Fly With Josh

I grew up wanting to fly, but it was never quite a possibility for me. Until finally it was, and I went full speed ahead.

In my first two years of flying I spent over 1500 hours in airplanes, over 900 of that teaching, and all of it having fun!

My favorite flights are the long cross-country trips that I've spent sitting alone, managing the plane, planning the trip, and just enjoying the view. Some people find long solo cross-country boring, which I simply can't understand.
One of my favorite missions was where five of us took two planes out, and came home the next day with five planes in a V-formation. Being able to take new instructors out on one of these delivery missions and give them a chance to use their skills in a real-world way is something I've very much enjoyed.

I love the challenge of learning. So far I've never turned down an opportunity to fly something new, and I don't plan to.

Some of my favorite hours have been on the water. One of my instructors (Maddie, shown here! ❤️) got me into flying the ICON A5 seaplane, and now as an ICON Authorized Flight Instructor (IAFI) I teach people getting seaplane ratings, as well as new ICON owners!

The ICON is a really special airplane, that's designed to be easy to fly, perform incredibly, and get you places you wouldn't normally be comfortable in a small plane, flying low and slow and interacting with water, boats, and birds.

The challenges of teaching in this environment and helping students to respect the danger of it has been incredibly fun. Especially when teaching a new owner who's going to go out and have great adventures. The reward of teaching is knowing that what you're doing is going to have a long term and continued impact.

A lot of pilots get their ratings with most of their time spent flying with an instructor, never having gone anywhere on their own. I've been fortunate to get plenty of opportunity to take a plane and go somewhere, either on a mission or just for fun. I'm very happy in a plane by myself just cruising across the countryside, or at night with nothing to look at but my instruments.

All good CFIs will teach that what we do is inherently dangerous, and our job is about mitigating the risks. One of the ways I've mitigated the risk for myself is by spending quite a bit of time as a mechanic's apprentice at the school, learning much more than the average student about the mechanics and maintenance of the plane. This experience has helped me detect and avoid several potential issues before they even happened, and really helped me with my ability to execute ferry flights.

I've loved teaching, and I've loved running a flight school. New challenges, new adventures.
What I'm looking for next is more of the same: work that keeps the learning curve steep, whether that's flying bigger and faster airplanes, taking on more technical missions, or teaching in new and different airframes.


I'm open to any opportunity that involves going further, higher, faster, or more interesting places, and I'd love it if you took a look at my resume to see if I might be the right fit for your needs.
And if you'd like to work with a CFI, ferry pilot, or contract pilot who will treat your plane like their own or push you beyond just the checkride, visit Daedalus Flight Services and let's work together!