In a new series brought to you by PilotLounge.com, PilotMag has compiled a list of extraordinary young pilots making a difference in their aviation community. Here are some “Pilots in the Crowd” that illustrate a growing movement in general and commercial aviation. This movement has brought aviation and its associated discipline and skill to the forefront of our country’s educational system. And without these individuals, this industry couldn’t continue to grow. Please take the time to find out what these young aviators are up to.

Daniel Fluke

University of North Dakota

A recent graduate of the University of North Dakota’s aviation college, Daniel Fluke had been flying for 7 years, since the age of 16. He has been involved in various student and aviation groups while at UND, including helping out others with the rigors of student life. Daniel had been busy gaining experience and flying different kinds of aircraft, earning increasingly complex licenses and ratings and for the past year and working for UND for as a full time flight instructor. Daniel completed his degree in only three years, which he credits to his time spent with the helpful faculty and staff UND has to offer. Daniel has also worked with 4-H summer camps at UND to give elementary students a focus on aviation. He has also worked with Scout clubs and even the Special Olympics, and has been involved with other local community charities and events to spread interest in the aviation industry. Furthermore, he is now helping an American Airlines 777 captain achieve a new altitude record in the unpowered category. This endeavor has required him to research new technologies in near-space equipment, including a sneak peak at future space suits intended for Mars missions. He is now working towards ATP and A&P certification and hopes to open his own flight school.

Zach Grunder

Lockheed Martin Summer Internship Program

Zach became a member of the Lockheed Martin Summer Internship Program at the behest of a friend who worked with Lockheed’s HR department. He has been a very valuable member of Lockheed’s team ever since. Originally studying to become a civil engineer, he pursued a double major, adding mechanical engineering. Once in the internship program, he contributed work on the new Orion space capsule slated to become the United States’ primary means of manned space access. When he made his way over there and reevaluated the team’s work on environmental derivations, he was able to consolidate nine month’s worth of work into just two, receiving awards and commendations from both Lockheed’s tech department and the Orion program’s supervisor. Zach also worked on the aeroshell for the Mars Science Laboratory and the GRAIL program, which will send two satellites to map the Moon’s gravity. Zach has also been heavily involved in academics and with his community, having been on the dean’s list for the past three years and working with various charities including Operation Santa Claus, a joint charity by Lockheed Martin and United Launch Alliance to give food and toys to children in the Denver, Colorado area. He also does volunteer home improvement for elderly citizens in his community and has greatly expanded his professional and volunteer connections through the Summer Internship Program. He is currently studying at the University of Wollongong in New South Wales, Australia, conducting research into signals and control systems.

Nathan Coats

Cherry Creek High School Career & Technical Education Department

Nathan Coats first became interested in aviation at a young age when his dad began work on his own private pilot certification. As he was sitting in the back of a Cessna watching his dad progress through various stages and accumulate hours, he thought it was the “neatest feeling in the world” and he would ask his dad for a ride at every opportunity. Now, not only is Nathan studying to be a pilot as a student of the Cherry Creek High School Career & Technical Education Department in Greenwood Village, Colorado, but he is also an active member of the Black Forest Soaring Society based at Kelly Airpark near Elizabeth, Colorado. Nathan began gliding a year and a half ago as a work-around of the FAA’s age limits (You only need to be 15 years old to solo in a glider) and has learned tremendously from the experience. That experience includes first-hand how it feels to have to be one-hundred percent committed to each and every landing with no chance of a go-around – certainly an opportunity to build one’s skills. Gliders also give him a chance to perform maneuvers most piston pilots are too timid to do – like push against clouds and turbulence in the hunt for thermals. He also has plenty of opportunities to hone his situational awareness as the Black Forest Soaring Society practices close to the flight path of jets heading into Denver International Airport’s Class B and just a thousand feet below 747s. Nathan had previously worked with Civil Air Patrol and assisted at airshows, and wishes to continue his flying career with the Coast Guard.

Kevin Burgess

Metropolitan State College of Denver

Kevin Burgess already had a couple of associate degrees under his belt, but went to the Metropolitan State College of Denver based on their reputation as an aviation college and on the performance of the college’s Flight Team. With all his associates credits transferred, he began studies in the general and corporate aviation program and joined the Flight Team, eventually becoming team captain. It was in this position that he attracted the attention of a local flight school that witnessed him coordinate and organize practice meets every Saturday. They were impressed enough to seek him out for a dispatch position. Additionally, he is also a national student representative for the National Intercollegiate Flying Association, and has maintained a GPA of 3.8 despite working 20 hours a week in addition to his full-time student status. Kevin says that his experience with the Flight Team has been a tremendous asset, giving him greatly increased exposure to the world of aviation. He has made it his duty as team captain to include low-time, would-be and even non-pilots into the Flight Team experience, mixing them into the cadre of advanced students and CFIs. “Everyone has a position in the Flight Team,” says Kevin; “even if they can’t fly a plane, their contributions to the team are invaluable.” Being able to make sure the team stays fluid and coordinated is more important than being worried about the skills each member is able to bring to the table, and Kevin has excelled as a true leader.

