Alan Shapiro
Been there, flown that
It is said that the two happiest days in an airplane owner’s life are the day they buy it and the day they sell it. If that is true, then retired businessman Alan Shapiro has had 28 such happy days because he has owned 14 different airplanes, all at different times and all for his personal and business use.
These include a Robinson R44 helicopter, a pair of Waco YMF–5 biplanes, a de Havilland Beaver, a pair of Beech Bonanzas, a Beech B58 Baron, and an assortment of Daher (and Socata) TBMs and Pilatus turboprops. He does not yet know what number 15 might be.
Shapiro was raised in a general aviation household and became inspired to follow in his parents’ footsteps. His father, Bernie, and mother, Renny, were both pilots, and his mother was instrumental in saving Van Nuys Airport (VNY) during the 1960s. He began flying hang gliders in 1975 but did not become serious about learning to fly airplanes until 20 years later.
Shapiro’s variety of experience is not unlike his variety of airplanes. His most memorable flight was when he picked up his new TBM 850 at the factory in Tarbes, France, in 2008 and flew it home using Reykjavik, Iceland, and Narsarsuaq, Greenland, as steppingstones across the North Atlantic Ocean.
His most gratifying flights were made shortly after the devastating 7.0-magnitude earthquake struck near Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on January 12, 2010. Responding to the call for humanitarian assistance, he and two friends left Santa Monica, California, for the Caribbean nation in his Pilatus PC–12 with a load of medical supplies. They made an en route stop at Opa-locka, Florida, to top off their load with additional supplies. They then returned to Opa-locka to pick up a load of doctors and nurses for a return flight to Haiti.
Another memorable flight involved a so-called “educational trip” from Florida to Havana, Cuba, in Shapiro’s TBM 930 in December 2016, a few days after the death of Cuban revolutionary and former president, Fidel Castro. The flight and three-day visit were arranged by Air Journey, a tour operator in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.
His bucket list includes following in his parents’ footsteps by acquiring a Daher TBM 960 and flying around the world with his wife, Tammi. The elder Shapiros had circumnavigated the world in a Cessna 441 Conquest II in 1993 and was among the first to overfly Russia following the end of the Cold War. 
Barry Schiff has been flying for 73 years, is a retired TWA captain, and has logged more than 28,000 hours in 364 different types of aircraft.
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