For one veteran airline captain, a routine flight to Denver changed her view about aviation safety—but not because of an in-flight crisis.
Rather, the captain heard a story that—for the first time in her decades-long career—made her uneasy about putting her loved ones on a plane.
During a 2024 conversation, a flight instructor described unusual steps managers took to salvage the career of a young female trainee pilot. The instructor described an “egregious” example of standards apparently being relaxed to meet DEI goals, the captain said.
The trainee repeatedly failed rudimentary pilot-training tests. By “crashing” a computer simulation “flight,” she proved her inability to operate an airplane’s three most basic control mechanisms, the instructor said….