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Name is Tom on Instagram, it's ommyfliesalot and tommyflies on YouTube and I am a commercial pilot working on a career change right now.

So I'm a professional engineer at the moment, but hopefully in the near future sometime I'll transition into being a professional pilot.

That's the goal.

AV Nation what is going on?

And welcome back to the Pilot to Pilot podcast.

My name is Justin Seems and I am your host.

Today's episode is with Tom from Tommy Flies a lot.

If you don't follow him, give him a follow.

He's got a great account, talks about buying airplanes, talks about how he got into aviation, how it was a lifelong dream but he said know how to make it work.

He didn't know how to pay for it and he is currently in the process of considering and going after a lifelong goal of being a professional pilot.

So if you are thinking about making the switch, you're an engineer, you're working a day job 9 to 5 and you want to fly.

This might be a good episode for you as Tommy or Tom as he says his friends call him is in the process of doing it and he is going through it.

He is still deciding, he's still going through the process and hopefully one day soon we'll be seeing him flying some kind of crazy cool commercial jet, whether to the airlines or for regionals or if it's for a fractional company like I used to fly.

I hope you enjoyed this episode.

It was a lot of fun.

This is going to be a Friday or Saturday release.

The release schedule is a little bit wonky.

We will get back to Tuesdays.

As I said previously, there are some health issues going on in our family and just taking the time to prioritize that and make sure everything's okay.

So I appreciate you bearing with me and there will be more podcasts soon.

If you think anyone should be on the podcast, send me an email justin@pilotonthq.com I do want to take time to pay my respects to Rob Holland, who passed away in a plane crash.

What was it yesterday?

As I'm recording this, it's an awful thing for the aviation community.

He was such a great role model.

He was an amazing performer and truly one of the best and from what I've heard, one of the best human beings that we could have had to promote aviation, his sport, everything he did.

So it's a terrible loss for aviation.

I pray for his family.

I pray for anyone that know them and you're in my thoughts and prayers.

But even without any further ado, here's episode 332 with Tom from Tommy Flies a lot.

Tom, what's going on, man?

Welcome to the Pilot the Pilot podcast.

Thanks, Justin.

Happy to have you on, man.

It's.

It's on the.

I always feel like I almost 50% of the time I feel like the first thing I say after welcome is, man, it's been a long time coming.

We've been talking, we've been messaging, trying to make this happen.

But today we are here.

The timing has worked out.

I think we both just talked here.

We're both in the Carolinas.

You look outside, it's not the nicest day out.

Maybe it's going to rain here soon.

So probably not much flying for you going on right now.

But it's actually gorgeous down here, man.

Is it?

Yeah, we got sunny skies.

It's windy today, but it's.

It's nice weather here.

You're talking to me.

You could be flying your Mooney right now.

What are you doing?

Get out of here.

Oh, yeah, I got too much.

I got friends coming in from out of town today, so no flying today, but we'll be doing a lot this weekend.

Cool, dude.

Well, that's awesome.

The first thing I want to talk about is the first question I ask everyone.

Why aviation?

What was it about aviation that got you interested in the first place?

So I've been.

I don't want to say obsessed, but I've been just about obsessed with aviation since I was a little kid.

And I'm a first generation aviator, so when I was younger, it was all flight simulator and RC aircrafts, things like that.

But yeah, just since, since I was very, very young, I've always loved aviation.

What was it about, like, what was it about aviation that you loved?

Especially with no one in there to kind of help you foster it?

Was it just kind of like, like you said, like, you just looked up, you're like, planes are cool.

And then, oh, I can play this video game.

Oh, I can fly this RC plane.

Yeah.

I don't really know where it came from.

Like I said, I just, I was just naturally drawn to it as a young kid.

It was, you know, I did a lot of model rockets too, with my uncle, things like that.

And yeah, just, I was just naturally drawn to aviation.

I wanted to go to school for it actually, and was actually talked out of it by the college.

I went to, Southern Illinois University, which is an aviation school.

They talked you out of it?

And they talked me out of it.

Yeah, I went, I went there and they looked at my, like, math scores from high school and like, oh, you're really good at math.

You should be an engineer.

And I was a young kid and they're like, yeah, the aviation market's terrible.

You could just fly later.

And you know, they're like, like, don't go to, don't go to school for aviation.

I was like, okay.

And so I changed my major and went to school for engineering and, you know, worked out.

But yeah, I was, I was talked out of it.

Dang.

I mean, was this like 2000, like early mid 2000s at time or late 2000s?

Yeah, it was, it was, yeah, 2008.

Okay.

Yeah.

So I went to.

I started college around the same time, and terrible time to go in aviation.

You know, no one was hiring for pilots.

There's CFIs are making eight to $10,000 a year.

Oh, yeah.

You had to have, what, 4,000 hours to be a regional pilot or even like a cfi.

It was crazy.

Way different than it is right now.

But, you know, times change.

And their advice necessarily wasn't the Wrong advice.

Because we always say, hey, have a backup plan, which you have a very good backup plan if, Well, I guess this would become your, Your new.

Your current job would become your next backup plan if anything went to crap with the market.

So you have a successful way to make money if you need to, but maybe it just delayed you becoming a pilot for a little bit longer.

Yeah, and I always tell people, you know, gave me insight into what, what else there is.

Right.

So now I know for sure, right.

After 15 years of working, you know, for a large company and, and as an engineer, now I know for sure that that's not what I want to do.

And, you know, when I'm finally sitting in, in, you know, the cockpit, I'll know, you know, that that's what I want to do.

You know what I'm saying?

So what, what would your advice be to people that are in a similar situation as you?

Someone that always wanted to be a pilot, you know, maybe they just didn't have the money to do it at an early age.

Maybe they had to wait to put 15 hours, 15 hours, put 15 years into work to be able to afford the, the life that they want.

But what advice would you give to someone that is thinking about making the switch but is just hesitant because, as you know, life just gets comfortable, right?

Like, you have money, it's safe or safer than transitioning jobs to a career like aviation.

You probably think you have a couple kids, you have a wife, and, you know, it's just, it can be very comfortable, very scary to move.

So what kind of encouragement would you give to someone and what would you say to someone that's thinking about making this decision?

Yeah, well, I haven't completed it yet, so I haven't been successful in that goal, although I'm on my way.

So.

But what I would say is exactly what you said.

You have to just, you have to do it.

It's really easy when you've got a cushy job, you're making good money.

You know, I could, I can continue this role for the rest of my life.

The company I work for will be there forever.

I could work my way up there and make a really decent living.

It's just not.

I wouldn't be happy doing it.

So my advice would be just, just to do it.

And, you know, I went a very unique route into aviation.

I didn't, you know, I didn't go to a flight school and rent airplanes.

You know, I, I was, like I said, obsessed with aviation prior to learning how to fly.

So I was able to go out and buy my own airplane before I had a licen.

I found an airplane.

It was a Cessna 150.

I knew that I wouldn't be able to afford to rent an aircraft and then I knew that after I got my license I wouldn't be able to afford to stay current.

So I knew I had to own my own aircraft.

So I had to wait to have the means to do that.

So I delayed it even further.

