The Spirit of St. Germain

The sea and the sky have some hidden connection. The number of pilots I know that are into sailing is a much higher percentage than the average population. Admittedly, the fact that so many of the people I know are pilots skews the data a bit, but even taking that into account, the sea seems to capture the interest of pilots at a disproportionately high rate.

Reading the November 2016 edition of Air Line Pilot magazine, I came across a story of a Canadian airline pilot who rowed across the Atlantic in 53 days. This is a little slower than Lindbergh's adventure in the Spirit of St. Louis (which I reviewed a few months ago), but is more than twice as fast as the previous record for rowing the Atlantic.

While the feat itself is compelling, what makes it even more interesting is how he connects his experience as a pilot to his ability to pull it off: "I credit my ability to survive on these different adventures to my training as an airline pilot," said St. Germain. "You follow procedures and manage risk, and I think that has a lot to do with my success in these extreme environments."

He echoes this sentiment at his website, where he says, "Uniquely blending extreme high risk outdoor adventure with the deliberate and strict adherence to procedures, checklists and risk management inherent in an airline pilot has kept Laval alive."

The magazine story gives some good examples of his approach: "He developed daily procedures and drafted 'mayday' and 'abandon ship' checklists. He trained extensively and drew from the experiences of Mylene Paquette, a Canadian woman who rowed the same route in 2013, taking 129 days."

With 2016 rapidly coming to a close, if you're looking for a goal for 2017, here's one that would be hard to top.

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The author is an airline pilot, flight instructor, and adjunct college professor teaching aviation ground schools. He holds an ATP certificate with ERJ-145 and DHC-8 type ratings, as well as CFI, CFII, MEI, AGI, and IGI certificates, and is a Master-level participant in the FAA's WINGS program and a former FAASafety Team representative. He is on Facebook as Larry the Flying Guy, has a Larry the Flying Guy YouTube channel, and is on Twitter as @Lairspeed.

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