Out.

Let's do it.

I guess we should.

Yeah.

So mind you, I'd been without a license and without a plane at least for, you know, eight months at that point.

Well, I had the.

The license for four months of that, but I hadn't really been flying, and I was pretty new to Cubs, so we just finished my plane and I'm flying it.

You know, I maybe had 20 hours or no, I guess a little more than that, but we were trying to make it to.

I forget the name in Florida.

A.

It was going to be a push, though.

We.

We had low ceilings all day.

Like, started at 1500ft, and then we knew that we were going to be pushing into the dark.

So it was kind of evening hour.

And, you know, as it's starting to get dark, the ceilings dropped from 1500 to a thousand to 750 to 500.

And then it was just after sunset, the dew point spread went to zero.

And then out of nowhere, it was like, this is building around, like, we're in it.

And so I was with another plane, told them, hey, we.

We need to divert and go to Tallahassee.

And at this point, Tallahassee is reporting ifr.

So, Yep.

So we had to Get a special VFR to get in there.

And so what that means is they have to clear out all the IFR traffic prior.

So my friend in the lead plane said, hey, stay here, I'll be right back to this frequency.

I'm going to talk to them.

Well, he never came back and he didn't tell me what frequency.

And at this point we are, I don't know, 400 AGL, 500 IF.

But touching the, the ceiling and the viz wasn't that great anyway.

But the guy in front of me is going into the clouds and out of the clouds.

So it was everything I could do to keep eyes on him and then switch down to ADS B to follow him.

Because we were circling out, you know, in between towers out in the middle of nowhere.

And the towers are going into the fog or into the cloud, I should say.

And we spent a good 25 minutes of just orbiting, waiting to get in.

And I'm just chasing that strobe in front of me.

I knew if I lost him there were like two blind mice.

And that's how midairs happen.

So my first night landing was, you know, in the dark, in fog.

I mean, we probably still had 1 mile of visibility maybe.

But yeah, we got the special VFR got in and I earned the, the drink that night and, and the worst was the next day.

We got out there and it was like, it looked great.

We were fine.

We took off right back into it and we were just like tree level.

Yeah.

Just trying to scud run our way out.

We had friends on the radio and they were to the north of us, same frequency, and they were just laughing because they had like all sorts of visibility, a thousand foot ceilings.

I'm out there like trying to, you know, weave my left wing in between trees on my right wing's in the cloud trying to get out of there.

But it wasn't that bad.

I just, I'm exaggerating.

But they could tell that we were a little stressed on the radio.

It was Virgil who owns Bearhawk Aircraft, and I, I, we ended up getting split away from the other guys at Legend and we did make our way up and found the other, the crew and got out of it.

But man, I was like, I do not need to screw with weather at all anymore.

Yeah, weather's no fun, man, whether you're in a 737, a bear hawk, just avoid it.

It is.

I spent a lot of time, single pilot, 135 and a PC 12 in a caravan.

Learned a lot about weather.

I know what I want to get into and don't want to get into.

It's like I've seen the scenario before.

I know we're kind of running out of time here, but one thing I wanted to ask is just do you feel you brought up Florida kind of flying low.

That's not necessarily your comfort zone.

Right.

Like you're usually around mountains, you're usually around doing this other stuff.

Do you feel more comfortable in those situations when you're in an area that you're flying that you have flown before, so say like the Reno area or mountains, Boise, all that area.

But when you go to Florida in that scenario, do you still feel as comfortable?

Because it's completely different terrain, albeit much flatter.

But there's just different kind of stuff that you would have to worry about.

About.

Yeah, I mean the weather is the big thing.

Like I've never seen like my dew point doesn't ever around us.

We don't really get fog that often unless it's a big storm and you're not flying anyway.

So like right now it's a full blizzard out and no one's flying.

But.

But yeah, in Florida that, that was a trip to me.

I. I've never really experienced that.

So that was a little scary.

And Alaska has similar weather too.

That the harder thing with Alaska is you get both.

You have these gigantic mountains.

Mountains and you have the super quickly changing weather and very few weather reporting sites.

So it's like you don't have great weather information that out there.

Like there's nothing to access.

So yeah, I'm definitely much more comfortable where I spend most of my time, which is out here.

But yeah, it was the weather that gets me.

And, and every time it's on the Oshkosh or once we're getting over on the east side of the Rockies that I'm dealing with convective activity that I'm not used to.

And yeah, dry line storms.

Just like what is happening.

Tornadoes, what the heck.

Exactly.

What's kind of a dream video that you, you were hoping to tell?

Like are you I want to fly across the world type person or go to Alaska.

I don't know, go somewhere cool, a different continent.

Is there like a dream video that you really want to tell?

Story that you want to tell?

I don't know.

Not.

Not at the moment.

The.

The big bucket list one was Alaska and I did that last year here.

Yeah.

The next big piece of the puzzle is.

Is floats.

I've got a set on order so I'll be going on Floats, hopefully this summer and kind of learning that whole side of things and doing more adventures that are based on float access instead of just strips.

So yeah, maybe a British Columbia or Ontario trip on floats and maybe all the way up into the Yukon too.

I know that there's some awesome flying and some good guys to fly with up there.

So those are all on my radar.

Love it, man.

And you mentioned earlier if you were looking for a bigger plane that you could fly, you know, you can come to North Carolina, hang out, fly in the real estate, you know, good place to fly.

I live in North Carolina.

But what would your, what would it be?

Have you ever thought about it?

You're like, it's going to be a bonanza.

It's going to be a TBM.

It's going to be PC12 kind of.

What would the plane be?

I, for a long time have wanted to build an RV10.

Yeah.

And put a parachute in it and just make it like my poor man Cirrus.

Because I think for, for where I live, like I'm crossing large mountain ranges regularly and for me to be comfortable doing so at night or in imc, like I, I need to be able to have a, you know, emergency button that I can land anywhere.

Absolutely.

Because yeah, if you're just gonna fly in day, you know, I could follow highways and fly over most of the roads pretty comfortably.

But if I wanted a true IFR and night aircraft, I probably, I see the value in a parachute on, on one of those, especially a.

Again, higher wing loading, higher energy aircraft.

Yeah, totally agree.

Well, Trent, man, I appreciate you coming on.

We mentioned earlier, it's a long time coming.

I feel like we left other things that we can touch on in other episodes in the future and eventually I'll put you, we'll get you in the magazine as well.

Yeah, dude, I need to send you one.

Dude, when you hold it, you're gonna be like, this is sick.

Somehow it came out better than ever imagine.

I just need more people to read magazines, right?

You got to bring them back.

Got to bring them back.

Yeah.

Well, I'm excited to check it out.

I haven't got my hands on one yet, but it looks great from what I've seen.

Nice work, man.

Thanks.

Appreciate it.

But I appreciate coming on, man.

This will, this will be a fun one and I'm excited.

I appreciate you being honest about how things made you feel because, I mean, I think it's important to talk about and yeah, it's a great story, so appreciate it, dude.

Awesome.

Yeah, well, thanks for having me.

That's a wrap on today's episode.

Thank you so much for listening, Trent.

I appreciate you coming on on.

I'll have to come out so we can come fly together.

It'd be a lot of fun.

But aviation?

Go check out the magazine pilotepilothq.

Com mag and get it today because it's the best magazine, I promise you.

And there's podcasts there, so if you don't want to read it, you can always listen.

I appreciate your time.

Thank you so much.

And as always, happy flying.