Craig
Fuller AOPA President speaks during the LAMA dinner at the
U.S. Sport Aviation Expo, Light Sport Aircraft Pilot News
newsmagazine.
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Light Sport Aircraft Pilot is a directory of aircraft that generally fit
into what are described as ultralight aircraft, advanced ultralight
aircraft,
light sport aircraft, experimental light sport aircraft, experimental
aircraft, amateur built aircraft, ELSA or homebuilt
aircraft in the United States and Canada. These include
weight shift aircraft, more commonly known as trikes,
powered parachutes, and powered para-gliders.
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Craig
Fuller AOPA President speaks during the LAMA dinner
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A.O.P.A. President Craig
Fuller spoke to the group of lightsport aircraft
manufacturers during the LAMA dinner at the 2011 U.S. Sport
Aviation Expo.
During his talk he admitted that it wasn't until a couple of
years ago that he really started paying attention to the
lightsport aircraft category.
That it wasn't until he was
introduced to it at Airventure that realized just how much
excitement there was about the planes and the opportunities
that this class of aircraft opened up.
He went on to say that during a trip to AERO show in Germany
he was again amazed at the passion that aviation community
was showing for their light sport aircraft community.
He commented on the need for
the lightsport aircraft movement to succeed. That success
will ensure that new people are brought into aviation, as
well as keep people in aviation that are in the process of
transitioning out of aviation for medical, and other
reasons. |
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He also used
some very astounding figures to bring the point across that
the industry has a problem starting at the flight training
level. He indicated that only 20 years ago the U.S. had over
800,000 pilots, while today that figure is closer to 600.000
and is declining.
He went on to say that the
industry is not pulling enough new people into aviation to
replace those that are for one reason or another leaving. He
reflected that the average student is now probably in the 40
age group. That some 80% of the people "that make the
determination that they want to learn how to fly, decide
they are going to invest the time, and money to become a
student pilot, never make it to private pilot!" Which he
believes "is something that no other industry or group would
tolerate."
In an effort to find out
why this, and to come up for suggestions and solutions AOPA
is working with other groups across the country to address
the problem.
While I listened to Mr.
Fuller I couldn't help but feel that in some way he was
still disconnected from the light sport aircraft movement.
He spent a great deal of time talking about fuel for general
aviation, and other topics that would probably have raised
the attention of a general aviation pilot, but were in
actual fact of very little interest to the group he was
addressing.
For more information
on AOPA visit
http://www.aopa.org
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Craig Fuller AOPA President
speaks during the LAMA dinner at the U.S. Sport Aviation
Expo 2011 |
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