Don't sweat the legitimate kids thing, Gump. All of mine could have legally soloed had they bothered to get a medical, but didn't take the time. Kids commonly avoid going into the same field as their parents.

Zane, I was strongly influenced by my Dad's partner in the golf course construction business who flew B-24s in WWII. He let me do most of the enroute flying from about age nine. Like him, I have influenced many by just letting them fly from day one. All my students, paying or otherwise, spent their first lesson and all following lessons flying the airplane 99% of the time. Students don't want to spend time or money watching somebody else fly.

I have taken probably fifty pilots and prospective pilots three thousand miles on a pipeline loop one or more times. I was old then. Guess who did most of the flying? Most have ended up flying commercially, many spraying or patrolling.

My recommendation is to encourage kids to manipulate the controls as much as possible. It is addictive.

My Dad and I were the dirt digging part of the business. Press Maxwell was the golf architect. I was a kid with a little money, all of which I spent on airplanes, who got a big break. I have tried to play it forward.

Well, yes, but......

I too wonder at how few youngsters are interested in flying. That said, at the school, we used to host a busload of young kids, ages 6 through 12 at the airport each summer from a reservation school east of us. We'd set up our sim and several laptops with MS Flight on them, roll out a couple airplanes and open the maintenance hangar for tours.

Most of those kids were not the least interested in aviation or airplanes.....a larger percentage were kind of interested in "playing" with the simulators.

But, every time we had one of these groups (and they all were 50 to 60 kids), there was always one, and sometimes two who simply weren't going to leave till they had all their questions answered....."how do I get started?", "how much does it cost", "what kind of jobs are there", etc.

And, in my experience, this may be similar to the ratio of youngsters who have the potential to become interested in flying.

Prior to one of those visits, I went into the pilot lounge, where there were a couple of corporate crews using the wi fi, and a couple of the local sprayers and an instructor or two. I warned them all that they were about to be invaded by a herd of kids. When I mentioned the ages of these kids, one of the corporate pilots (King Air 200) said to me "Why are you bothering with kids that are six or seven years old? They're way too young to have a clue about what they want to do for a living."

I thought about that a moment, and responded that I had first got interested in flying as a flagger on the family farm, flagging for the Stearman sprayers.....and getting sprayed with DDT, or whatever else they were spreading. I was seven. I then went around the room and asked each of the pilots there at what age they first got interested in flying.....not when they decided they would fly for a living....but what sparked that interest? Every one of them, including the King Air pilot, allowed as how that happened at between ages of 6 and 9.

I think that's part of the issue we see in Young Eagles and other groups: Many of those 12 and 14 year olds have already been exposed to LOTS of other interesting things, they've been involved in sports and other activities, and have REALLY got into electronics, as in X-Box. The six year olds....not so much just yet. They're perhaps a bit more open to new stimuli at that age.

So, I recommend working on them when they're young.....like six or seven.

But, also understand that if you hook one out of sixty or seventy, you're probably doing really well. And, I guess that's okay. We simply have to keep trying.

MTV

I completely agree...it is a head scratcher.

Almost more bewildering are guys who have their tickets yet no real plans to get back involved in flying. I'm thinking of one particular owner of the company I work for, who is an inactive pilot of many years. Suffice to say, he has plenty of income to support the hobby but for whatever reason has moved it way down the priority list. He does say he is happy to go for a ride in my airplane, so maybe there is some room to evangelize (he's paying his half of the direct operating expenses if we do go, though!).

Such people may just need a little prodding: my wife's boss, a hard-driving and high-achieving Westpoint grad, learned to fly while in graduate school but has probably been inactive for better than 15 years. I got to telling him about my plane and showing him pictures, and now he is asking for an instructor recommendation...

A buddy of mine had ~15 hours towards his PPL when he set the project aside. I've been goading him with the pictures I take on weekend adventures, and he too is talking about resuming training this Fall.

I do know that from my earliest memories I was totally fascinated by airplanes. My parents bribed me to try baseball as a kid by buying me a model airplane. The baseball fields, however, were right next to the airport, and airplanes had a strange habit of showing up right when the ball was headed my way. My baseball career ended after a season...but I've only gotten crazier for airplanes.

