It’s been a long and semi-eventful summer, but I am ready for my second year at Embry-Riddle to take off.

A week after returning back home to Texas, I attended the Phoenix International Aviation Symposium on behalf of Airways in Phoenix, AZ. At the symposium, more than a hundred aviation professionals from all different facets of the commercial airline industry listen to several different panels over two days in which the status of the industry, trends, and the future are all discussed (and sometimes even debated). It was a fascinating two days to hear from the different professionals, and it was really cool to meet several folks in the industry I had been pen pals with.

After Phoenix, it was off to Cleveland, Ohio for the annual Regional Airline Association convention. The Regional Airline Association (RAA) was founded in 1975, and it is a North America business association that represents regional airlines and their employees, regional airline aircraft manufacturers, and all of the suppliers. The association represents, lobbies, and supports its members before many government organizations such as the FAA, U.S. Congress, and the Department of Transportation.

The view of Cleveland while on approach.

RAA has more than two dozen airline members and about 150 other members. It’s a large undertaking to represent these companies, especially when more than 13,000 regional flights a day. To say the least, I was quite excited to attend as this would be my first real exposure to the regional side of the airline industry.

During the first day of the convention, we heard from Bombardier, Embrear, and Mitsubushi; each manufacturer provided program updates and talked to the media on the future. The next day, several regional airline executives spoke to the media about the current state of their respective airlines and dug a little into the pilot shortage. If you want to read more of a re-cap of the event, you can check out my story on the Embry-Riddle Career Services Blog here. It was also really inspiring to meet several executives such as Ryan Gumm (the CEO of Endeavor Air) who are alumni taking their education and passion to the regional side of the airline industry.

The Airways Magazine team at Airliners International

In June, I traveled to Atlanta, Georgia for the annual world’s largest airline collectible show to help represent Airways magazine. It was two days filled with catching up with lots of friends that I’ve met at the other shows, meeting a few folks at Delta, and shopping till I dropped. It was a great way to end three years working as an airline journalist.

After these three events, the rest of the summer was fairly uneventful as I had to take some time off for health reasons, but now, I’m back in Daytona and all settled into an apartment off campus with two of my friends. It is nice to live off campus and have my own room, a full kitchen, and a lot more space. Although, I’m already missing my seven minute walk to class!

Now, the semester is in full swing, and I have a good feeling that it’s going to be a good semester! More coming soon.

Until next time,

Jack