McCain's "Strait Talk Express" plane

Notice how all the bags in the first picture are all spread out on the ramp? They had two bomb sniffing dogs scan them before loading. In the second picture, the plane on the far right is his plane.

Secret Service football

I am in St. Louis, Mo at Signature flight service hanging out with about 60 cops and Secret Service agents. John McCain is leaving here shortly and this place looks like Fort Knox. I'm sitting here watching football with this agent next to me. I better put my phone away before I get arrested!

Coca-Cola Light

This just in for all of those who were wondering.... Diet Coke is
called Coca-Cola Light in Mexico. I took this picture the other day
in Cabo.

The Unity tour

We were forced to check out of our hotel at 11:00am because the hotel was sold out tonight due to the Labor Day demand and we had 6 1/2 hours to burn until our repositioning flight out of Harbor Springs, MI to Sturgeon Bay, WI. We took one of the three taxis available to the airport to drop our bags off in the plane and borrow the crew car to get some food in town. We ate lunch at a nice place overlooking the lake and while we where eating, a huge 130 foot yacht named "Unity" pulled in and grabbed the attention of nearly everyone in the restaurant while docking at the pier.

After lunch we decided to walk down the pier and take a look at the yacht. We figured that since we were both in uniform, they may invite us on board and give us a tour. We got to the ship and the only person from the crew on the pier was a deckhand washing the side windows. I asked him how long the yacht was and he told me 130 ft. He seemed busy and not in the mood to chat, so I just left him alone. We quickly realized that because we had pilot uniforms on, many people on the pier thought that we were the crew of this $25+ million yacht and started asking questions about the ship. After explaining to multiple people that we were not the crew of this yacht, we decided to walk to the main part of town less than a block away.

On the way to town, everyone was looking at us like we just pulled in with the huge yacht. We checked out some cool shops and ended up getting some ice cream at the local parlor. While we were eating our ice cream on the bench outside the store, at least ten more people asked us about the yacht! We joked that we could make some money by setting up a table in front of the ice cream shop that read "Unity tours $10 for adults, $5 for kids". I know for a fact that we would have sold a lot of tickets! People really love big yachts.

UPDATE: Upon further research, I came across this article explaining that this yacht belongs to Elena Ford, great-great granddaughter of Henry Ford.

Labor Day weekend in Harbor Springs

We landed in a one of the oldest and most popular vacation spots in the Midwest yesterday, a little town on lake Michigan called Harbor Springs. We are told that some of America's wealthiest families (Ford family, Proctor&Gamble, etc) have vacation homes here that have been past down from generation to generation. Click Here to learn more about Harbor Springs.

Line break problem

If this post turns out normal, then I fixed the line breaks. I went to
my formating settings and changed the "convert line breaks" option
from yes to no. If yes is selected, single hard returns in the post
editor will be replaced with single tags in my blog and two hard
returns will be replaced with two tags.
Sent from my iPhone 3G

Aspen massage chair

One of the things I love about this job is the little perks we get from parking on the private side versus the airline terminal. We just landed in Aspen and I am currently watching TV while sitting in an awesome massage chair. In the airlines, I would probably be in a terminal rushing to get ready for the next flight.

Troical Storm Gustav

I woke up yesterday morning in Denver to my Blackberry alerting me of a new message. Our plan to take four people to Nassau, Bahamas for a diving trip had changed.

The winds in Nassau were forcasted to be 40+ mph due to tropical storm Gustav which would cause poor visibility and potentialy dangerous diving conditions, so the owners decided late in the night to change the destination to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.

I was happy to make the change because it meant we would not have to fly in the direction of a developing category 3 hurricane and we would not have to deal with the customs guys in West Palm Beach, FL who always seem to have a superiority complex for some reason. So off we flew to beautiful Cabo on a 3 1/2 hour flight which took us out over the mainland of Mexico, across the Sea of Cortez and down the Baja pennisula. The flight was smooth and uneventful and we arrived in Cabo with over and hour to spare between our next repositioning flight back to San Antonio, TX. It was nice to chat with some of the handlers down there that I haven't seen in a while.

Not to change the topic, but as I'm writing this at 34,000 ft enroute to Aspen, a Continental airlines flight on frequency has a passenger who is experiencing a heart attack. They are currently trying to figure out which airport they will divert to to get help. It's either going to be Denver or Albuquerque. They just called back and they have a cardiologist and nurse on board tending to the 74 year old female patient. They are diverting to Denver and that plane now has priority over every other plane in the air with the exception of another aircraft with an in-flight mechanical safety of flight type of emergency. Hope everything works out for that lady.

Sent from my iPhone 3G

Pictures with my SLR camera

I was planning on shooting the Piaggio, but the light was too perfect on this Learjet to pass up. This was taken on the ramp in Denver. In the second picture, we are taxiing down the runway after landing. The third picture is Mt. Hood in Oregon I believe.