I waited until I had the money to buy the airplane, then found a cfi, taught me how to fly on it.

And I've upgraded obviously since then.

But you know, that would be my advice probably if money is going to be, be an issue.

Buying your buying an airplane and learning how to fly it is, is the best route.

Now there's risk involved with that.

Obviously there's, you're responsible for the maintenance.

Aircraft ownership is a whole thing.

But for me, like I said, it was something I knew I wanted to do.

I'm also pretty mechanically inclined, so I'm able to do a lot of the work myself, you know, under the supervision of amps and things like that.

So it worked for me.

May not work for everyone, but you know, like I said, it worked out.

So what was the, what was the purchase price of the, the 150 that you got?

I bought, I bought it for just over $30,000 and I sold it a year later, just under a year.

So I didn't even have to annual the aircraft.

I bought it right out of annual for 30,000.

A year later I sold it right before annual for 31,000 and I put $200 on it.

So yeah, I mean there was some maintenance, you know, in there, but nothing huge.

It was like a couple hundred bucks here, a couple hundred bucks there.

So yeah, it was essentially a thousand hour or 200 hours for free.

What was there a sell to buy a new airplane or was it just like, all right, this is too small for what I need, I need to get something bigger?

Yeah, I knew I had to sell it because I was, you know, second I got my, my pilot's license.

I flew around a little bit.

I knew I wanted to get right into my instrument training and I didn't want to outfit the Cessna for that.

So yeah, I ended up finding, finding a Mooney out in Seattle that was also pretty cheap.

I think my Mooney, the first Mooney was just under right around $50,000, which was a really good deal.

And yeah, me and my buddy got a one way ticket out to Seattle you know, we're in Charleston, that's across the country.

And just sight unseen, I bought the plane.

I mean, I had it, I had it pre biden, things like that.

But first time we saw the plane was the day that we flew it all the way across the country back to Charleston.

So it was pretty cool.

That is pretty cool.

What a, what a good journey for your friend.

Is he in aviation at all or is this kind of just like, hey man, I bought a plane, let's go?

Yeah, no, he's a, he's a pilot.

Oh, cool.

I needed him to come with me because I was not instrument rated at the time and I knew that we would be, you know, we wanted to be able to fly in the, in the weather if we had to.

So I brought him with.

I actually credit him shout out to my buddy Lee for getting or convincing me to buy the airplane in the first place because I always thought that an airplane would be later on in life.

I was like, you know, I can't, I'll never be able to afford an airplane.

That'll be a retirement goal of mine.

And my buddy was like, dude, you can afford an airplane.

And I was like, no, I can't.

He's like, yes, no, you can afford.

And he laid it all out for me and showed me and I was like, holy crap, I, I can afford an airplane.

So I bought my first.

It was first airplane, which was the Cessna, and then him and I flew out to Seattle together and we're still good buddies, so I love it.

That's awesome.

When.

So you bought the one or you bought the Cessna, then you bought the Mooney?

Yeah.

Looking back on it, do you wish you just would have saved a little bit more and just gone all in on a, a bigger airplane that was going to be more suited for as you progressed in your training or did you, if you go back, would you do the same thing by the 152 and then move into the to the Mooney a year later?

Yeah, I would do the same thing.

I thought about that beforehand.

I didn't want to jump into something complex with retracks for a bunch of reasons.

One, it's harder to learn on and two, insurance is crazy on that for a zero hour pilot.

That's a good point.

And the Cessna 150 I knew is a proven aircraft.

The engine in it was proven.

You can still get parts for it, mechanics know how to work on it, and it's simple and easy to fly.

And so that checked all the boxes.

I didn't Want to make the learning process any more complex than it had to be.

So that is one thing I tell people to don't.

I mean, if you have an opportunity to jump into something for a good deal, you know, maybe do it.

But if you can go the route of flying something simple to begin with, that would help me, or excuse me, that.

That would help.

There's so much to.

When you're first learning how to fly, and even when you're going in ifr, I'm sure it was a little bit of a.

Of a difference for you, like having to wrap everything around, put everything together, and also remember to put the gear up, remember to do the other things.

You know, it's.

There's a lot going on, and then add more steps of what you need to do can just make everything a little bit more harder and just delay you, like, a lesson or two.

But, like, you know, it's just something else you got to think of, especially if you're thinking about buying your own plane or renting your own plane, because you know how it is when you go to the FBO, they're like, all right, we got this 152 for whatever.

This wet, or with the instructor.

This is the price of it.

Or we got the cirrus over here, or we got this, you know, this arrow over here.

And you're like, oh, I like the arrow.

But it's like, yeah, but you got to learn way more, and you got to do 25 squared.

You got to remember.

You know, you got to remember so many more things sometimes that just keep it simple.

Stupid, right?

Like the.

There's a lot.

Lot to do in a complex aircraft.

But, you know, when I fly, even with my airline buddies, they're so used to just like you.

You guys are so used to, you know, the.

The big jets, things like that.

When you get in these small, complex aircraft, you're turning knobs, twisting this.

I've got the manual gear lever and the manual flaps.

And, you know, after takeoff, you know, my buddy Andy is a Delta pilot.

Was.

He's like, man, I don't know what the hell you're doing in here.

It's like, there's so much to do after takeoff.

I'm like, yeah, like, there's a lot going on.

Yeah, there's a.

There's a lot that you forget when.

When you kind of move, make your way into the career.

So you think you're doing.

You think it's gonna be super complicated when you get to.

I mean, it can be complicated, right?

But you just forget so much of what it was like flying ga and so many GA or so many airline pilots don't ever get back into ga.

You know, it's kind of a shame.

You think that you're always going to have the opportunity to fly these planes and you're gonna make way more money, but it's still expensive.

Doesn't matter if you're making 400 grand, if you're making 30 grand or don't even have an income, you know, and you're just paying for training, it's still going to be expensive.

You're not going to want to rent the airplane.

And as you make more money, most people spend more money.

So you usually end up having more expensive on top of that.

Exactly.

Talking about your training, how did training go for you?

You know, it was uneventful, which is good.

Like I said, I reached out to a local flight school just because I knew that they would know CFIs and said, hey, do you got anyone who knows how to fly a 150 or has time in 150?

And they had one instructor, his name was Chris.

We're still friends now and he's actually a part 130, I think he flies for netjets now.

But oh nice.

And yeah, they hooked me up with him and we, we got along great.

Which is an important thing to me.

Obviously if you're sitting in a cockpit with somebody for 40, 50 hours, whatever it is, you want to make sure, you know, you guys mesh and get along and your learning styles match.

That's another important thing.

And it went great and we did a lot of fun stuff.

Since I owned the aircraft, we could take it, you know, kind of wherever we wanted.

We go to fly ins together and we log time that way.

Then for my instrument training, I just went on Facebook and tried to find a local CFII that could, that could teach me and ended up getting lucky again.

Found a good instructor.

I stayed with him through my commercial and then for my commercial multi I went to a kind of an accelerated course.

I think it was three days nice in a baron and it was with some very well known, a well known DPE and cfi, Roger and Zenda.

I know people listen to the podcast, will know who they are, but I went to them and they were, they were awesome.

