Ezekiel Andrews has spent more than a decade pursuing his dream of becoming a commercial airline pilot, but he hasn’t given up.
It can cost $100,000 or more to become an airline pilot. “Unless you really come from a wealthy background, it’s almost an impossible endeavor,” Andrews said.
He spent years “working every single job” he could find to earn money to pay for flight hours needed to qualify — “fighting to get back into my field,” he said. Along the way, he says he has accumulated hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt.
But a couple of months ago Andrews started working as a certified flight instructor at DeKalb-Peachtree Airport, and he now expects to accumulate the required 1,500 flight hours within a year and a half.
U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock mentioned Andrews, who he met during a visit to PDK Airport, as the type of person that inspired him to introduce legislation in Congress for federal grant funding to support aviation programs in colleges, vocational schools and high schools — including for scholarships or apprenticeships for future pilots, aircraft mechanics and aviation manufacturing professionals.
Andrews “had that light in his eyes that I see in young people when they’ve found something that they want to do, that they’re passionate about. For him, that’s flying,” Warnock said. “It shouldn’t be that difficult... What I’m trying to do is increase the pipeline, and for young people who want to enter into this space, there are just limited pathways.”
The legislation would also fund programs for outreach about aviation careers to students starting with elementary school, and for under-represented communities.
The language is included in the Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization bill being considered by the Senate.
“Georgia is a top aviation state in our country,” Warnock said in an interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “I consider it a top priority of mine to strengthen Georgia’s position.”
His aviation workforce legislation is one of a number of measures proposed in Congress to address and forestall future staffing shortages in the aviation workforce.
Warnock, a Democrat, is also supporting a raft of other legislation to bolster the aviation industry, ranging from grant funding for the sustainable aviation fuel industry to a controversial measure to expand flights at Washington D.C.’s Reagan National Airport.
The sustainable aviation fuel measure and the proposed expansion of flights at National are both supported by Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines.
The Georgia senator is also backing legislation for a study seeking recommendations to update the aircraft certification process to make it more timely and transparent. He said that could help companies like Savannah-based Gulfstream Aerospace.
Warnock wants to get his legislative proposals included in the FAA reauthorization bill, which must be passed every five years and thus becomes a vehicle for a variety of aviation legislation.