Almost by definition, most of the people I fly with have the money, time and ratings to be able to fly GA. maybe 1 in 20 actually do. I don't even bring it up anymore unless I sense they're open to it. Most guys just don't care.

Too bad - there are some phenomenal pilots out there, some of whom are very active in various youth and neighborhood activities, that could do great things for GA.

contactflying wrote:My recommendation is to encourage kids to manipulate the controls as much as possible. It is addictive.

THIS!... On my first Young Eagles flight the flying was just sumthing different from the every day. BUT,
Taking control of the yoke of the Ercoupe was the hook getting set for me too want to fly.

Sometimes the seed that gets planted take a long time to develop into something. I think I got one ride from my parents' friend when I was maybe 10. Didn't think much of it other than it was really fun and how odd it was with all the guages and dials (not being able to see over the panel during most of the flight). Almost 20 years later I decided I should start flying more or less out of the blue and then figured out how to make it work.

Flew out to Utah yesterday to pick up two grand kids. Jackson is 15 1/2 and he flew most of the way here today. Even had him tracking a radial in to a VOR for about 10 minutes. He picked it right up. He has about 10 hrs with me and wants a log book. I need to find him an instructor near Morgan, UT. (other post) He is way hooked.

Tim

I was very small. We lived just off the runway and I often saw that plane going around and around the pattern. I knew someday I would be in it.
She was a proud member of a fleet of Aeronca Champions that were training returning GI's on the GI Bill. After her sisters were sold, crashed ,or moved away, she remained teaching for many years. That is when I first saw her and later learned to hand prop a 65hp, and finally do what I figured was impossible to T & L a TDer. She saw me through solo and continued to endure the scratches, bounces, and occasional mild ground loop while teaching many more people to fly. Old timers from Reno Tower still chuckle at her antics on the runway in front of them. She is still registered but now I hear she is a well deserved hangar queen on a strip outside of Reno.
Do any of you great people remember Aeronca "zero" ?

Yeah, I'm in the "born with it camp". I was fascinated by airplanes and the idea of flying long before my first airplane ride. Before I could afford flight instruction, I built a hang glider out of bamboo poles, 6 mill polyethylene sheet, duct tape and clothesline wire (that was in 1968 when I was 16). I had a friend pull me behind his car to get airborne. I don't know how I managed to survive those days, but my numerous crashes failed to quench my interest in all things that fly. I was finally able to afford lessons when I graduated from college and pursued flying rather than buying a house or a newer car. Flying has brought many magical moments to my life, but I've only ignited the fire with one passenger in over 40 years of flying. I took a passenger to Oshkosh from Seattle in the mid 1980s, and he signed up for flight training as soon as we got back. He wound up with both a commercial pilot's license and his A&P license. I lost track of him when I moved east. I don't think the flight with me created his desire to fly, I think it just made him aware of a desire that had always been there but was dormant. I keep taking people for rides hoping to create that same awakening, but so far that one passenger is my only success story.

Perhaps it is a problem with the narrative of our times. I grew up with movies and boss that idolized pilots. Books by Earnest Gann were on the best seller list, as was "The Right Stuff" by Thomas Wolfe. The moon landings filled the news and aviation was the focus in movie theaters with films like the Great Waldo Pepper, the Gathering Of Eagles, the Battle Of Britan, and Aces High filling theater seats. In the 1950s and 1960s, there were still a lot of pilots left over from WWII, and small grass airports were everywhere. There was one just 3 blocked from my high school. That airport is now a shopping mall. Besides, computers, cell phones, computer games and drones didn't exist, so there were fewer shiney things to capture our attention. Still, the lack of interest and the overall adding of the pilot population saddens me.

Another thought is that even commercial flying was a fabulous experience in the 70s, 80s and into the 90s. Airports were cool places to visit, and pilots were admired professionals. Now, flying commercially is a pain in the ass, and airports are dismal places to be.

It does boggle the mind. And it's sad, in general. Very Sad.

For me, I'm 3rd generation aviation enthusiast. So I guess it's in the blood!