And that was a lot of fun too.

I've heard of Zenda before.

Yeah, she's done a lot of check rides and I always brag about it because we were flying together and she, you know, she had me do steep Turns in the, in the check ride.

And I did, I did my steep turns and I swear to God that needle didn't move a foot.

It was the best steep turns I've ever done in my life.

I played it off like I always did that, but you know, yeah, man, those are the best steep turns I've ever seen someone do in the Baron.

And it was a huge compliment, but I surprised myself.

I didn't tell her that.

But yeah, that's funny.

I always do worse with compliments.

Like if you're on a check ride and someone gives me a compliment like I'll mess something up five minutes later she's like, right?

Are you kidding me?

What was that?

Yeah.

Oh yeah, yeah, she was, I think she's pretty, pretty well known in the Carolina area.

Like she think she has a lot of the check rides.

I did all my check rides in North Carolina with Joey Rogers out of South Carolina.

Yeah, I know.

So I used to fly.

I used to fly from Monroe.

I remember my.

What is I flying?

I was flying the Arrow.

I think it was like a two arrow 201 or just over high performance and flew down to Florence, did my commercial check ride, then flew back and then did the same thing with my multi engine with my instructor.

So yeah, I had a lot of, a lot of time down there.

But great, great instructors, great DPS down in the area.

Yep.

For sure.

North Carolina's a great place to train if anyone wants to come down.

You don't have to go to Florida, just go to North Carolina.

That's where Zenda was too.

She was in North Carolina.

I flew up there to do it.

So.

Yep.

So you, you're doing your training, you're, you're kind of learning how to fly.

Now today you say your goal is to, to fly professionally, you want to make the career change.

But when you were doing this, was this just, just for love, just for fun, for passion?

Yeah, it started that way.

So I started my aviation career flying paramotors, actually.

Yeah.

And for those that are listening, don't know what that is.

It's a paraglider, which is like a kind of a parachute.

More efficient, but.

And then you just wear an engine on your back.

Casualties.

Yeah, it always sounds crazier than it is.

It's actually a very mundane and safe way to fly.

I actually just sold my paramotor this week, so it's gone.

I just hadn't had time to fly it.

But I started flying that once.

I discovered that in 2000 and geez, when was it 15.

And that's what made aviation accessible to me.

So it was.

I was into motorcycles and dirt bikes and things like that.

And then I found paramotoring, and I was like, that's what I'm doing.

There's no question.

Everyone thought, you know, I was crazy because it wasn't as popular as it is now.

But I got into paramotoring, got.

Got pretty good at it.

I ended up being sponsored by a paramotor company at one point, which helped me, you know, get gear and things like that.

I flew on the Paradigm Aerobatics team, which was a lot of fun.

We actually performed at Sun N Fun one year during the night show in front of 30,000 people.

It was awesome.

So I had a lot of fun doing that.

And I kind of think that I'll probably go back to it one day, but that's how I got started in aviation.

So it was just for joy.

And then, like I said, once I realized that I could finally afford the airplane, then I started thinking to myself, well, I might be able to actually achieve this goal that I had kind of put out of my mind, which was that I wanted to fly for a living.

And so once I saw it in front of me, then I made the decision like, okay, that's what I'm going to do.

And it worked out.

Yeah.

What is the goal right now?

Is it specific to airlines?

Is it charter?

Is it 135?

Do you have it kind of defined?

So in my ideal scenario, I'd like to do, like, corporate aviation for someone local to Charleston.

That'd be the goal.

I can't move, which is unfortunate.

I know that makes it harder to find a job in aviation because my wife and kids love it here.

My wife is killing it as well in Charleston, so I'm not gonna uproot them.

So if I could get a corporate gig here, that would be awesome.

I wouldn't say no to the airlines.

If I could make that happen, I will.

So I'm keeping my options open at the mom.

I don't have to make that decision yet.

I've only got 900 hours total time.

I've got a little bit of time before I have to start actually thinking about it.

But, you know, if I can even get a gig flying skydiver or something like that.

I'm sending resumes out now, trying to get just some.

Some work that way, and I'm ferrying aircraft when I.

When I get the chance, so.

That's awesome.

Well, you live in a great spot because, you know, if you choose Delta, Atlanta's not too far away.

If Choose American, eventually go to Charlotte.

That's not too far away.

I think they're both probably, what, but an hour flight in the Mooney, maybe less than that.

So if you want to commute by airplane, there you go.

But.

And then netjets, Flexjet, fractionals.

I don't know Flexjets style of basing.

I know before I left the 135 corporate world, they changed it a little bit, so it's not truly home basing anymore from what I remembered.

But NetJets is a great option as well.

But you have time.

You have time to figure it out.

What's really fun is saying yes to the opportunities that come up.

And we might do an interview in two years and you might be flying the Goodyear Blimp.

Somehow it just like worked out, you know, it's like you never know what could come up.

And I would challenge you to not be afraid to say yes to something that obviously gives you the opportunity to stay at home, seeing your kids there, and talk about loving South Carolina.

I mean, Charleston's one of my favorite places in the whole world outside of summertime, summertime in Charleston is one of the most brutal places.

But, you know, you got water, you got pools, you can make it work, and you got a plane.

You can go fly somewhere else if you want to.

Exactly.

Yep.

Yeah.

Well, that's really cool that, that you were able to finally do this and you're able to finally make this become a reality, because so many people just love aviation.

And I say that because whenever I go somewhere with my wife, being a doctor, all the doctors, they don't want to talk about medicine, they want to talk about aviation.

When talking about being a pilot, I'm just like, oh, my gosh, I can't talk about this anymore.

Yeah.

You know, so it's really cool that you're able to actually make that a goal and a reality.

Yeah, I'm.

I'm enjoying the journey, that is for sure.

You know, like I said, we, we with the Mooney.

I can take the family places, too.

So we go back to Chicago, which is where we're from, you know, a couple times a year.

And it's, it's fun.

I'm trying to enjoy the journey at the moment.

That's all you can do.

And if you can join the journey, then you're enjoy where you go, because you're going to find out that usually what the kind of the heart, what you think the hard parts are now are the most enjoyable parts and the fondest memories you're going to have in aviation.

Yep.

What part of Chicago?

Northwest suburbs.

Okay.

I don't know if you're familiar.

Like, I lived in Oak park for, for four years and my wife went to med school in Chicago.

Oh, cool.

Yeah.

So cool.

Yeah, Everybody followed me to South Carolina, so my folks live here now.

And like I said, I'm.

I'm here.

I can't, I'm not going anywhere.

Yeah, no, there's no way.

I do not miss the, the Chicago winters.

Sorry to my Chicago friends.

You should move especially for the winter times because the winter in the Carolinas are the best.

You know, the summers in the Midwest are amazing, but the winters are brutal.

It's still got hot sometimes, you know, they still get hot and humid, but yeah, nothing like the extent that it does here.

But I'll take the hot and humid over.

You know, it's March and you're getting another 18 inch snowstorm and you're like, holy smokes.

And then the next week you get tornadoes.

It's like, what is going on?

Yep.

Yeah.

