Flying Contributor

Lauren Cohen caught the flying bug while attending high school in Reston, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C. “My high school was very focused on getting into college and having a career plan,” she says. “I did a project on the pilot shortage and started considering aviation. When I got the idea in my head, […]

When Scott McCall was a kid growing up in California, his favorite pastime was flying a Lear 45 on Microsoft Flight Simulator. “My friends were playing Grand Theft Auto, and there I was in the simulator flying across the world,” he says. Scott’s parents recognized his interest in aviation and bought him two introductory flights. […]

Shalyn Marchetti, 23, was born and raised in the culture of general aviation. Her parents, both pilots, own and operate a private grass strip called Applegate (15MO), about 120 nautical miles northeast of Kansas City. She soloed in the family’s J-3 Cub there shortly after graduating from high school and is the only pilot in […]

Ever since she was a little girl, 25-year-old Seattle native Kelsey Yoder dreamed of becoming a pilot. Two of her uncles are pilots, but growing up she never met or saw any female pilots or had any exposure to general aviation. After graduating from high school in 2011, she decided to become a lawyer, like […]

Laura Mayo is a lover of all things that fly, especially airplanes. “I have devoted most of my education and field experience to birds, and now I get to fly with them,” she says. Mayo earned a bachelor’s degree in fisheries and wildlife sciences from Oregon State University in 2017, and has worked and volunteered […]

For 29-year-old National Guard veteran Justin Miller, the best part of being an airline pilot is the view from the flight levels. Miller recalls his first flight on a Northwest DC-9 from Detroit to Syracuse, New York, to visit his grandfather. “I remember looking out the window and seeing the Great Lakes, the snow-covered ground, […]

The rigors of an intensive, fast-paced flight training program are proving no match for 28-year-old Tennessee native Trevor Pickard. When he’s not working on his instrument rating, he’s training for his first Ironman competition, which he hopes to complete later this year. “Flying ties so many emotions together,” he says. “The sense of exploration, adventure […]

Oscar Mims knew at a young age that he wanted to be an airline pilot. His uncle is a pilot for American, and his mother is a flight attendant for Delta. The family’s airline travel benefits allowed him to see the country and develop a sense of what it would be like to work as […]

California native Sherry Smith never imagined she’d grow up to be an airline pilot. Nobody in her family is in the aviation industry, and flying wasn’t something she ever seriously considered. But when she graduated from college with a business management degree, Sherry knew that she wanted to travel, and soon found a job as […]

Utah native Luke Maddox was working as a Spanish teacher when he realized he needed a career change. “When I finished my bachelor’s degree I started into a graduate program, and did a year of that,” he says. Something gnawed at him, though, as he recalled his childhood dream of becoming a pilot. “I thought, […]