Good news is; there is youth getting involved. There really is. Just in the last several months, I've had opportunity to feel like an old man (And I'm 28!), when around kids 15-18 years old, who have more hours than I do.

Guess it inspires me to work harder..

Here I am as a little skuff!



- Joseph

Funny how many of the related potential gateway hobbies are also way down.





It is interesting to see that building model airplanes is much less popular than in days past. Go to a hobby shop, and if in fact there is anyone buying an airplane model to assemble, it is the older folks.

Flying U control planes? I have not seen that in a while. Flying Radio Controlled stuff... again with the exception of those multicopter "drones", I see few younger folks engaged.

I just mention this because my route was initially via building plastic airplane models by Revell, flying a U control airplane with a Cox .049 glowhead engine, then into Radio Control. Even though I had a ham license, I could not afford the expensive ham radio frequency gear so it was on the old CB frequencies.


Climbing into a Cessna 150 later on was simply a matter of taking the next step in a natural progression. The ham radio hobby gave me the skills to ease the comm part of grabbing a mic.

All these hobbies which sometimes serve as a gateway into getting a private pilot's license. They all seem to be much less popular now.

Maybe all the 20 somethings are now into coin or stamp collecting

That's funny .... you can't even say it's genetics. My 17 year old son only cares about flying when it pertains to going fishing somewhere remote. He really doesn't care! In fact, last time we flew, he was trying to get Sports Center on his phone when we got low enough to the airport.
On the other hand, my 14 year old son shares my passion and wants to get his license just as soon as he's old enough. Each time I go without him, I get a guilty trip that lasts the entire day; however, I defiantly know what he's feeling.
I think with most it's commitment vs reward. Some like the idea of it, but not enough to fully commit the time, effort or money to follow through.

I guess I'm different from most pilots here, I never had any inclination toward aviation as a kid. Rode Harleys from age 20 to 32, ended up moving from L.A. to western Washington at age 35 and about 3 years later I was thinking about getting another Harley when I took an intro flight lesson. Something just clicked, and I got my ticket 3-1/2 months later. Now at age 58 I've logged almost 3000 hours in the four airplanes I've owned.

I've given plenty of rides-- some people enjoyed it, some didn't, and some coulda cared less one way or the other. I don't think anyone who took their first ride with me went on to aviating on their own.

My theory is that taking to the air takes work, planning and commitment, which are not particularly popular in our culture these days. In addition, it takes money and either your partner's or your mother's permission for most folks. The way that most people run their lives, some combination of these elements can produce plenty of force to draw one away from getting in to it.

It is also a BIG responsibility, loading people in to a plane that you are PIC of. Not everyone is wired for that kind of exposure. A car is also a very big responsibility, but we culturally seem to be disconnected from that responsibility because it is such an integral part of our lives.

What got me in to it, is that I am a dreamer. When I let my mind wander, it usually fills with visions of flying around mountains, visiting cool destinations, and exploration. Aviation leads to discovering things about the world, as well as within yourself and then creating memories of adventure that will be along until we move on.

For me, flight is about exercising the planning and activating the observe-process-respond loops of an airman, taking in the territory from this unique perspective and then about the destination, people and activities once arrived. I think that if more people realized how satisfying all of this can be, that more people would take it up. It takes a big commitment to arrive at this realization though.

I work in the aviation industry and have encouraged quite a few folks to take up flying. A really strong catalyst, I have found, is just networking and establishing connections between the aspiring and the inspiring. I know of one instructor in particular, who sells pretty affordable tailwheel endorsements, who is excellent at hooking a candidate and sweeping them right in to their primary training. Folks like this are a big part of the future of aviation.

I do believe that interest in backcountry flying is growing. I plan to make more videos promoting and romanticizing the activity by presenting images of "living the dream" in the future.