What was it like with the family, with the lifestyle change of telling your wife like, hey, I'm actually going to go be a pilot.

Was she totally on board at first or was she kind of hesitant?

No, I mean, my wife's amazing.

We've actually been together for.

She's gonna kill me.

I don't know, 17 or 18 years.

Very long time.

We're high school sweethearts.

So nice.

I don't even know how long we've been married.

We've been married for a big portion of that as well.

Yeah, no, you can leave it.

She knows if she asked me our wedding anniversary, I think pretty hard about it.

That's funny.

No, she's great.

I support her 100%.

Anything she wants to do, she supports me 100%.

Obviously, when I told.

When I came home one day and I was like, I'm gonna go buy an airplane, I kind of spring that kind of stuff on her.

I think about it in my head for a long time before I let her know that I've been thinking about this and, you know, she was kind of like, what are you talking about?

You're gonna buy an airplane?

So that was a shock to her.

But once I told her that this is my goal and this is what I want to do.

Yeah, there's no question.

What was.

Does she have a fear of getting in airplanes at all?

Was it pretty easy sell when you told her you're gonna Buy one.

She's like, all right, you're crazy, but I trust you.

I believe you.

She's not afraid of flying, but she.

Her.

Her fear came from us both being in an aircraft at the same time.

And if something goes wrong, then what happens to the kids?

So she's not, you know, she's not afraid of the actual act of flying.

But, you know, like I said, we fly together now, but before we ever flew together, she made us, you know, draft a will and all that stuff, make sure it was all, you know, laid out.

What exactly is going to happen?

So, like I said, she's not afraid to fly, but she was very nervous about it.

Just.

Just because of the boys.

Yeah, no, I mean, that's a.

That's a genius thing to think about.

And very smart on her end.

Yeah, that's something that my.

If I ever bought an airplane, my wife would do, too.

You know, we might be similar, but it's like we don't think about the whole picture.

We don't think about everything you're saying about plane flying.

Fun.

Let's go.

It's like, well, okay, sit down for a second.

We need to make sure there's a plan just in case.

We need to make sure anything does happen.

We know where our kids are going to go.

Yep.

Yeah.

Now she doesn't even think about it.

Right.

She gets in the plane and falls asleep before off the Runway.

And same thing with the boys.

They just.

It's just another day.

To them, it's just the car to them.

They don't.

The act of flying isn't.

You know, they're.

They're.

They're spoiled.

But that's awesome.

As someone.

I followed your Instagram for a while now, and I've seen you post how buying an airplane is more affordable than what a lot of people think.

Can you talk a little about that and talk about.

I think it was your buddy Lee who explained it to you.

Kind of talk about what he explained and what made it finally click in your head that this is an actual opportunity and you buy an airplane.

Well, there's a lot of avenues into it.

Like I said, I'm most familiar with the avenue I took.

But, you know, you can.

You can finance aircraft, so if, you know, if you can afford a nice truck, then you can probably afford an airplane.

At least.

At least some type of airplane.

That's what I always tell people.

It has to be something you want to do, though, because obviously flying is expensive.

The fuel is expensive.

The maintenance is expensive.

If you get a Hangar, it just, you know, it has to be something you really want to do it and it can't be a kind of a passing hobby or something like that.

And that, that in my opinion is unsafe.

Also, if you're not going to be all in and you're going to fly infrequently or you're not, you know, willing to, like I said, go all in, then it's a safety issue too.

But yeah, that's, that's, that's the first one is you can finance.

And secondly, like I said, I bought my first aircraft for $30,000.

So, you know, that's not terrible.

A lot of people think airplanes are, you know, hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars and some of them are, but there are smaller aircraft or deals out there especially too that you can get into.

And even my Mooney, you know, I'm on my second Mooney now and I own it with someone, right?

So my first two aircraft I own by myself and the second Mooney, the one I'm in now, I own with another person, which cuts the cost of everything in half, which makes it even more affordable.

So there's, yeah, there's ways into it that are, that are not that expensive.

The other thing I do, and I'm very fortunate about this or for this is I work with a mechanic who lets me do a lot of the work myself under his supervision.

So I do owner assisted annuals in my own hangar, right.

So he'll be there, tell me what to do and I'll turn the wrenches and do the actual work.

And that saves me a ton of money.

So I get charged for, you know, the annual inspection cost and the parts I use.

But a lot of the labor I'm doing now I have to take, usually I take two or three days off of work every year.

I just planted in my vacation every year to do my annual inspection.

Hopefully that's all it takes.

But that's another part too.

I save a lot of money by doing that all myself.

And if I had to pay someone to do that, it'd be a lot more expensive.

When you say something like that.

So when you are doing the actual labor for it, you have an amp that's kind of watching over you.

Is it like actually them like sitting in the hangar be like, all right, so this is what you need to do.

And they watch everything you do or do they tell you what you need to fix, you fix it.

Then they come one day and they check it to make sure everything's tight.

It depends on The A and P and the regs are clear about this.

And there's actually a big.

A big, I don't know, hoopla going on right now about this where I forget what the regs say and I forget which.

Which one it is.

But essentially it says that they need to be.

The A and P needs to be available for consultation when necessary.

Okay.

And in today's world, that just means, you know, it could mean face time, things like that.

But the FAA just issued a legal interpretation of that statement, and it says that the.

The amp has to be there with you doing the work.

And a lot of people are fighting that right now because it makes.

It makes no sense.

And it also makes it harder for amps to train other amps, because that's how you get your training, is you work under an amp for X amount of hours, and then you go take your test.

So you.

You know, and if the a.

If the amp has to be over your shoulder the entire time, it's not feasible.

So the way it works for us, obviously, I've been working with him for years now, so he knows my skill level and knows what I can do, and he trusts me to do the work correctly.

And then if I don't know something, I'll ask him too.

I'll say, hey, I don't know how to do this, or could you give me a hand?

And he'll walk over to the hangar and do those things with me.

And then obviously, the final inspection is all him.

He makes sure that every time I do something, he checks it over, make sure it's done correctly, and then I can move on to the next thing.

Yeah, it's one of those things that the faa, like, in this instance, how I interpret what the FAA is doing is.

Is out of good.

Like, they think this is the right thing to do, right?

They're like, this makes sense, right?

Like, yeah, you do.

You need an amp to be there.

But they don't think the practicality of it, like, all right, well, we don't have a ton of amps.

We don't have enough for every single aircraft owner to be able to do this.

Or the cost is just too much for this to actually happen, and people can't afford to do this.

But at the same time, you know, it is nice to have the oversight.

And you.

You, in theory, you want an amp to be there at all times.

It's just not practical.

Right.

Like, it's just not possible for every single person to do that.

And if you don't want to do it like me, if I own an airplane, I'm not going to be the one doing the maintenance on my airplane.

You know, I'd be flying, be like, wait, did I tighten that all the way?

Like, oh crap.

When you're owning your own airplane, you know, and you had the second Mooney, we'll go with that.

But you finally bought the second Mooney and now you're on, or, sorry, you're on your second Mooney.

Now, do you think this is you a forever aircraft or you think you're going to continue to try to build as your mission grows with your family?

I would keep it if I could.

I love the Mooney.