Bill Donovan

University of Kansas

Bill Donovan started as an undergrad student at the University of Kansas, but his interests in physics and math existed well before then. What specifically drew him to aerospace engineering was how fun it would be to take math and science and apply them to build and fly aircraft. As he calls it, to be able to do all that and get paid for it is pretty amazing. Choosing the University of Kansas based on its reputation for airplane design, he began research and work on UAVs. His first work was to build a small R/C airplane that would carry as much weight as possible for a Society of Automotive Engineers competition. His team took first place in that competition. Soon he was working on the Hawkeye, a UAV designed, built and flew one semester with 11 other students. That UAV not only later became the basis for a lager vehicle called the Meridian, but of a company he founded, Viking Aerospace. In the meantime, he’s still doing undergraduate studies at Kansas University, including designing a sensor suite called CRESES (Cryospheric Remote Sensing) which will be fitted to the Meridian and taken to Antarctica and Greenland and measuring changes in ice thickness and sea level.

Daniel Halperin

Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University Daytona Beach Campus

One of Daniel Halperin’s professors calls him “the most outstanding student that I’ve had the pleasure of teaching.” Graduating in only three years with a perfect 4.0 GPA, he was awarded a graduate fellowship to Florida State University to continue his studies in meteorology. This is the accumulation of extensive research work that earned Daniel recognition as the FAA’s Student Researcher of the Year for 2009 for a project involving general aviation pilots encountering hazardous weather. Instead of the usual NTSB follow-up reports and data, Daniel and his team saw a different, innovative approach. This approach involved following a group of 26 pilots closely over a period of two years and painstakingly combing through every detail each pilot’s weather encounter unveiled. Daniel collected and analyzed this data and was able to highlight the successes and failures of current systems designed to alert pilots, which the FAA and other groups are closely looking into. This is made all the more impressive by considering that the team was several months behind before Daniel joined. Outside of the project, Daniel sponsored SKYWARN Spotter training for the student population at Embry-Riddle and the general public. He was also the meteorology honor society chapter president. But perhaps his most prominent leadership role was in the third annual Science Day for elementary school students, which, under Daniel’s leadership, has grown to include over 150 children and morning and afternoon sessions. Daniel was even involved in organizing and designing the event’s exhibits, which included a detailed look at Embry-Riddle’s research facilities. Daniel plans even more important meteorological contributions during his graduate work.

Andrew Grevitt

Bristow Academy

Andrew Grevitt may only just now be learning about how to fly helicopters, but it is by no means the only thing he has done in his life or even his first encounter with rotorcraft. An Englishman now studying at Canada’s Bristow Academy, his first career was with the British Army where he served in the Intelligence Corps. (Choosing to err on the side of caution, he would not divulge the specifics of his military career.) He then became a member of the Surrey Police where he qualified as a Tactical Team member, similar to being on the SWAT team. This meant having practically zero vacation time as he was often called out on special assignments during periods of rest. He then transferred to the Cayman Islands and became involved in Air Support Unit performing search and rescue and drug interdiction onboard a Eurocopter A-Star. It was during this time that he became interested in helicopter aviation. Taking a big personal risk, he resigned from the police force and signed on with Bristow Academy. He has already made a number of important contributions to the safety of helicopter pilots, being a very safety and equipment-minded person. Using his experience as a student, he has designed an ATIS plate to increase crew resource management and situational awareness, and is now seeking to place his invention into production.

Aaron Repp

Metropolitan State College of Denver

Aaron Repp has been involved with aviation ever since he could remember. When he was only four years old, he got to take a tour of the Boeing plant in Renton, Washington with a family friend. “It was one of the coolest things,” he said, “and I’ve been hooked on aviation ever since.” On his 10th birthday, his dad arranged a joyride in a glider. He went to the Metropolitan State College of Denver, Colorado with the idea of fully delving into aviation, when a professor’s question brought gliders back to the forefront of his mind. “He asked ‘who’s ever flown a glider’ and only one hand in the whole class came up.” Not only did Aaron decide to earn his gliding license, but he wanted to take it a step further – not only is he trying to organize a glider club at Metro, but he’s been actively drumming up interest in flying gliders within the local aviation community. Armed with a 30-40 minute long presentation, he’s been exposing the virtues of flying gliders to the young and not so young. “It’s helped me tremendously learning how to fly – there are no complicated systems and a minimum amount of ATC.” He’s also been collaborating with NCAR – the National Center for Atmospheric Research – for a plan to use gliders in low-level metrological data gathering. His professional hopes are to become an airline pilot, with short-term goals of working for a local FBO.

If you know a young aviator who exemplifies hard work and high achievement in aviation and aerospace, Pilotlounge.com and PilotMag want to know who they are. Please submit your candidates for “Pilots in the Crowd” to editorial@pilotmag.com to be published in future issues. Our industry is dependent on the youth that will develop new technologies and efficiencies to keep our aircraft in the air and aviation research and development on track.

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