I must be doing pretty good, I've gotten 2 people to get there license since I bought my 170 almost 5 years ago. The first was my wife, she got her license in 2012 but only really flies when she goes with me. The 2nd was my brother in law. I took him for his first small airplane ride right after I bought the 170. I let him fly most of the time keeping altitude and heading and even doing some s turns across a road to get a feel for the plane. He had a lot of questions and seemed to really enjoy it. A couple years ago he enrolled in an aviation college with his GI bill. He now has his private, instrument, and commercial and is currently finishing up his ME. Then he's moving on to CFI and CFII. I keep trying to get him to buy a plane of his own and I know that eventually he probably will. I have given rides to plenty of people and they all have enjoyed it. I know most of them will never learn to fly themselves though. Of course I don't understand why not. Learning to fly and owning my own plane has been one of the most rewarding things I've ever done. I couldn't imagine not doing it. The places we get to go, the things we get to experience and see, are hard to describe to those that don't fly.

Ours is not to reason why... ours is to do and die!

It boggles my mind as well. I grew up flying with my dad's boss as well as helping load the spray plane. Also marked for him before he got his satloc. As much as I loved it I never saw myself doing it. Not sure why. Then one day I'm at work flipping through the bargain hunter (Ya, this guy bought a 15k C150 out of a bargain finder magazine!) And there's a C150 in there. Called my brother up and within a week he, one of our best friends, and I owned a plane. 2 of us got our license and one started a family. My brother would still like to get his license but has other priorities. I wish he would. That way we could split a 206 for family travelling, and I could build myself a little tandem for playing. One day maybe...

Scolopax wrote: My theory is that taking to the air takes work, planning and commitment, which are not particularly popular in our culture these days. In addition, it takes money .....

These days, I don't think the money is the problem-- look at how many new cars motorhomes etc you see on the road. I think the work planning & commitment part is the problem. Delayed gratification.... what's that?

Look at it this way, say a young (20's or 30's) guy is looking to get into a cool new hobby. He goes down to the airport, and if he can get anyone in the FBO to pay attention to him he'll find out that it'll take a month or two to solo, and 3 or 4 to get his license, which'll cost anywhere from 5 to 10 grand in the process. Then he can rent an old POS 172 for $130 an hour (or buy it for $25-30K) and drone around in it.

Or he can drop by the Harley shop, drop $15-20K on a brand new Road Glide, helmet, boots, leather gear, etc, and be showing it off that night down at the local watering hole. What would most young guys do? Substitute ski boat, jet skis, fishing boat, quads, etc for the Harley in the above example, depending on the person.

hotrod180 wrote:

Scolopax wrote: My theory is that taking to the air takes work, planning and commitment, which are not particularly popular in our culture these days. In addition, it takes money .....

These days, I don't think the money is the problem-- look at how many new cars motorhomes etc you see on the road. I think the work planning & commitment part is the problem. Delayed gratification.... what's that?

Look at it this way, say a young (20's or 30's) guy is looking to get into a cool new hobby. He goes down to the airport, and if he can get anyone in the FBO to pay attention to him he'll find out that it'll take a month or two to solo, and 3 or 4 to get his license, which'll cost anywhere from 5 to 10 grand in the process. Then he can rent an old POS 172 for $130 an hour (or buy it for $25-30K) and drone around in it.

Or he can drop by the Harley shop, drop $15-20K on a brand new Road Glide, helmet, boots, leather gear, etc, and be showing it off that night down at the local watering hole. What would most young guys do? Substitute ski boat, jet skis, fishing boat, quads, etc for the Harley in the above example, depending on the person.

This is exactly it. Many people can afford to fly (I firmly believe that any person with a middle class income can afford it), but most are not willing to put in the time or effort. I constantly talk to people who are "interested" in learning to fly, but all I hear is a string of excuses from them. They like the idea of it, but aren't actually interested enough to make it happen.

A while back I was talking to the guy who took me for my first airplane ride when I was 15. He's owned his airplane for 36 years, and in that time he's given first flights to all kinds of people. To date, I am the only person he's taken for a ride to have gone on to get a pilot's licence. That ride was cool and fun, but to be completely honest it had no influence on my decision to become a pilot.

I view my role in taking people up flying in the same way as when I take them shooting. I likely will not make a pilot out of them, but they will at least be aware of our sector of aviation, and not think of us simply as rich men with silly, noisy toys. Flying (like shooting) will face many political challenges in its future, and if I can educate a few people about it then we might have a better chance when it comes time to face them.