The only thing is the, you know, as my family grows, I'll outgrow the useful load of the aircraft.

So, you know, the back seats in the Mooney, I can fit adults back there, but it's tight and then the weight becomes an issue.

Right.

As the kids grow, we can take less and less bags and eventually it'll be at the point where we won't be able to take trips together.

So I, I don't know what's next for me.

I don't know, you know, maybe it's an A36 bonanza, you know, something like that, something with six seats where we can, they can stretch out a little bit in the back.

I think that might be attainable at one point.

I've been on barnstorm wars and I'm not finding any A36s for 30 or $40,000.

Yeah, they're expensive.

I mean, like I said this, the smoothie I'm in now is not cheap either.

So it's, it's fractional ownership.

Yeah, you know, me and one other guy.

So maybe that is the way I go in the future is, you know, own a bonanza with somebody, which would be fine.

But yeah, eventually, eventually we'll grow out of it.

It'll be unfortunate because the Mooney's great.

I, you know, I cruise 150 knots plus, and that's true.

And so I can get 155, 156 out of it if I push it and that's burning, you know, and then, you know, if I'm going easy and I'm flying 150 true, I'll burn just, just below nine gallons an hour.

And I've got a 900 pound useful load in it.

So it's, it's great aircraft.

It's only got four cylinders, so the maintenance is cheaper.

Yeah, it's got a manual gear, manual flaps, everything like that.

So it's manual flaps.

Big fan.

Great airplane.

Yeah.

Big fan of manual flaps.

Me too.

Is that a Johnson bar?

Yep.

Johnson bar gear?

Yep.

Yeah.

So it, it's really, it's, it's, it's the perfect plane, I think.

Yeah.

If it just had a little more room.

Just.

Yeah.

Mooney's have never been known to be the most spacious aircraft in the world.

I'm 6 foot 2, I've sat in one Mooney and I think it was a J model and I could make it work, but I don't think I could have someone sitting behind me.

So essentially make my four seat plane a three seat plane.

And that's not ideal unless, I mean, unless it's just me, my wife and Emmett and that works out.

But yeah, yeah, yeah, Mooney's a great.

Have you had any issues when you were transitioning to the Mooney?

You know, it's much faster airplane.

Moonies are very, very, it's very important.

You have your speeds right when you're coming on the land.

If you're too fast, there's a lot of videos out there of Mooney's overrunning four or five thousand foot runways.

So do you have any issues at all when you were figuring it all out?

Yeah.

So my buddy owned a Mooney Lee, that I was talking about earlier, before this.

So I did get to fly in one a little bit and pick his brain about it.

And all those things you said I knew before I bought the Mooney.

Right?

Yeah.

But a lot of that stuff is pilots not knowing how to fly it.

So that was one thing I budgeted for when I bought the Mooney.

I budgeted to hire somebody who knew how to fly Mooney.

So it was somebody from a company called Mooney Pros.

I paid him to come out and train me to fly the Mooney for two or three days, I think it was.

And that was the best money I ever spent.

So, I mean, he taught me everything he knew about the aircraft, how to fly it.

We pushed it to the limits that I would not go to on my own or that, you know, a CFI that didn't understand Mooney's would go to.

But that, that was, that was, yeah, like I said, the best money I spent transitioning into the Mooney.

Even though I did that, you know, I still, I took it easy for a long time.

I didn't take passengers for a long time.

Especially, you know, my wife and kids, they didn't go in the Mooney for a very long after I owned it.

And you Know you mentioned things like overrunning the Runway.

You know, everyone says the Moonies float down the Runway and that's true if you're, if you don't honor your, your V speeds.

Right.

For me it's, it's 80 miles per hour over the numbers, not 85, not 82.

It's 80 miles an hour over the threshold.

And, and if you're not on 80, you will float down the Runway in my plane.

So, you know, but, but if you're, if you're, you know, disciplined about that, that it's, it's, it's an easy aircraft to fly.

Yeah.

It's one of those things that when you get scared of an airplane because of so many things that have happened.

Yeah.

It's not the airplane's fault, it's the people flying.

A lot of times now there's obviously circumstances that things can happen, it can be there something can happen where it's not the pilot's fault.

I'm not trying to blame pilots for any, any kind of issues that have happened in the past the Moonies, but once you truly understand how the airplane flies and there's a lot of planes like this, I think the Lancer is another plane where there's a lot of, I think it was based to final turns where people just do steep spirals cuz too slow.

So maintaining your speed is huge in any airplane you fly in it.

It gets more important the bigger airplanes you fly, you fly jets, you know, you gotta be on speed, you gotta be stable, you gotta be all this.

So learning in a plane like a Mooney or learning to be stable as early as your, your 1:50 or 1:72 is just a incredible skill to have to carry on for your whole career and your whole flight training.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'll tell you a story too.

After the, after flying the Cessna for so long, an hour flight in the Cessna was, you know, I don't know what it was, but it was X amount of distance right from my home base.

Maybe Myrtle Beach.

Yeah, yeah.

It'd probably get me there.

Yeah.

So, you know, after I had the Mooney, I was, you know, I had a couple hours in the morning and I go to do a flight and I checked the weather and the weather is degrading as the day goes on.

But it's not supposed to get bad until, you know, later on in the afternoon.

So I'm thinking, okay, I have time and I go and I go fly.

Not used to or anticipating how fast the Mooney was compared to the Cessna.

So an Hour flight out.

I was really far away from home.

And then the weather came in faster than it was forecasted to by a lot, like, I don't know, hours ahead of what it was forecasted to.

And so I'm far away from home.

I'm not instrument rated at this time.

The ceiling is dropping and the, the tops are rising and I'm.

And I'm getting pushed up by the tops and there's no holes underneath me.

And I'm freaking out.

I'm running low on fuel.

And it was all because I didn't anticipate the fact that I'd be so far away in this now, much faster aircraft.

It ended okay, but I was so shaken up from it.

Very long story short, I found a hole in the clouds.

I, you know, I spiraled down through it and I just skirted, you know, treetops basically, to find the airport that was nearby.

Use foreflight to find it.

And I landed the plane and I left it there.

Like I said, I was an hour and a half from home.

I called my stepdad.

I was like, hey, man, you gotta come get me.

I can't fly anymore.

Even though the weather started improving after that, I was so shaken up from making that very poor decision.

And like I said, running low on fuel and being above the clouds, not instrument rated and, you know, it was a.

It was scary.

But I, you know, like I said, I just didn't anticipate how far the Mooney would take me compared to the Cessna.

Yeah, I mean, unfortunately, learn how to be the best pilot possible by either making the mistakes ourselves or hearing about someone that has made a mistake in the past.

It's not something you ever want to do.

It's not something you ever want to happen to be in that position and choose wrong or push safety or just kind of not really understand what you're getting yourself into.

But it's important to never make the mistake again.

And it's also important to share stories like that because it's very impressionable for people when I could be up flying my Mooney and I could be like, oh, this looks like a lot what Tom was talking about.

So maybe I'm just gonna sit here because it did not go well for him, and chances are it's not gonna go well for me either.

So let's just sit here and we'll chill.

So it can be really difficult.