Flight Tracker for this week

I took this hilarious picture of my F/O Sean on the ramp in Camarillo this morning, what you can't see is everyone laughing including me. Click here to track our flights this week.

Photo for previous entry

I wrote the previous blog entry on my iphone at 39,0000 ft and the picture didn't make it through when we landed, so here it is.

Change of multiple plans

See the 550lb text on the screen? That is good news for us because our plans just changed....again. The 550lb's is the amount of fuel the flight managment computer predicts that will be remaining once we land at our destination.

The original plan for today as of this morning was to fly from Camarillo-Santa Barbara-Portland-San Jose-Los Angeles. Our plan was to take a leasurely lunch in Portland to help fill the two and a half hour gap between flights, but that all changed when one of our company planes in Las Vegas got a flat tire. We happened to be the closest plane available to do the recovery flight for that trip, so the new plan was that we would fly to Vegas as soon as possible to pick up the owner and take him to Denver (he was probably going to the Democratic national convention). So the relaxing lunch we were looking forward to went right our the window. We instead got the courtesy crew car and drove to a Subway and ate there to save time.

I did the flight planning when we got back to the FBO (Fixed based operator/private terminal) and determined that we would take off with just enough fuel to get to Las Vegas with a minimal reserve of about 600 lbs to save money. Jet fuel in Portland was over $7/gallon and in Vegas we get it for under $6/gallon, so you can do the math on how much is saved when we purchase over 300 gallons at a time.

So we finally got going to Vegas and we were climbing through 30,000ft when the bat phone started ringing (satellite phone). I answered and the flight followers on the other end told me that the owner decided to cancel the flight, so they now needed us to fly to Denver for a trip to Florida and the Bahamas tomorrow. Luckly we had enough fuel on board to make it without a fuel stop .

Just landed in Santa Barbara

We just landed in Santa Barbara where we had to shoot and ILS
(instrument landing system approach)
due to the 900ft overcast marine layer.
We are picking up two people and flying them up to Portland.

I shot this picture from the cockpit when we pulled up. If you look
closely, you can see the reflection of the plane in the window!

Burbank airport

I landed in Burbank at 4:00pm and I am currently eating dinner at Panda Express while waiting for my F/O (first officer) to land. I thought we would have a rental car set up, but I quickly learned that we need to take the 7:25pm Amtrak train to the Oxnard station where the hotel shuttle will pick us up, so hurry up and wait!

Career note: You have to be able to accept changes as they happen and really just go with the flow in this line of work. The only thing constant in fractional aviation is change.

Start of my tour

This is the start of the first day of my 7 day tour. Most (if not all) of these post will be done through my new iPhone 3G which makes blogging a breeze as I can upload pictures and blogs directly from my phone without having to be on a computer. Speaking of computers, San Jose airport now has free high speed WiFi in all of the terminals which is a huge step up from the T-Mobile hotspot pay internet they had previously. They even have some nice laptop bars where you can plug in and work while you wait for your flight.

My Southwest flight from San Jose departs at 3:00 and arrives around 4:00pm in Burbank, CA. The plan from the company for now is to wait for my First Officer who will be arriving at around 5:20 pm, get a rental car and make the 45 minute drive to our company's west coast headquarters in Camarillo, CA.

Molly walk

Molly enjoys running along while I ride my bike. We have a set route which takes us around the neighborhood and is a total of 1.75 miles.

Click here to see a map of the route

Sara looks bored

Here is Sara in the pilots lounge at Scenic living the dream.

Piaggio Avionics

The Piaggio II comes from the factory with the state-of the-art Collins Pro Line 21 avionics package. The main advantage to this all glass (glass meaning LCD screens) cockpit is reduced pilot workload and more reliable instrumentation due to no moving parts.

Fractionals 101- Vacation

Want 21 days off in a row? If you answered yes, then welcome to another benefit of fractional aviation. Vacation time is based around the seven day on / seven days off schedule. Vacation bidding is usually done at the beginning of the year and is awarded based on seniority and which day of the week you start. When you bid for vacation, you are actually bidding for which 7 day tour you would like to take off that year. So you end up with a week off before your vacation week, your awarded vacation week, then a week off after the vacation week. for a total of 21 days.

Welcome to Fraclife!

Welcome to my Fraclife Blog. Here you can fly the virtual jump seat and learn what goes on with the day-to-day life of a fractional pilot.

NEXT: Fractionals 101

Fractionals 101 - Travel

Fractionals 101 - Schedule

Fractional pilots typically work rotations of seven days on followed by seven days off, or eight on and six off. Fractional schedules require the crew members to be on the road for more consecutive days than a typical airline, however, fractional pilots also get more consecutive days at home than a typical airline pilot.

