Articles for category Human Interest
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May
22
2023
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Posted by Admin
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RPMN: What is your current position?
My dream job: experimental test pilot and instructor pilot for The Boeing Company in Mesa, Arizona. I primarily fly the AH-64E Apache and AH-6 Little Bird but I get to fly other helicopters and airplanes too, which provides lots of variety. The flight tests we conduct range from benign testing (new radios, software upgrades, etc.) to exciting experimental tests including weapons firing, testing new rotor blades and things of that nature. I work with a great group of pilots and support staff, which truly makes this my dream job. Besides, I do not know many civilian pilots that get to shoot miniguns off helicopters; I consider myself fortunate. On the side, I am also an FAA designated pilot examiner (DPE) in helicopters for private pilot through initial CFI certificates. Arizona’s great weather makes this area perfect for year-round flying so naturally there is a concentration of flight schools. The other FAA authorizations I have allow me to do special medical flight tests, military competency activities, foreign pilot license conversions and a few other things. I am active in local aviation organizations including being an FAA Safety Team representative, I am a co-chair for the annual HAI Heli-Expo Military to Civilian Transition Workshop and I work as an expert witness for aircraft accident lawsuits.
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Tags:
Boeing Helicopters
helicopter experimental test pilot
helicopter instructor pilot
Meet A Rotor Pro
Scott Tinnesand
Categories:
Human Interest
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May
08
2023
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Posted by Admin
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When Todd Tetzlaff Talks… People Listen
“I’m really good at dumbing things down because I’m not that bright,” says the man who is now leading the revival of past-bankrupt Enstrom Helicopter Corporation, based in Menominee, Michigan. In a relaxed interview that spanned over an hour at this year’s recent HAI Expo in Atlanta, one gets the sense that Todd Tetzlaff is completely candid when he confesses his shortcoming. No, not because the aircraft engineering technology graduate from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University is “not that bright.” After all, Tetzlaff has held FAA engineering designee privileges with flight analyst and structural authorities for over 20 years and is also a certified private fixed- and commercial rotary-wing pilot. He bilingually and fluently speaks the advanced languages of engineers and pilots. He also was the object of a decades long tug-of-war between Enstrom Helicopter and Gulfstream for his abilities, when he bounced back and forth between helicopters and jets until helicopters won. Of course, he humbly doesn’t see himself as an object of pursuit; he was the pursuer and just grateful to be working in aerospace.
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Tags:
President and CEO of Enstrom Helicopter Corp.
Rotor Pro Executive Watch
Todd Tetzlaff
Categories:
Career Development
Human Interest
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Mar
16
2023
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Posted by Admin
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RPMN: What is your current position?
My current position with Skyhunter Outfitters and Semper Fly Helicopters is CEO and pilot. I am a CFII and also an A&P mechanic so I help maintain our helicopter. Skyhunter offers helicopter hog hunting along the Texas/Oklahoma border as well as night thermal hunts on the ground. Semper Fly Helicopters does tours of Broken Bow Lake, Oklahoma, customizable tours, and skydiving events. I am working on solidifying a Part 135 so we can offer charters. We also do a lot of work with veterans and first responders and try to donate hunts and host events to raise money for them.
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Meet A Rotor Pro
Categories:
Human Interest
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Mar
05
2023
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Posted by Admin
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Small business owners and entrepreneurs often feel like they’re little David with only a slingshot going into battle against strong and tested giants. After 16 years of battle, it is safe to assume AeroLEDS is slaying giants armed with a “slingshot” that was simply the ability to out-pace the competition. “I knew that the main competitive edge we held was our ability to work longer hours and more days, with less mistakes and higher efficacy” says Founder/CEO Nate Calvin. “My work ethic was formed by the ethos of family, my upbringing in a rural environment, and experience as a young kid in wrestling. After you get your butt kicked a few times, you figure out that hard work always pays off if you want a different result”. Calvin, a former wrestling, and current Jiu Jitsu practitioner is deftly taking large competitors down to the mat by leveraging advantages that an agile, small business has over big, established competitors. He explains, “We had no business on paper going up against any of these industry giants, but you have to play to your strengths. For the first dozen years of AeroLEDS, I was working 80-100 hours a week every single week with a dogged pursuit of survival. Like any grappling match, I could live with failure as long as I knew I worked at my best.”
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Tags:
AeroLeds
AEROLEDS’ CEO & FOUNDER
NATE CALVIN
Categories:
Company Profiles
Human Interest
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Jan
09
2023
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Posted by Admin
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Dale Neubauer, founder and CEO of Oregon-based HeliLadder is rare among mechanics. That’s too narrow a claim; in fact, he’s rare among people. He noticed a real need as a working mechanic: he and his fellow wrench turners were contorting themselves in risky, uncomfortable, and inefficient working conditions, dangling themselves from old-style ladders that hadn’t made a significant step-up in half a century. “I thought that it was just ridiculous that maintenance ladders had not improved,” he says. “Nothing had changed, except they were now made out of fiberglass, but it was still the same conventional design they’d used in World War II.”
