Is the Magic Gone From General Aviation?

General aviation may be headed for crisis; some might say it is already there. A recent article in the New York Times cites FAA statistics that say the number of student pilots is down from 129,000 to 88,000 since 1990. The total number of private pilots is also down: from 299,000 to 236,000.

The fact that those private pilots are also aging isn't encouraging, either.

So, why the decline? Doesn't anyone want to fly planes for a hobby anymore? Matthew W. Phelps is a computer system administrator and likes anything technical. The first time he got behind the controls, he was hooked.

"I liked it a lot," he said. "It was fun, it was exhilarating."

But Phelps, 42,  gave up after only 15 hours of lessons.

"At that point, I'd met my future wife and we were starting to save for the wedding, and then to buy a house, and then there was something else to save money for," he said. That was in 1993. "I'm still sort of dreaming that it might get done, I just put it on hold," he said.

Lack of time and money discourage many pilot wannabes. Months of training for a license may cost from $5,000 to $7,000, or more... figures that aren't too appealing. Renting a Cessna 150 can run up to $75 an hour, plus instructor and fuel costs. Even a high-time, late-70s-vintage C172 may go for over $100 per hour.

David Ehrenstein told the Times he got his pilot's license in graduate school in the early 1990s. "I'm a little bit of a closet technie nerd," he said. He liked flying because "there's a bunch of technology involved," and "to do this great cool thing was exciting." But he had to give up flying after a move.

"My impression is that when people grow up and have kids, they no longer have time to fly," said Ehrenstein, now 40. "When I quit, the major demographic of pilots was retired white guys."

There are still plenty of people going to school on the airline track, but experts and private pilots fear the hobbyist and the industry, is disappearing. Part of the problem appears to be lack of interest.

General aviation is taking steps to lure people back, to attract new students. But, our technological-inclined society seems to be ignoring a pastime that embodies high technology.

One problem appears to be a decline in risk tolerance -- and fear, although statistics for small aircraft show fatal accidents per 100,000 flight hours had decreased by a full quarter in the decade ending in 2004.

A hard-to-tackle reason for declining student numbers is an increasing number of women assuming a greater decision-making role in the family. And women just don't enter aviation as frequently as men.

"There's been a big sociological and psychological change in the families of today, in where the discretionary dollars go," said AOPA president Phil Boyer. In the 1950s, it was common for a husband to tell his stay-at-home wife he was going to spend a Saturday afternoon taking flying lessons... with little to no argument. Today, in a two-income family, Boyer states she is more likely to say: "You are not. That's your day to take Johnny to the soccer game, and what the heck are you doing spending our hard-earned money on flying lessons?"

Matt Kauffman, chief flight instructor at Aero-Tech Services, asserts the training system has not adapted itself to women.

"Women learn differently from men. If two men go up, they will scream and shout, and a transfer of knowledge occurs, and we'd get back on the ground and go have a beer, and life is good," he said. "If you yell at a woman, she'd start crying, and she'd never come back."

Kauffman adds he would like to hire a female flight instructor -- but can't find one. (One wonders why that is... Ed.)

There may be hope. As Aero-News has reported on extensively, AOPA is actively pushing its revamped Project Pilot campaign, spearheaded by pilot Erik Lindbergh, grandson of Charles.

"It gives me a rush every time I go up," Lindbergh says on a promotional video for the project. "Just as my grandfather's flight created a huge interest in flying, we need to create that same groundswell today. We need a new generation of general aviation pilots, because without more pilots, even AOPA can't keep general aviation strong, and that will ultimately have a big effect on every pilot."

There is also the newly-introduced sport pilot license, which requires fewer hours and costs about half as much to get. It limits a pilot to very small planes, and only day-VFR flying.

FMI: www.aopa.org, www.faa.gov