A high bar for safety

Organizing the safety drive is David Miller, chairman of the newly formed CJP Safety and Education Foundation, a 501(c)(3) charitable organization. Miller brings a rich background in general aviation to the foundation’s work, having progressed from flying pistons and turboprops to business jets in support of his manufacturing company. With five type ratings in Citations, Sabreliners, and Falcons, he has decades of experience operating business jets, writing for aviation publications, and speaking at aviation conventions on safety topics. At the conference, Miller discussed how a string of fatal Citation accidents the previous year had led to the soul-searching among CJP’s board members that culminated in the foundation’s birth.

“Although safety has always been important to most jet pilots, when you know someone personally who dies tragically as a result of an accident, it brings it home. That’s what started us thinking that we needed to change the entire focus of our organization to being really entirely focused on safety,” Miller said.

“Kirk Samuelson—our chairman—it was his brainchild. We kind of initially said ‘OK, let’s start this foundation,’ but then he was more forceful. He said ‘No, we’re not going to talk about it, we’re going to do it.’ So, we brought Charlie on which is, I think, the major reason that it took off so quickly.”

“Charlie” is Charles Precourt, chairman of the foundation’s safety committee, and a pilot of unparalleled experience and qualification. After a career as an Air Force pilot and instructor in T-37s, T-38s, and F-15s, followed by six years of test piloting at Edwards Air Force Base, there was only one direction Charlie could go: up, as in way up. Selected by NASA in 1990, Precourt flew four space shuttle missions as a pilot and commander before ultimately heading the astronaut corps.

For all his professional experience, Precourt was quick to point out his deep roots in GA: “My dad was a private pilot, and I had the opportunity to learn to fly when I was in high school with [aerobatic champion] Mike Goulian’s dad, as they were partners in a little FBO and flight school. All the way through my Air Force and NASA careers I always maintained my roots with GA, including building and flying a VariEze.” Working with Citation owners has clearly rubbed off on Precourt, as he recently became the owner of a Cessna CJ1+, and has—in just a few months—amassed nearly 100 hours in its cockpit.

With strong leadership in place, the foundation decided to focus its first year’s efforts on two major initiatives: creating a culture that encourages CJP members to increase their training frequency and rigor, and designing and disseminating best practices for flying Citations.

To encourage a culture where training is prized and not simply tolerated as an obligation, the foundation created the CJP Gold Standard Safety Award, a recognition of members who have far exceeded the minimum mandatory training needed to operate a jet. To be eligible for the award, a member must have accomplished all of the following in the past year:

• Flown at least 100 Citation hours as PIC;
• Completed a FAR 61.58 check in a full motion simulator;
• Completed an additional training event such as a second recurrent or six hours of in-aircraft training; and
• Accomplished additional aviation training from a long list, such as altitude chamber attendance, getting a tailwheel endorsement, or adding a rating to their certificate.

“We decided that if we take some members who meet rigorous criteria that goes above and beyond what is normally required for the FAA and insurance companies, and we give them a gold seal of approval, we can make it important for not only them but all the other members. And we’re already seeing other members seeing what they’re doing and wanting to emulate their efforts,” Miller said. “We thought 20 awards given out the first year would be a success. We ended up giving 43 and it looks like we’ll double that next year.”

Recognizing the unique membership that makes up CJP, Miller explained that from the beginning a deliberate choice was made to call the standards being developed operating practices, not procedures, “knowing that Citation owners are Type A performers who might not like to be told what to do. So instead we give them things to think about when they fly their airplanes.”

In addition to the printed standard operating practices (SOP) booklets that were handed out and extensively discussed during the convention, a professionally produced video series, “What Good Looks Like,” was debuted. Consisting of five short training videos, the series puts pilots in the simulator and shows them a scenario they may have encountered during their flying, when things didn’t go so well. The videos show how things should have unfolded using CJP’s SOPs. Missed preflight items, taxi mishaps, and inadequate planning for failures on takeoff are examples discussed in the first round of videos.

Miller laughed when recalling how powerful he found the videos. He played the part of the pilot making common errors in the simulator. “The more we did the videos, the better I was performing, and I didn’t want to because I was supposed to mess up—but because I was watching ‘What Good Looks Like,’ I found myself trying to model that. So, it speaks to the concept that if you show it enough, it will help our members see and model those practices.”

Any fear of a backlash as the association pivots to an overriding safety theme proved unwarranted; convention registration increased 30 percent from 2017, yielding record attendance. The enthusiasm for the safety efforts has the foundation leadership energized for more. “The industry itself is wrapping its arms around this project now,” Miller said. “From insurance companies that are offering a discount on your insurance premium if you are a Gold Standard awardee, to the training companies FlightSafety and TRU that are developing training curriculum based on our SOPs and providing scenario-based enrichment training. The training is based on things that have killed or injured Citation owners, so training can be not only the things you have to do to check the boxes, but also training to save your life from things that actually happen and have happened.”

Miller concluded, “Our focus is now making safety the number one priority to the point where our members think of it every single time they get in their airplanes. Single-pilot jet operators are normally the pilot, the co-pilot, the baggage handler, the weather briefer, and the dispatcher. They wear all the hats, and we want the safety hat to be the biggest one.”

Neil Singer is a Master CFI and was lead author of the CJP SOP guide.