Page 10 - Oct2020

WHAT ATTRACTED ME TO AVIATION Did my runway crossing story suggest I wasn’t the brightest on
the block? Nonetheless, the written tests and medical were all
AND IS A FLYING CAREER FOR YOU? passed successfully and after burning my bridges by leaving
by Ken Armstrong university I learned that only 3-7% of applicants signed up for
The excellent editor of this magazine asked me to write about training would make it to wings standard. Had I known that,
my attractions to aviation. That’s a broad spectrum challenge. there is no way that university would have been abandoned for
Airforce postings, many magazine articles, aircraft sales, VIP such a distant and unlikely goal! Skipping through the next 18
flights, accident reconstruction and international operations months of training on the Chipmunk, Tutor and Expeditor,
have blessed my life. It could be your future too. What is where all my square edges and fragmented personality were
aviation? To paraphrase a somewhat crude song: “money for hammered into a uniform state, I had wings sewed to my chest
nothing – and y’er chicks for free….” With a broad assemblage and my buns strapped to a C-45 as an instructor teaching multi-
of skills, aviators can become uniquely qualified. How did on get engine IFR. Living all my passions, it’s impossible to express how
to that lucrative level - and, is aviation for you? Are you curious happy I was. Instructors are forced to fly well because they
what flying careers are really like – the truth? Read on. need to demonstrate exercises accurately for their students.
This is good as one’s skills get honed very quickly – especially
For me, aviation began at age four. I was standing outside my with the Standards crew looking at our performances. Learning
home in Kirkland Lake Ontario when a DC-3 airliner droned to fly accurately and smoothly while teaching students low level
overhead from horizon to horizon – it took some time and it fire suppression would subsequently become a big part of my
gave me quite a long lasting image. That was the beginning of life.
the dream. It’s been fulfilled over 55 years of overcoming
gravity’s pull – and still continues. Like most career visions, I
had no idea of the real life experienced by professional pilots.
When I was six, Dad was a dead-heading passenger in a tractor
trailer in which the driver skidded on ice and plunged off a
bridge and my sleeping father did not survive his injuries. My
mother, sister and I were taken in by a cousin in Toronto where
I was schooled. (My appologies to my fellow westerners.) My
goal to fly never diminished in that aviation active locale.
Entering my teens, I read everything available to me, built
models and pedalled my bike many miles to the Malton Airport
(now Pearson International) to watch aircraft operations. I had
read so much about aviation, I knew what runways they would
land on to take advantage of the headwind to reduce the
landing roll. Here’s how smart I was. I knew we could bike
across the longest runway that ran east-west because the wind As a nineteen year old, full of testosterone and other poisonous
was from the north. My buddy and I were met by security on chemicals, I had a rather high opinion of my flying skills. Time
the other side of the runway where he was about to admonish for fate to intervene, again… One of my mature army students
us when I pointed out that there was no risk because it was the gaining his instrument rating had a Hiller helicopter at his
out of wind runway. He was not favourably impressed by my disposal. When not flying as my student, Pat Thornton was
conducting operations against a fighter jet. The military wanted
explanation and part of what he said was drown out by the
shinny new DC-8 jetliner screaming to a landing immediately to know what techniques would be best for attacking a low and
behind us. That’s the turning point when I learned at 13 years slow helicopter. (The answers are surprising.) For some strange
of age that I couldn’t learn everything about aviation from reason, Pat thought I was a know it all – so, as a comeuppance
books. Apparently, these new high-speed jets needed long he allowed me to try to fly the helicopter.
runways for their operations. Time for more studying…. Upon
entering York University with the plan to join the RCAF ROTC
university plan - if my first semester marks were successful, the
military announced the summer flying program was cancelled. I
knew I didn’t want to wait four years to fly, so I joined the EAA,
bought the plans to a Jodel and was about to start building my
amateurbuilt in 1965 when I learned that direct entry to the
military was a possibility. One of my many flaws is that I am
impatient. The next day found me at the recruiting center filling
out an application and taking a series of exams.