Especially, you know, you're early on in your training.

You're like, oh, my God, I get home, my wife, my kids, you know, pushing it, pushing it.

Pushing.

It's like, yeah.

I think one dangerous mentality is always just like, all right, well, I'll fly as long as I can, then I'll stop.

It's like, you never know.

So you're always going to try to go a little bit too far, and then when you stop, it might be too late.

So something to take in mind.

The best.

The best thing you can do sometimes is wake up and say no and just be on the ground.

Yep.

Yeah.

Get there.

Itis.

I felt it, I've succumbed to it and I've gotten away with it.

And so I'm better at it now.

You know, like I said, I always tell people that the greatest piece of safety equipment you have is your credit card.

Right.

So you're out somewhere, just go get a hotel room for a night, it's 100 bucks.

You know, sleep it out and wait for better weather.

That's what, you know, that's what I always tell people.

Yeah.

Or rent a car.

If you're an hour and a half away, just go rent a car, you know, drive back and you can get a couple days later.

So I've done that.

I left my Mooney in Florida one time.

We flew the family down this before I was instrument rated.

It was supposed to be.

It was good weather on the way down, and forecast three days later was supposed to be good weather.

And then, you know, three days later, the weather wasn't looking as good.

And I wasn't sure.

It was a toss up.

It was one of those things where it could be good or it might not be.

And I, you know, told my wife, I was like, we're not going to risk it, especially with you guys in the plane.

And so we left the Mooney in Tampa and rented a car and drove 11 hours home because it was horrible traffic.

And then the whole way home, it was clear skies.

It was like we.

I was looking up, thinking, like, damn it.

But, you know, I didn't.

I knew it was the right decision still.

I was like, I'd much rather be down here looking up, thinking, we could have done it, than be up there with the kids in the plane and her on the plane thinking, wow, we really shouldn't have done this.

Yeah.

It could have led to a divorce, if not worse.

Right?

Yeah.

That would have been the best case scenario if you took off in bad weather.

Right.

Yeah.

So all it cost me was a drive, rented car.

I obviously had to buy a plane ticket to fly back and get the aircraft.

But, yeah, I've made that decision many times.

Yeah.

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That's AllworthAirline.com PyotoPilot and now back to today's episode.

I want to talk more about flying paramotors.

I've never really talked to anyone about that.

I've been to Oshkosh before.

I've, I've seen kind of, I think it was similar where you talked about sun and fun with doing the night show.

Yeah.

So you just, have you mentioned to say like it wasn't the cool thing to do back then but how did you like, how does someone get into paramotors?

You mentioned it.

As I wrote dirt bikes, I was outside, you know, and I just got a paramotor.

It's like, did you just throw an engine on your back and a parachute and just like, all right, cool, we're gonna just go run and up your flying.

Yeah, I mean, pretty much.

So I saw a video on YouTube.

A lot of people credit this guy Tucker got, he's a, he's a, the most popular paramotor YouTuber.

But he was, he was learning to fly right on the same time I was.

So I didn't see him, but I saw some random video on YouTube of paramotors and that's, that was it for me.

I was starting to get into drone FPV flying because that gave me the feeling of, of, of flying and in doing that and on, you know, watching FPV videos on YouTube, I saw a paramotor video and then I was gung ho about that.

Like I said, I sold my motorcycles and I was like, this is what I'm doing.

And I was going to self train, you know, so I was just going to buy gear and teach myself how to fly, which has worked out for some people.

I don't recommend it, especially for the average person.

If you're not, you know, if you're just starting cold, you don't understand it.

I don't recommend it.

But even for me it would probably wouldn't have been a good idea.

And I got lucky.

There was A paramotor school.

I lived in Indiana at the time.

There was a paramotor school 15 minutes away.

Oh wow.

Somehow in Franklin, Indiana.

And I was like well that does it, I'll just go there and see what's going on.

So I drove up there and they were not busy at the time.

Like I said, there was not a lot of people flying.

Nowadays the wait list to get into a paramotor school is long.

Really?

Yeah, it might be slowing down now but I think at one point there were six month wait lists to get into Aviator PPG and in Florida which was one of the most popular schools.

But yeah, they were booked solid.

So when I showed up to Franklin, Indiana, shout out Dave who was the instructor there, he was working out of a little hangar, he had a couple of paramoters and now he's got a big operation there.

But yeah, I showed up and I was like hey I'm Tom, I'm interested in paramoters.

He's like hey, try this on.

And he put the paramotor on my back and he's like here's a wing.

And I was kiting the wing and he's like like, you know, come back tomorrow, we'll get you flying.

I was like tomorrow?

He's like yeah.

And so yeah, I showed up the next day.

I gave him I think fifteen hundred dollars or something.

It was for all the training and it was one day of, of training learning how to use the motor and kite the wing.

This is not common by the way.

It usually takes people a week or two to learn.

But yeah, then the next day he's like yep, show up in the morning and we'll, we'll, we'll solo you.

And I was flying the next day.

It was awesome.

Awesome.

What were the lessons like?

Is it just essentially you just like start the motor, run, sit back and then.

No, most of, most of your training is kiting the wing.

So kiting is you don't have a, you don't not wearing a motor, you have a harness on and you're just learning how to control the wing on the ground.

So you need some wind and you'll bring the wing up over your head and you'll kite the wing and just learn how to control it on the ground and you'll practice that way.

That's 90% of your training.

I'm looking it up right now.

Yeah, so you're, yeah, it's just like flying a kite on the ground but you're, you're have the wing up over your head.

And you're learning to control it.

Once you can do that, then once you put the motor on, get used to the feeling of that.

Yeah, kind of.

I don't know if it comes naturally, but it's much easier.

Geez.

And then you just fell in love with it.

And it's like, all right, this is, this is me flying.

This is what I'm gonna.

This is my flying.

This is as far as I'm gonna get.

Yeah.

The first time you, you take off in a paramotor, it's amazing.

And it is a completely different feeling than an airplane.

In an airplane, you've got your whole panel in front of you, smaller windows, you know, and you have a window and a paramotor, the second you get off the ground, there's nothing.

It's just.

And then you scoot back into your seat.

Right.

There's a little seat board that unfolds.

And so you're actually sitting.

You're not, you're not actually hanging.

You're just sitting in a seat and you just.

All you have in front of you is your knees and then just air.

And it is, it is the closest, like, feeling to like, actually flying that, that you can get to, especially because you can go.

I mean, you can go up as high as you want.

10,000.

I had a good money.

The highest I went to is like 7 or 8,000ft.

You know, after that, it just, it's just a number so you can brag how high you've been.

It doesn't really feel like you're getting any higher.

Yeah, Just got hypoxia.

Sweet.

Yeah.

Well, my buddy Mark.

Shout out.

Mark, He.

Mark Honeycutt, he flew to 18,000ft.

He flew up.

Yeah.

Without oxygen.

And then I'm guessing the coming down in a parachute, you know, it's not like you're coming down that fast, right?

Yeah, you, you, you basically pin it until you run out of fuel.

I think he did run out of fuel up there at 18,000.

You just glide down.

But yeah, he's.

That's the highest you're allowed to go on a paramoter.

