Plus One Flyers The flying club that Lisa and I belong to recently held their quarterly membership meeting.  This particular meeting was especially interesting in that Craig Fuller, the President of the Airplane Owners and Pilot’s Association (AOPA) was attending as a guest speaker.  AOPA is one of the most influential aviation advocacy groups in the world and is providing a critical service to the general aviation community.  AOPA works to ensure that our privilege to fly as GA pilot’s is maintained and the freedom’s we sometimes take as granted as American Pilot’s is not threatened.  Mr. Fuller is currently leading the charge at AOPA and fighting the good fight for us little guys.

The meeting was well catered and held in the Crown Air Hanger at Montgomery Field.  The general membership meeting was fairly quick and the session moved on to a talk and Q&A with Mr. Fuller.  He have quite a few interesting things to say about the state of affairs in general aviation.  Interestingly, his number one concern is the shrinking population of pilots, and specifically the poor retention rate of those seeking primary flight training.  Getting people to take the first step and begin their training is hard enough.  The fact that the great number of people do not finish the training is startling.  Mr. Fuller’s point here is that there is strength in numbers.  For our voice to be heard in Washington, we need many voices.  We need to do all we can to help grow our numbers and provide a strong and healthy community for which AOPA can advocate.

During the Q&A session I was able to stand up and ask the final question of the night.  I basically asked Mr. Fuller to comment on my concern that, in the long run I hope that flying is something I can share with my children and grandchildren.  Currently there exists a number of threats to GA.  From funding, to the price of fuel, to regulations stemming from fear or terrorism, to bad press from accidents.  I asked Mr. Fuller to speak to those concerns in light of  Lisa and I are currently a lot of money into flying now in the hopes that it will be a life style our family can have for generations.  His main point was that AOPA will do everything it can to secure that future, and that in the end pilot’s will always find a way to fly.  Looking to Europe where these threats have already materialize, people still fly.  They way they fly might be different but they still do.  Pilot’s are a resourceful bunch and will find a way to stay in the air.

It was a great night.  Just another reason why Plus One Flyers is the best flying club in the country.  After the talk, we got an opportunity to take a picture with Mr. Fuller.