Page 24 - March21T

From the Flight Deck
Freedom of Flight
General Aviation: Use It or Lose It
by Kevin R. Dingman
Do you enjoy the smell of fresh-cut grass and the click of a golf ball on your club? Or gently resting the pad of
your finger on a four-pound test line – then, one click at a time, trying to convince your favorite fish to bite? Perhaps traversing a wilderness area where the nearest jeep trail is a four- hour horse ride away? Fresh powder on the slopes? How about Champagne and music at the fire-pit? What about gardening, cooking, building things, playing music or writing? Or do you enjoy things more of a nurturing en- deavor: showing the kids how to tie a square knot, pull the string on a gy- roscope, keep a kite airborne or that the roots of a sassafras sapling smell like root beer? Maybe you enjoy all of the above freedoms and, like me, also appreciate being at the airport – the little airport.
22 • TWIN & TURBINE / March 2021
Time you enjoy wasting, was not wasted.
– John Lennon
Even if only to enjoy the smells, the sounds, the artistry of f lying machines, and to hear and speak piloteze, I relish GA airports. Succumbing to a spur- of-the-moment trip, taking control of your machine to become a physical part of life’s adventure. Do we fly only to increase the efficiency and thereby the profitability of our business? Is it to save on our most valuable asset – time? Or is your reason the one popularly accepted as the new paradigm – to avoid the inefficient, inconvenient and occasionally embarrassing aggravation of the TSA/oversold/canceled public transportation process – while getting your temperature checked and wearing a now federally-mandated face cover- ing? Or perhaps you simply have a deep
appreciation of the word “freedom” and how it’s personified by GA.
Freedom is never
more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same...
– Ronald Reagan
Recently in the U.S. (and the world), it appears that we are transitioning to a more Orwellian, subservient society. And we all feel a bit restless, anxious and agitated. The world events of the last year serve to remind us that our values, freedoms and perhaps some of our favorite things like GA exist in accordance with not only our physical and financial health but judicial and political systems sometimes only mar- ginally influenced by the majority. Just as governors close our businesses and airport screeners seize our scissors, shoes and shampoo, could our gen- eral aviation freedoms be modified or taken away as easily? While repeatedly challenged by a few, general aviation continues to give us the freedom to come-and-go as we please, on a course of our liking and to destinations of our choosing. We The People of GA are still in control of our flying. It’s a gratifying Declaration of our Independence, but are we neglecting the activism and fortitude that has made our aviation freedoms possible?