So there are people that have done higher, I forget, you know, 20,000ft.

But they do.

With oxygen.

Obviously.

Bear Grylls flew.

Flew over Everest in a modified paramotor.

But those.

That's all like, obviously, like, I've never, I never heard about that.

I don't know.

You didn't hear about that one.

I don't know if that's just something that the paramotor community knows about.

Oh, Yeah.

A wide known thing, but I didn't know Bear Grylls flew paramotors.

Yeah, yeah, he, he, I don't know if he does anymore, but he did.

He flew up to the top of Everest with it or flew over Everest in it.

Imagine just like landing on Everest.

All right.

Climb.

Exactly.

That's the way to do it.

Yeah.

My favorite was always flying in class G airspace where the cloud clearances are just clear of clouds and you can just, you know, on like in the mountains where all you get all those puffy clouds and it's calm air and you can just weave your way through, you know, these like cloud tunnels and you can dip your feet in the clouds and it's, it's an amazing feeling.

It is awesome.

What does it feel like when you touch clouds?

It's cold and wet.

Yeah.

So exactly what you think it would feel like.

Yeah, exactly.

And you can feel temperature inversions too, which I always tell people.

You know, when you're flying an airplane, you have a temperature gauge and you'll see, oh, it's a little warmer up here than it was on the ground.

Or you'll fly through a couple of bumps, but in a paramotor you can feel it.

You'll take off on the ground, you'd be freezing.

And at 700ft you're like, oh, it's nice and warm up here.

It's a big difference.

It's pretty crazy.

What do you do to stay warm?

You just either shorten your flight or where you just wear a ton of layers.

Yeah, yeah.

When it's chilly, you have to layer up.

We fly, fly with heated gloves and you know, just tons of layers, which is rough because if you're planning to fly high or it's, you know, in the spring or the fall where it's warm on the ground and cold up, up, up there.

If you're planning to go high, then yeah, you have to layer up on the ground and you're sweating with, you know, you put the heavy motor on and you've got to run to get in the air.

And if you mess up your first launch for some reason you got to reset everything up and you'll be soaked in sweat and then you have to get up in the air and then you're, you know, it's freezing up there.

So.

Yeah, but a lot of times I wouldn't fly high.

It's more fun cuz paramotors don't have the 500 foot rule.

So you can fly just over the tops of the trees.

Um, yeah.

I was going say what.

What was the most fun about doing it?

Was it kind of pushing the limits?

Seeing how high you could get, seeing how long you could fly for, or.

What was kind of like the most fun about a paramotor?

I enjoyed the aerobatics part of it a lot.

Like I said, when I was part of the aerobatics team, that was a lot of fun, you know, just.

It just felt cool flying in an air show.

You know, like I said, when we flew at Sun.

At sun and Fun, we'd be sitting in.

We could start our own air show called Fun and Son.

Fun and Son.

Yeah.

We ended up calling it sun and Meh at the end because they were.

They started banning one wheels and you couldn't do all this stuff.

But, yeah, we'd be sitting in a pilot briefing in the morning, standing next to the Blue Angels and, you know, like all the acting, real pilots, and then we're just sitting there with our, like, paramotor jerseys on.

Yeah, it was a lot.

Yeah, we're here.

Paramoto team's here.

Well, there's a lot of fly ins.

Yeah, yeah, there's a lot of fly ins that go on across the country, which is great.

You go to an airport and camp for the weekend and everybody flies and hangs out and that was a lot of fun.

But, yeah, it was just the freedom just being able to, you know, find a park that has a nice big open field.

You can pull up with your paramotor, pull it out of the truck, lay the wing out and just go fly.

And it was.

It was a great feeling.

When did you realize you could do aerobatics in a paramotor?

Early on.

Yeah, I just.

I was naturally drawn to it.

I progressed very slowly into it.

You know, I didn't.

That was not my ambition.

My ambition was to fly.

I didn't.

I didn't think I'd be doing aerobatics.

But after I started getting into it and, you know, you start getting onto hotter and hotter, smaller wings, faster wings, things like that.

Like I said, it just.

Just kind of happened.

I started doing wingovers and then I did my first barrel roll and I was like, oh, that's fun.

And then, you know, I just, yeah, progressed from there.

I ended up taking an SIV course, which is a French acronym.

I forget what it stands for, but it's like simulated incidents in flight, something like that.

They tow you up behind a boat and you're not.

We're not wearing a motor.

It's just a paraglider.

And then the Instructor's on the ground with a radio, and he tells you what to do.

And you practice, like, collapsing your wing and stalling the wing.

And you know, if anything happens, you're over a lake, and so you have a reserve shoot.

You throw your reserve and you land in the lake, and they come get you.

Oh, wow.

I've actually got a quick story about that if you want to hear it.

So I did it in Florida, and I was down there with my family, and we were visiting my sister, and I was like, I'm gonna go do this SIV course while we're down there.

Like, okay, fine.

So it was just a day for me, day course.

And I went out there and it was just me.

And I have a YouTube channel, so they were doing, like, YouTube for it, right?

So it was just me that day.

So we could film and do the whole, whole thing.

And.

And it went great all day.

I learned all these different maneuvers.

I learned how to stall the wing.

I learned how to do just a ton of things.

It made me a thousand times more confident under the wing.

However, it was getting windy, and the last thing of the day that they let you do if you want, is do your reserve throw.

Because we fly with a reserve chute.

Most people do, and if you're lucky, you never throw it.

But in the SIV course, if you want, they'll let you throw the reserve so you can feel what it's like.

And I was like, oh, yeah, let's do it.

But I asked the instructor, I was like, is it too windy to do this today?

Because it was.

It was like 25, 30 knot winds, like, over the lake, and it was smooth, but it was just windy.

And he's like, no, you'll be fine.

I was like, okay, let's do it.

And so we.

He tows me up and we do a run, and I'm losing altitude.

And then, you know, he's like, okay, we're gonna get ready for the reserve throw.

I'm like, let's do it.

And so, you know, he gives you instruction so you're not thinking about it.

And then he's like, reserve, reserve, reserve starts yelling reserve.

So you throw it, right?

So I grab the reserve, I toss it, and it opens up.

And then when you do that, the reserve chute comes to one side and the wing comes to the other, and you kind of plane toward the ground and speed up.

So I was thinking to myself, get the main.

The main wing pulled in so that I.

The reserve comes overhead and I descend slower, which doesn't didn't matter, right?

I'm over water.

It makes no difference, you know, just a couple miles an hour.

It's not a big deal.

So the whole time I'm worried about getting the wing in, and I keep letting go of it, and it keeps re.

Inflating.

What I should have been doing the whole time is unbuckling from my harness, right?

And getting out of at least getting my leg straps undone so that when I hit the water, I can get out of the harness.

Well, yeah, I didn't do that.

And I hit the water, and all the lines came down over me and wrapped around me.

And then my reserve re inflated in the wind.

And it's a big reserve chute, right?

And it felt.

I mean, it inflated and pulled me, and it just grabbed me by the neck and pulled me underwater, and I went under.

And it was the hardest.

I mean, it felt like you're getting pulled by a boat.

