Hi, thanks for stopping by my web site! I put this site together back in 1997 to make a tribute to my wonderful dad who sadly passed away that year. I still miss him terribly and can't believe that it's been more than ten years since I lost him. I recently made a video of him which you can see here on YouTube. Well, the rest of the site just evolved and I started adding pictures and stories of family & friends, myself, my flying career. Nothing fancy here but I hope you enjoy your visit.

News: I had a fun reunion in NJ with some of my buddies who I've known since I was a kid. It was great being all together again with these guys... Matt, Mike, Jimmy, Bob, S. Miller, Doug, Amy and Wendy. Saw lots of others too. I've known Matt since I was twelve or thirteen and we've been buddies ever since. See pics below...

September, 2006, I was absolutely devastated by the loss of my hero, Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter. I was fascinated by Steve and shared his love of wildlife. He was a modern day Tarzan. From all accounts he was completely genuine. Almost immediately he became a legend and arguably the most famous man in the world. But he remained so grounded, so simple and sweet. He shared a trait with my father, one that is so rare in human beings, the man was pure goodness. Steve was a man's man and we all wanted to be like him. He lived on the edge but I never thought he would be killed. I thought he was Superman, invincible. He wasn't but in his time here, he changed the world.

 

Me & My Great Dad, 1/14/97.
Ron & Matt 1980	2006

Because I Fly, I Envy No One.

I earned my private pilot license in 1997 after what seemed like a lifetime of dreaming about it. Over the next few years I continued flight training earning an instrument rating, multi-engine rating and finally my commercial license in 2001. As of April 2004 and after 3 years of flying freight in the middle of the night, I am now a pilot for a great airline flying the awesome Embraer E-145 Regional Jet pictured below. The E-145 holds 50 passengers, cruises at 545 mph at 37,000 feet.

I love everything about flying and I can't think of a single thing in my life that would be harder to give up. It's not only the thrill of controlling an aircraft but the science of navigation, aerodynamics, physiology, weather, the physics of flight and how it all works together. People ask me when I decided I wanted to fly and the truth is I never did. The desire to fly is not something that dawned on me one day. In fact there has never been a time in my life, from the moment I could think, that I did not have the yearning to do this. I've dreamed about it as long as I can remember, probably since the first time I saw an airplane while sitting on my dad's shoulders watching them come and go at our small local airport. As a boy my eyes never left the sky, always searching for one of those incredible machines, amazed at how if flew so fast, how the pilots found their way and and dreaming to do it myself. When I was in the 3rd grade in 1970, we had to write a paper about what we wanted to do when we grew up. I wrote that I wanted to be an airline pilot and my mother kept the paper. It took a while, longer than I had expected but I am here nonetheless and loving it. When I am at the controls I am still that little boy who's toy airplane has become real after years and years of wishing it to be so.

 

United Express E-145

American Eagle ERJ-145. This is #844AE which I have flown several times.