Striking out from Maine to Alaska solo in a Cessna 150 was only a small beginning for Lydia Jacobs, now 25, in search of the greater flying opportunities Alaska promised.
After her dream of joining the U.S. Air Force fell through (she didn’t meet the height requirement for pilots), she trained in her own airplane until that fateful summer when she sold her car to pay for fuel to the Last Frontier.
Jacobs started out loading aircraft for a seaplane operator at Lake Hood while earning her commercial certificate. Soon she got a job on Kodiak Island flying Piper PA–32s, then Cessna Caravans flying cargo to and from villages. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, her then-employer, Wright Air Service in Fairbanks, suddenly found themselves the sole flight service for the entire North Slope—an area covering 95,000 square miles of wilderness bordering the Arctic Ocean—whose majority of inhabitants are accessible only by airplane. Jacobs’ flying career struck the afterburners.
“We were accessing incredibly remote villages that closed doors to the outside world, and we were their only lifeline,” she says. Jacobs and her fellow pilots delivered hundreds of thousands of pounds of mail and groceries, medical teams, and eventually COVID-19 vaccines, reaching their maximum 1,400 hours per year quickly. At a latitude of 71 degrees North, months-long polar days and nights were the norm, weather was often 40 degrees Fahrenheit below zero, and polar bears wandered into town.
Eventually Jacobs was recruited to an Alaskan search and rescue company, rapidly adding large capacity helicopter and jet operations to her skills. Now at just more than 7,000 hours, her certificates and ratings speak for themselves: commercial single-engine land and sea, ATP multiengine land, commercial rotorcraft; type rated for Pilatus PC–24 and Beechcraft King Air 350; second-in-command rated for Sikorsky S–92.
Jacobs has “a lot of love” for the PC–24, which she now flies in a corporate capacity in Washington state, and cites its “gravel strip to flight levels” versatility as a favorite trait. Although now flying jets, she still owns her trusty Cessna 150, and has lent it to several other students to earn their pilot’s certificate, including her own father.
“I feel fortunate to have the career experience I have, and I feel silly saying I want to slow down a little,” she says. “Slowing down” to Jacobs means becoming a CFI and getting more involved in the GA community, especially attending fly-ins like the ones that inspired her as a child. One thing hasn’t changed: She’s still chasing the thrill of exploration.
“I haven’t figured out whether being a pilot has made my world bigger or made my world smaller,” she says, promising that when she figures it out, we’ll be the first to know.
By Michelle Walker
Visitors to EAA AirVenture are greeted by an iconic smiley face drawn across the sky.This is the work of Nathan Hammond, owner and pilot of GhostWriter Airshows, who flies his de Havilland Super Chipmunk across the country to skywrite and perform in day and night airshows. His daytime low-level aerobatic airshow performances feature loops, rolls, and a whole lot of smoke. The night airshow features aerobatics with about 200 pounds of pyro on the wing tips to light up the night sky.
Hammond got his start in aviation at the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome in the Hudson Valley of New York. He was born and raised there, and his father was the chief mechanic and chief pilot there. “They say it takes a village to raise a child and that was my village,” he said.
By the age of 10 he could tell you everything about all the vintage aircraft. Old Rhinebeck was the spark that made him realize being an entertainer, specifically an airshow performer, was what he wanted to do with his life. He went to college and got a degree in aviation administration, which allowed him to run his own business, an aircraft maintenance shop.
Hammond and his Chipmunk have a long history together. The airplane flew into the local airport where he was working around the age of 12 or 13. The owner at the time knew his father and his father ended up ferrying the airplane from airshow to airshow. So, at a young age Hammond got to ride in the front seat of the airplane going to various airshows. “And that really set the hook. Old Rhinebeck started the love, and this set the hook,” he said.
He has 3,000 to 4,000 hours in the Chipmunk alone. “And I tell everybody, it’s my one airplane. If you’re destined to fly one the rest of your days, this is going to be my one.” The airplane does everything Hammond wants it to: It loops, rolls, flies at 150 mph cross-country, and is backcountry capable.
Being the spark for the next generation of aviators drives Hammond. After an airshow he enjoys walking the crowd line and interacting with the audience. “For me personally, it started at an airshow, and I know for a lot of people it starts at an airshow. It’s their first interaction with aerospace.” In addition to being an airshow pilot, he is also a teacher with the Bluegrass Aerospace Experience. In this program, on the first day of school students unbox a CubCrafters Carbon Cub kit and by the last day of school the airplane is complete with all paperwork and is ready to be sold. The program intends to show kids that aerospace is all around them, and there are tons of opportunities for them to pursue.
