Introduction

     Aviation has always been an interest of mine since I can remember.  That's a pretty common thing to hear and I'm sure it already sounds like a story you have heard before.  On a family trip at a young age, a little ways up-north Michigan in the summer of 1992, we stayed on an in-land lake with airplane rides being offered on a seaplane.  Of course thats what I did, and once we were airborne the pilot pointed out that it was a clear day and I remember not understanding completely why we could see the sky line of Detroit, since we were "up-north".  Even though the landing into the water pushed us forward like catching the wire on an aircraft carrier, that ride was one of the best things that I experienced to that day.  The landing didn't really bother me, I was ready for another.  Since then I reached out and attended to any air show that I could.

     When I joined the Marine Corps, I chose to be in the Aviation field to stay motivated with what I knew would be best for my interest as a Marine, and if I decided to move on.  I was placed in a FA-18C Hornet fighter jet unit on the west coast and deployed overseas a couple of times with that same unit.  On our most recent deployment, as a Sergeant of Marines, I trained 36 Marines completing more than 6,000 maintenance man-hours while simultaneously ensuring qualified Plane Captains were ready for combat operations.  This leadership directly resulted in the safe launch, and recovery accumulation of over 2,100 flight hours.  

     Today, I'm in training at Eastern Michigan University in the Aviation Flight Technology bachelor's degree program on track for a career to demonstrate exceptional performance as a professional aviator.  My goals are to complete my Commercial (ASEL) certificate with an Instrument Rating by the end of this summer.  Furthermore, I plan on immediately rolling into additional training and completing my CFI, CFII, and MEI.  Initially, I'm anticipating that I will put my Flight Instructor ratings to work as they are completed, to give an effort for new pilots and to work on flight hours.  I'm also genuinely interested in starting with a low time pilot career including cargo/freight, survey/aerial photography, aerial mapping, surveillance, fire management, medevac, and oil spill response.