Thursday, February 24, 2011

BIOGRAPHY

Capt. Bill Wilkerson and son, Capt. Ryan Wilkerson (right).
I started flight lessons at age 16 and earned my pilot’s license at 21, beginning 42 years of continuous flying experience. With Piedmont and U.S. Airways, my career included jobs as Line Pilot, Check Airman, Assistant Chief Pilot and Flight Manager. I love aviation. I could never give back what it has given to me – but I intend to try by sharing what I know about surviving spatial disorientation.

Within months after retiring from commercial aviation, I focused on preventing the cause of general aviations most deadly in-flight experience, spatial disorientation. Supplementing my group presentations, I created a mobile unit (IMC-Safe Flight) to bring my simulated flight programs to aviation events where pilots learn one-on-one, the procedures to follow and survive disorientation. The FAA has included IMC Safe Flight presentations at Wings programs. The positive feedback has fueled my ultimate goal to create a national network of mobile sim-units.

A resident of North Carolina, I hangar my Cessna 195 at Burlington-Alamance Airport (BUY).