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industry—they weren’t only occurring among utility and air ambulance operators, but also law enforcement, general aviation, agricultural, and personal operators. We debuted the course at HAI HELI-EXPO 1989. We had over 100 people from all over the industry at that first course. We still offer the course today, specifically for utility companies because we do a lot more work around wires in the utility sector than in other sectors. We also have courses for other operations, including air ambulance, military, and law enforcement, all of which fly in the wire environment at night.


Have you seen safety around wires change since you began this work? Absolutely. Wire-strike accidents have declined substantially. I get testimonials from people all over the world that say the course saved their lives. We had an email not long ago from a pilot who was flying between two barns. He said he remembered us teaching him that when you see a building out in the open like that, ask yourself the all-important situational-awareness question, “How does it get its power?” He asked himself that, and as a safety precaution, he realized he needed to fly above the buildings, not between them, because he didn’t know if there was wire there or not. While he was in the process of ascend-


ing, he flew right over two wires that he couldn’t see when he was lower because they weren’t visible. He ended the email to us by saying, “Thank you, Utilities / Aviation Specialists, for saving my life yesterday.” By popular demand, we created an online refresher course to make it easier for people to remain current. Then the pan- demic hit. We started getting demands from everybody pleading with us for a full one-day online course. So, we decided to create one, completely restructuring the online refresher course and reformatting it to a full “Flying in the Wire and Obstruction


Environment” (FIWOE) course. The online FIWOE course went live in


May 2021. Since then, thousands have taken it with the same material as in the in-person course. We bet the company on the online course and invested heavily to make it truly high quality. That’s paid off in safety. We hear testimonials from people who took the online course saying it, too, saved their lives. The course is also becom- ing popular in Europe. More people are get- ting the information and increasing their safety in the wire environment.


You have a unique philosophy about auditing. Tell us about that. Back when I was a flight department man- ager, I spent a lot of money having so-called professional auditors audit our company. They came in and were looking for trouble—something to nail you on. While it’s important for auditors to find things wrong with the company, it’s equally important to find good things. We started our own audit business in the mid-1980s with that mentality. First, all our auditors have spent their careers in the industry. Second, we always send two auditors on an audit because it’s important that two people confirm they’re seeing the same thing. Third, we match the auditors and their experience with the operator. For example, we don’t send people with expe- rience in the Gulf of Mexico to audit power companies. We also developed a philosophy that the company we’re auditing is a good com- pany and our job is to help them be the best they can be by finding things they can improve upon. We’ve seen some terrible companies


and we’ve seen some good ones. When we get audit jobs now, 99% of the time people are happy to see us. The exceptions are the operations that have something to hide. But we truly believe the vast majority of people in this industry want to do it right and safely, and we’re there to help.


How has helicopter safety changed during your career? I’ve seen tremendous leaps in safety over the past 40 years. In the early ’80s, safety was a kind of necessary evil; a safety offi- cer was someone who couldn’t do any- thing else in the company. That’s not true today. Now, it’s a science that’s embraced. Safety officers are some of the most highly qualified people in these companies. They’re very well educated, very well respected, and very disciplined.


How have you seen safety culture, in particular, change?


What I’m really impressed with is some of the younger people coming up. They’re really on fire; they really want to learn—in some cases, much more than the older generation. When it comes to safety and wanting to do it right, and assimilating as much information as they possibly can, I see a much-improved attitude than when my generation was in the pilot seat. Also, the top leaders used to set the


company attitude. While that level is still very important, when it comes to safety, I don’t see that as much today. A lot of the factors driving an organization’s safety cul- ture come from the bottom, not the top. We still have individuals out there who are contributing to accidents, sure. We’re starting to see wire-strike accidents start to come up again. But not anything like it was. I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that we need to increase awareness, and a growing safety culture plays into that. CASA [Civil Aviation Safety Authority] in


Australia was talking about making the wire-strike course mandatory to get one’s license. Turns out, they didn’t have to because Australian companies started making it mandatory on their own. Most of the power companies in the US and Canada require this training too. This growing safety culture and desire to do what’s right is really helping increase safety in the industry.


SEPTEMBER 2022 ROTOR 21


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