I mean, it just jerked you, and it just pulled me across the lake.

And I'm underwater, and I can't find my harness straps.

I even have a hook knife on me, but I'm freaking out because I'm underwater and I didn't take a breath.

Nothing.

And I didn't even think to grab the hook knife to start slicing.

And I couldn't find my harness straps, and I'm stuck.

There's nothing I can do.

I'm completely tangled.

And I'm just thinking to myself, this is it.

Like, I'm done.

Like, I'm drowning right now.

And the second I, like, I'm, you know, I'm like, you know, I'm done.

I felt.

I felt a hand grab me and pull me out of the water.

Oh, dang.

They had seen it happen, and they.

They rushed over in the boat and they yanked me out of the water.

And yeah, that was this.

That was the scariest aviation incident of my life.

And hopefully will be the scariest aviation incident of my life.

But I was.

I was that close, man, to not making it.

It was.

What'd they say when they pulled you up?

They're like, what were you doing?

Why didn't you get out?

No, they.

No, they knew.

They.

They knew it was.

It was close.

Obviously, they were on it.

They were watching me the whole time.

And, you know, that's why they're there, is to get you out of the water.

But, yeah.

Oh, and that's the other thing.

I was wearing flotation, but it was automatic inflating flotation, and it didn't inflate Nice.

It malfunctioned, so I didn't even have a life vest on.

And so, yeah, it was really scary.

You're just along for the ride at that point.

Like there was nothing you could do.

It was nothing.

It was unbelievable, the strength of that chute pulling you through the water.

Like I said, it felt like a boat was pulling you.

Have you ever been behind a boat, like wakeboarding or something like that?

That's exactly what it felt like.

This isn't as bad of a story.

It's actually kind of funny.

But we were tubing.

I haven't tubed in so long.

But he got flipped over.

And you know, the normal thing you do when you get flipped over is you're like, oh.

He just kept holding on to the tube underneath it, just dragging him under the water.

But yours was obviously much, much more intense and much scarier, but horrifying.

Dang, man.

Well, I'm glad it all worked out and I'm glad that you're not afraid of flying because there's a lot of incidents like that that scare people away.

You know, maybe you thought fixed wings would be a little bit safer than a paramotor or pulling the reserve shoot.

But you know, here you are and you're doing great stuff.

You're flying awesome airplanes.

I'm really looking for forward to seeing how your career progresses.

Because being a 900 hour pilot, it's a really interesting place to be.

Right.

Because you feel like you're very confident.

You feel like you have so much time, but at the same point, you know you're just starting out in your career.

I was told that when I was about 700 hours, that's the time where you can be the most dangerous you can ever be.

Because you think you know everything, but in reality you're still trying to figure everything out.

And it's just one of those things that you learn as you go.

And I think it's really cool that you're going after this and you're making it happen.

So I'm excited to see how this works out for you and how the future plays out.

I do want to know, as you've made this choice to change careers, you said it's not done yet, but you're pretty sold on the fact to do this.

Has what the current landscape, what aviation looks like, has that made you change your mind at all?

Maybe just keep doing it for fun or are you still pretty much all in?

I'll tell you, it makes me nervous, but only because it changes so often.

Yeah, but that's, you know, that's what, that's what stopped me in the beginning was the landscape, you know, And I, if I was giving advice to someone, I would, I would tell someone, don't, don't let that stop you.

Because that, you know, that's what everyone's gonna do.

And the second things don't look great or the second things get hard, that's when people stop and they don't follow through.

And that's the difference between someone who makes it and someone who doesn't.

So I will be successful in this eventually.

I know it.

And whether that is the airlines, whether that's 135, a corporate charter or anything in aviation, maybe I find a job selling aircraft.

I don't know.

I just want to be around airplanes.

I want to fly, and that's it.

So if that means, like I said, Airlines, 135, whatever it is, I'm okay with that.

I'm open to all of it right now.

So, like I said, right now I feel like I have a little bit of time because I don't have the hours for the higher paying starting roles yet.

So I still, you know, I still got some time to think about it, but I try not to let that stop me.

And it does get discouraging from time to time.

I'll look at it and I'll think, dang, man, am I making the right decision here?

And again, what we talked about when we started the podcast was I've got this nice job, I've got a cushy role.

I don't have to be making this change right now, you know, and I'm good at what I do, so I'm not worried about losing my job, you know, that.

That creeps in.

It creeps in.

And it's, it's a, it's a killer of motivation.

And I try not to let that happen.

I try to.

I try to stay focused, stay motivated on the days.

And it sucks to say it, but, you know, some days I don't want to fly.

You know, it'll be, I'll be like, you know, I've got a.

The weather's great, I've got a free night.

I haven't flown in, you know, four or five days.

And I have a goal, an hour goal, and I'll, you know, I'm like, I have to fly today if I want to hit that goal.

And it's insane to say that because I, it's like people might not be able to relate to that.

But, no, I think it's relatable, I think, for sure.

I think there's a time, you know, just some days you don't feel it.

You don't feel like you need to go fly.

And you think that it's going to hinder your opportunities.

You think it's going to make sure you're not going to be a pilot.

But at the end of the day, it doesn't matter.

You're going to get the hours.

It could delay you by a day, it could delay by a week, could be delayed by a couple months.

But just keep at it, keep plugging away.

The most important thing is don't get burned out.

Don't become the pilot that everyone hears about that doesn't want to fly, it doesn't want to be around ga that doesn't want to do anything, you know?

So try to just enjoy it.

Try to have fun with it, get your family involved with it, prepare your wife for when you finally get that 135 job or that 121 job that, you know, the days I might be gone more, you might know kids, it might be gone a little bit more.

But it's leading so we can see you more, so we can go on better vacant, whatever it is, however you sell it to them, it's going to get easier, it's going to get harder, and it's just aviation.

There's unfortunately no other way around it.

And that's kind of what the aviation.

That's the way it is.

Exactly.

It is.

Well, Tom, I appreciate you coming on the podcast, man.

That's all I got for you.

Like I said, it's been awesome to follow you.

We're not too far away.

We should meet up sometime at Pick and Pig.

If you haven't been there before, I hope you've been.

I've not been there.

Oh, my gosh, you gotta go.

I might actually drive because I'm an airplane.

I don't rent airplanes.

Maybe I should rent one.

But it's like an hour drive for me.

I'll come pick you up in the morning.

It's so sick.

You have to go.

One of my favorite places.

I hope someone there is listening to it because it's great.

And I love the Pick and Pig.

It burned down and it's back.

We got to bring cash if we go, or else they make you wash dishes.

That's the only thing.

Yeah, let's stay in contact.

I'd love to do that.

Cool, man.

Well, sounds good.

Well, I appreciate you coming on and I hope you have a great day.

Yeah, thanks a lot Justin.

I'm a big fan of the podcast so I really appreciate you having me.

On and yeah, anytime.

We'll have to do it.

We'll have to do a part two when as your career progresses and seeing where you go.

Yeah, we'll meet up at a thousand hours again.

See where we're at.

All right man.

I appreciate it.

Hope you have a good one.

Thanks, buddy.

That's a wrap on episode 332.

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