Last week, J. Heffernan, HAI’s director of safety, and Stan Rose, director of safety outreach programs, took the new HAI Flight School Seminar on the road for the first time. This new initiative is geared toward students and instructors at the primary training facilities for helicopter pilots, with the aim of addressing the expectations of students’ future employers and the customers they will fly.

Since the focus of the training facilities is on teaching students to fly the helicopter, Heffernan and Rose discussed the other ‘soft’ skills required when the students and, indeed, instructors become commercial helicopter pilots. In this round of seminars, Heffernan and Rose covered discipline, professionalism, and leadership, as well as risk management and the importance of mentoring throughout the length of a career in aviation.

HAI has taken the feedback from this initial event and will use it to improve the product. In the near future, we will be offering this seminar in other locations.

Pam Landis, vice president and chief flight instructor of Ocean Helicopters, was the host for this inaugural event, and HAI would like to extend a warm thanks to her and her staff for all their assistance.