My company has the seven and seven schedule which I really enjoy. With this schedule, I can just look at a calendar and know which days I will be working and which have off months, even years in advance.

At an airline, you will typically bid monthly for your schedule and your seniority will dictate which line you get. With fractionals, you simply bid for a day of the week you would like to start and which week rotation you would like to work (either even or odd weeks) and your seniority will dictate which day/weeks you are awarded.

NEXT: Home until series complete

Fractionals 101 - Hotels

Spending nearly six months of every year on the road, you learn quickly to appreciate the quality of hotels. One of the great benefits of flying for a fractional is the ability to earn hotel reward points for every night you are out on the road. With my company, we will usually stay at Hilton, Marriott, or Holiday Inn properties. You will typically earn enough reward points over the course of a year to pay for about a week of hotel stays at one of these brands.

NEXT: Schedule

Fractionals 101 - Packing for the trip.

Ever tried to stuff seven days worth of clothing into a 20" rolling luggage? It can be challenging, especially if you are unsure of what you will need and what you can do without. This post will give you an idea of what you might need for a seven day trip.

To start, you will need a high quality 20" or so rolling luggage to carry most of your items. There are many bags to choose from including many that can cost over $300. In my opinion, the best value out there is the $89.00 Kirkland Signature Costco luggage.

Costco offers a lifetime warranty on the luggage, so when it wears out, you can simply exchange it for a new model with no questions asked. I am currently on my second Costco bag. The first one was wearing a bit after 5 years and had all the zipper pulls broken. I brought it back with with no receipt and they promptly refunded my money onto a Costco cash card so I could purchase a new bag.

You may also want to consider purchasing a laptop bag to carry your laptop, electronics, and other miscellaneous items.

Below is an example of what I pack on an average 7 day tour:

-Documents-

• Pilot License
• Medical Certificate
• Passport
• FCC Radio Operators Permit
• Drivers License
• Company Credit card
• Company I.D.
• Personal cash and credit cards

-Electronics-

• Laptop computer and charger
• Company cell phone
• Personal cell phone
• Chargers for cell phones
• Portable GPS device
• Camera

-Clothing-

• 5 Uniform shirts
• 5 Uniform pants
• 8 Undershirts
• 8 Underwear
• 1 Pair of jeans
• 5 Pair of socks
• 2-3 Casual Tee shirts
• 1 Pair of cargo shorts
• 1 Pair swim shorts (Cabo!)
• 1 Polo shirt
• 1 Pair of flip flops
• 1 Pair of uniform shoes

-Miscellaneous-

• 1 Pair of Sunglasses
• Hotel rewards cards
• Fuel rewards cards (Avtrip, Exxon rewards, etc.)
• Toiletries
• House keys

NEXT: Airlines

Fractionals 101 - Airlines

When you are assigned to an aircraft to start your tour, you will most likely have to fly on an airline to meet up with the airplane and the rest of your crew. This often times can be the one of the more frustrating aspects of being a fractional pilot depending on which airport you fly from.

Due to the dynamic nature of the fractional business, the company will typically purchase a last minute one-way ticket which may occasionally leave you stuck in the middle seat if you fly out of an busy airport with high load factors. In addition, the ticket will more than likely be a last minute one way, so it meets the criteria to be flagged by the TSA for "special screening".

Special screening is an additional screening process (denoted by SSSS on the boarding pass) where they search through all of your belongings thoroughly and run tests to see if there is any explosive residue on any of your property.

Most of my flights out of California are on Southwest Airlines and thankfully I am rarely stuck with a middle seat and almost never get flagged by the TSA leaving my home airport. For some reason, Rapid Rewards members seem to rarely get flagged on Southwest.

Riding on an Airline every other week also has it's advantages. We get to keep all of the airline miles or credits earned for the trip. These miles add up quickly and usually equate to a couple free round trip tickets a year which can be then used in conjunction with your free hotel rooms you will earn from all the reward points to go on vacation.

Next: Airports

Fractionals 101 - Aircraft

Comming Soon

NEXT: Hotels

Fractionals 101 - Airports

One of the benefits of flying for a fractional as opposed to an airline is that fractional flying offers the variety of flying to most of the more than 5000 airports available around the country. I say most because some of these airports have inadequate runways to handle corporate aircraft. In contrast, an airline pilot is typically flying to and from central hubs and seeing the same airports day after day. NEXT: Aircraft

Factionals 101 - START HERE

Welcome to the Fractionals 101 section. I made this section for people who want to learn the very basics of fractional aviation. I will continue to add more content in the coming weeks. Once Fractionals 101 is complete, the 102 section will come and be geared more towards professional pilots.

NEXT: Packing for the trip