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Tags:
Dale Neubauer
Executive Watch
HeliLadder
Categories:
Opinion-Editorial
Human Interest
Company Profiles
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Nov
21
2022
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Posted by Admin
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RPMN: What is your current position?
I am a single-pilot IFR HAA Line Pilot, Part 135 check airman, instructor, and FOQA gatekeeper for Metro Aviation, and a designated pilot examiner (DPE) for the FAA. I also remain active as a sworn law enforcement (LE) officer flying on a part-time basis for a sheriff's office.
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Tags:
Matt Johnson Metro Aviation
Meet A Rotor Pro
Categories:
Career Development
Opinion-Editorial
Human Interest
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Nov
07
2022
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Posted by Admin
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“It’s not fake it until you make it , but keep working until you obtain it,” says the entrepreneur pilot who accelerated through the pilot ranks into management faster than a V-22 Osprey and decided that wasn’t enough. So, he bought four helicopter tour operations that fly from Montana to Mount Rushmore. That wasn’t enough. So, he’s starting up a fifth utility operation to balance his tourist-heavy holdings. Yet, if you’re expecting to meet some hard-charging, win-at-all-costs egomaniac, you’re in for a pleasant surprise and time.
Here, let’s introduce you to Mark Schlaefli president and owner of Dakota Rotors LLC, and (deep breath now): Black Hills Aerial Adventures, Rushmore Helicopters, Badger Helicopters (DBA Badlands Helicopters) and Yellowstone Helicopters. Coming this fall is the addition of a Part 133 and Part 137 certificate to Dakota Rotors to enhance their ability to deliver a full spectrum of services throughout the Midwest and Mountain West.
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Tags:
Black Hills Aerial Adventures
Dakota Rotors
Helicopter tour Operations
Categories:
Human Interest
Career Development
Company Profiles
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Sep
26
2022
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Posted by Admin
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RPMN: What is your current position?
I recently retired as the Aviation Section captain for the Orange County Sheriff's Office in Orlando, Florida. The Section has four helicopters, one fixed-wing aircraft, and 24 full-time personnel consisting of pilots, flight observers and mechanics. There are additional part-time personnel available on an as-needed basis.
RPMN: Tell me about your first flight or experience with helicopters.
My first flight in a helicopter was when I was assigned as an A-4 plane captain with VMA-131 in the U.S. Marine Corps. We flew on a CH-53 from Willow Grove Naval Air Station in Pennsylvania to Lakehurst Naval Air Station in New Jersey. It was a fantastic experience. The pilots were Vietnam veterans who truly enjoyed their work and took time to explain what they were doing as well as how the systems operated on the aircraft. From that point on I was hooked on becoming a pilot.
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Meet A Rotor Pro
Orange County Sheriffs Aviation Unit
Tony Minnis
Categories:
Career Development
Human Interest
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Aug
01
2022
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Posted by Admin
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What is your current position?
I am chief pilot at the Lee County Mosquito Control District (LCMCD). Our team of pilots operate a fleet of both fixed-wing and helicopters that currently consists of two DC-3TPs, two King Air 200s and six Airbus H-125 helicopters. LCMCD is the largest single-county mosquito control agency in the country and we fly a variety of missions from daytime liquid and granular treatments to nighttime ultra-low volume treatments with the use of NVGs.
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Tags:
Lee County Mosquito Control Aviation Unit
Thurbie Botterill
Categories:
Human Interest
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Jul
11
2022
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Posted by Admin
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“The helicopter industry is a comparatively small industry that almost has a family feel,” says Markus Schmitz. It’s a family that the managing director of Axnes Inc. has wanted to belong to much of his life. Upon graduating from the University of Applied Science at Aachen in his native Germany with an aerospace engineering degree , the 1998 graduate had to make a choice. One road led to his designing fixed-wing airframes. The other road led to Eurocopter in Donauwörth where Schmitz was offered his way to helicopters. Schmitz took the wanderlust path. “I chose Eurocopter because I wanted to work in the helicopter industry and with its customers and see the world,” he says.
Actually, that decision was pretty predetermined since Schmitz was a young boy growing up in the town of Vellmar, near the city of Kassel. His father sold fertilizer and salt internationally and his mother was a homemaker for her family. “My background was a stable one from a small town,” he says. “My interests growing up were in medicine and aviation. Helicopters always fascinated me from seeing them fly overhead as a small boy and I later understood their capabilities in medical emergencies.”
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Tags:
Markus Schmitz Axnes
Rotorcraft Pro
Rotorcraft Pro Executive Watch
Categories:
Human Interest