Yesterday.

Yesterday was a sad day. The aviation community lost a brother in a helicopter crash. We heard about it at work well before it hit the news. News like that travels fast. I still don't know all the details and I don't know the pilot personally but it has still occupied a large part of my mind over the past 24 hours. He will be dearly missed and I can't help but think about my loved ones when something like this happens. I know that I had to do an inventory of all of my friends that fly that particular type of aircraft and confirm that they were not involved. Even that process of hoping it wasn't one of your buddies sours your stomach. Because that means that it was someone Else's buddy, husband, son or father.

Even though the statistics speak for themselves that flying isn't inherently dangerous, that driving is, that we're more likely to be run off a logging road on our way to the job site than die doing our jobs; it's still a crystal clear reminder that what we do comes with risk. And sometimes a lot of risk. I really try not to think about it too much. But it is certainly there and at risk of speaking for someone else, we all know it's there. We do our best to mitigate the risks and be as professional as we can. Calculate the risks and rewards. In doing so we count on each other. We count on the engineers to be thorough and double check their work and each others work. They count on us to do our daily pre-flights. We count on other pilots to make good position reports while we're flying. We count on our cross shift pilots to not abuse the aircraft that we both fly. We count on our companies to provide a safe work environment and choose wisely when it comes to selecting overhaul shops and service providers. I could go on and on but it really comes down to the fact that we are all human. We are all able to make mistakes and sometimes the machines we build break. But we will not stop flying for love or money... because we do it for both.

Now I'm going to go and clear my mind because I have to concentrate for a few more hours today while we keep our helicopter flying logs to the landing...