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infrastructure needed to serve and support the people of Egbe. The little Cessnas and Pipers used to get Don back and forth between home and school lit a passion for aviation that would later steer his decisions in life and career. Don told TwoTen Magazine in 2016, “I loved watching the missionary planes fly in and land in the grass airstrip next to the hospital. They would pick up a group of us missionary kids and fly us to the school. That’s where my love of aviation and my desire to make it a career started.”
After primary school in Nigeria, Don attended Seneca College in Toronto, Canada, earning a pilot’s license and a degree in aviation. On school breaks, Don spent lots of time in Florida with school friends and began to see opportunities for servicing and supporting aircraft. He moved to Fort Lauderdale after graduation and flew charter customers between Florida and the Bahamas. There, too, he saw an opportunity to provide excellent maintenance support to the little charter company.
It was in Fort Lauderdale that Don and his friend, an aircraft broker, leased a hangar together and started up a service and sales business. Soon after, in 1979, Banyan Air Service was founded and began operations. It is said that if you build it, they will come, and come they did. Others in the area started requesting service and support from his small company. Don soon took over sole ownership of Banyan and in 1985, it grew its footprint at FXE and started selling fuel and providing logistics support to transient and based customers. Now anyone could land in Fort Lauderdale, hangar their airplane overnight, get fuel, get maintenance, reserve a hotel and car, and even find their next airplane – all in one place.
Don further explained to TwoTen: “We took advan- tage of the surrounding hangar space at the airport and started attracting other peripheral businesses as tenants to provide services that we didn’t provide, including aerial photography, flight schools, helicopter repair, air ambulance, legal assistance for aviation law, cargo, etc. We can now go to the people in our industry and say, ‘If you come to Banyan, you have access to more services offered to meet your needs than perhaps anywhere else in the world.’ That approach has been working very well.”
Selecting the team to help Don provide world-class service is one of the most important aspects of running Banyan. “We employ close to 200 teammates, and I have always referred to our employees in that manner because we are all a team. We have a very stringent hiring process consisting of at least four interviews. [Once given] the thumbs up, we proceed with the hiring process.”
As the team and its footprint has grown, it has be- come increasingly important for Don to have a second- in-command with the experience and right fit to lead with him. In 1996, Michael O’Keeffe joined Banyan and has served in a variety of managerial positions since, including vice president of aircraft maintenance, general manager and director of operations. Michael is now the company’s senior vice president and is also responsible
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October 2022 / TWIN & TURBINE • 19