Three days of gatherings by flight training providers, industry representatives, and product and service providers in Orlando wrapped up yesterday with another series of seminars focused on the business of flight training coupled with discussions about GA safety.

During lunch on Friday FSANA recognized several individuals and/or businesses for their contributions and service to the flight training industry.

Those being recognized included Flight Schedule Pro and PlaneEnglish who received Aerospace Entrepreneur Awards. Vern Moyer, FSANA Board member and first FSANA Chairman, Chris Erlanson, Nashville Flight Training, received the Aero Mentor award. Kathryn Creedy received the Aero Media Award.

With over 200 participants over the three days, it is clear that there are no opportunities in the training industry to share information and collaborate like the International Flight School Operators Conference. Coordination in the flight training industry can only improve our overall industry. There is much we can learn from each other, and a major goal of FSANA remains to continue the promotion of this effort.

If you are receiving this newsletter and didn't get a chance to join this year's conference, we are hopeful that you will do so for the next conference if you are in any way involved with the flight training industry.

Can the goal of aviation training be ZERO accidents?

Why not?

The goal in air carrier operations has moved to zero for some time, but it has not done the same thing in general aviation or the training sector. We have set acceptable ratios of reduction, but have yet fully say that ZERO is the goal.

Aviation media personality Dan Gryder, and host of the YouTube channel “Probable Cause” - https://www.youtube.com/user/UGOT2CTHIS spent time discussing the potential of a goal for targeting

With over 1 million views per month and over 6 million minutes of watched content per month, Dan is taking time to drive conversation about safety in our aviation environment. Utilizing modern social media tools, his reach has been broad and is something that many flight training providers could model with promoting safety with their own customers and clients.

The goal of zero accidents is a discussion point of significant value to the flight training community. Is it achievable? We aren't sure. But airlines once thought it was unachievable and they have now had multiple periods where zero fatalities have been what has been achieved. The goal made it important to make their operations safer. We could do the same in training if we work at it. Making us safer also makes us more profitable.

A concern is that we need to see the trend vector of accidents and incidents continue to go down if we are going to see insurance costs, operational costs, and parts costs remain affordable. FSANA is going to be taking time to lead discussions on this topic to help the flight training community as a whole target zero accidents in our collective operations.

FSANA is pleased to announce a return to the normal winter schedule for its next International Flight School Operators Conference. During the conference in Orlando, FSANA announced that the next conference will return to Las Vegas on February 16-18, 2022.

Returning to Bally's Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, attendees from the flight training community can look forward to a full conference schedule focused on the business of flight training, training safety, and industry trends.

More information will be coming in upcoming communications, but for now, save the date!

A major component of the aviation training throughput capacity is infrastructure. It is hard to train people to fly airplanes, without airplanes. But the ability to source airplanes is a challenge for many flight training providers and it is expected that that challenge may be getting harder.

Many flight training providers are using aging aircraft that are harder to maintain and harder to replace than ever before. In many training operations, aircraft resources are 30, 40, or even more years old. Replacing these fleets is not only costly but is also challenging due to reduced production by manufacturers in the past two decades. Peak production years for many of the aircraft that are heavily utilized in training were in the late 1970s with little to no production in the 1980s and early 1990s. Since then, production levels have been much lower and with fewer aircraft makes and models available. This is a concern that might need to be addressed sooner than later if the training industry is to maintain infrastructure availability for the training pipeline.

These topics were discussed multiple times at this year’s conference, in a pre-conference workgroup meeting, and as a part of a session today “Got Airplanes?” that discussed the shortage of training aircraft considerations. Flight training providers and aircraft manufacturers are working closely together to understand the needs and try to solve this challenge.

Simulators are great, and helpful, and needed, but at some point, the flight training community also needs the aircraft infrastructure to keep training going. This is going to be an issue that flight training providers, and FSANA, continue to monitor, help drive solutions, and provide resources for the flight training community.

A successful conference is a partnership between the coordinating party, in this case, FSANA, and the hosting property, the Rosen Plaza Hotel for this week's event. FSANA is ever grateful for the hard work that the team at the Rosen Plaza Hotel put into making sure the attendees had fantastic service and the best possible event.

A special appearance by Harris Rosen himself at yesterday's luncheon session gave attendees a chance to see just how much it means to the host property to have had the opportunity to provide services to groups such as FSANA.

Bob Rockmaker, President of FSANA, announced a new scholarship named for Harris Rosen. The scholarship will be the Harris Rosen Entrepreneur Scholarship.

Highlighting how appreciative he and his team are of the business, and how hard the last year has been for those in the hospitality business with reductions in business such as these events and overall travel stays, attendees were left understanding just how much his team members mean to Harris Rosen. While we are all thinking about the aviation industry many times, it is telling to see how much our own industry affects other industries, such as the hospitality industry that hosted this week's conference. Each industry in this country is affected by each other. We are all part of the overall economic health of our system. We are all working to bring back as much normalcy, progress, and hopefully growth for ourselves, our families, and our staff. Many times, our staff are a form of family also.

It is apparent that at the Rosen properties, Harris Rosen considers every team member not only service providers for customers, but a part of his family. FSANA appreciates this feeling greatly and knows that for many flight training providers this is the same. We all care about each other and our team members. It is part of how we run this entire industry. People matter.

FSANA wants to highlight and thank the special effort the Rosen Centre and its staff made to make sure this event was as successful as possible through its additional precautions, staffing efforts, and continued effort to excellence.

ASA offers a free Test Prep Update subscription service providing the most complete and up-to-date information available. Subscribe and receive update notices when changes are made to the FAA Knowledge Exams databases.

All ASA Test Prep and Prepware databases are now updated for June (with the exception of Flight Engineer for which there are no updates at this time).

Aviation is a people-oriented business. Those people give of themselves, both professionally and personally. While they may do so for compensation as a job, many of them go beyond that and do so for passion and love of the industry additionally.

In the past month, aviation has lost two such individuals who will certainly be missed.

Irvin N. Gleim passed away on Wednesday, July 14, 2021. Known for many years in the aviation industry as a leader who helped provide guidance to many in the industry and products from Gleim Aviation that served as training support for thousands of aviators over decades, his presence will be missed by an entire industry along with the family he leaves behind.

On Sunday, July 4th, 2021, Gregory Sean Winton, Esq., also passed away. He was a world-renowned aviation attorney and advocate, practicing in Annapolis, Maryland. While not as visible to some in the aviation industry, FSANA and many others know his contributions through legal work within the aviation industry. Much of this work was contributory in very quiet ways but highly effectual to those for whom his services were critically impactful.

Contributions of individuals such as these many times are a part of a larger part of work the industry as a whole does, but without individuals such as these, the industry would be lessor. FSANA appreciates the contributions that these two who have recently flown beyond gave to our entire aviation industry and wishes their family the heartiest of condolences. Their contributions to this industry made it better, and we will not forget.

FSANA has been collecting DPE names who have expressed a willingness to travel to help flight training providers secure practical tests since our last newsletter.

This list is published on the FSANA website and is kept up-to-date with contact information, so if you are a flight training provider who is finding a challenge of scheduling DPEs in your local area, feel free to reach out to these individuals and you may be able to have them help serve some of your local testing needs.

This effort is being made in general, but also as many DPEs have self selected to delay a return to providing practical tests during the effects of COVID-19 periods and in some locations. FSANA will continue to hep provide this information as the flight training industry continues to move forward with both new and existing students in all phases of their training.

If you are a DPE who is not on this list but would like to be, please let us know by emailing us at info@fsana.com with your email and phone number and we will add you.