Episode Transcript
[00:00:03] John Ramstead: Ten or fifteen minutes later, the brain trauma would have been to the point where either it was not recoverable or fatal. And I gotta, you know, I am so grateful. And then we find out that actually that was your helicopter.
[00:00:14] Intro: Welcome to Hangar X Studios, where former fighter pilot and host John Ramstead takes us on a journey across aerospace as it enters an historic period of innovation and transformation. Our guests include aviation experts, pilots, financiers, military leaders, and innovators of all types. Buckle up for another episode of Hangar X.
[00:00:44] John Ramstead: All right. Hey. Welcome to Hangar X Studios. We are live at verticon, and this is where you get to hear from disruptors and innovators and people that are actually making things happen in the industry and where we get to learn things before the rest of the world does. And today we have on John Vance from Metro Aviation. And I am so excited about this because this man, we just found out five minutes ago, this man in this company were actually responsible for the life flight that saved my life about 13 years ago. So, John, welcome to the podcast.
[00:01:14] John Vance: Awesome. Thank you. Glad to be here.
[00:01:15] John Ramstead: Glad to have you here. So I won't share any of the pictures. Nobody wants to see those pictures, trust me. But I was involved in an accident. I was on a horse at a full gallop, bucked me off head first into a steel fence, and I basically crushed every part of my body from my chest up. Neck was broken, skull crushed. And the paramedics got there and said, you know, we can't transport this patient.
He wouldn't make it. So they called Life flight and Life flight got there and they got me to the trauma center there in Great Falls, Montana, in Benefice. And what we found out later, if I'd been that gotten there only 10 or 15 minutes later, the brain trauma would have been to the point where either it was not recoverable or fatal. And I got to, you know, I am so grateful. And then we find out that actually that was your helicopter that your pilot was operating. So, you know, maybe just start out with this, the. The mission that you guys do. I mean, think about this. I get to be here and be a, you know, you know, a father and live in this world and run my companies and my employees, or else I would have been gone. It's got to be incredibly rewarding for you and your entire team.
Just the mission that you guys get to do.
[00:02:26] John Vance: Absolutely. It's pretty incredible to see that we can be a small part of what goes on out there for impacting people, real people. Right. And our piece to the Puzzle. You know, I want to be clear, I don't want to take more credit than is due us, but our piece of the puzzle is safe transportation so the people in the back can save lives. Right. Like, and we're very clear, we're an aviation company and that's what we do is we provide aviation services. Right. So I like to say no magic in the front, magic happens in the back because they save people's lives back there. But the reason they're able to do that is because they trust that we're providing good aviation services and they're not. They don't have to be concerned that we're going to get them safely from point A to point B. They can focus on taking care of the patient. So that's our small piece of that puzzle, is being professionally prepared, being able to respond, have an airworthy aircraft to go out and transport those teams that do incredible things.
[00:03:16] John Ramstead: Yeah, and you guys do hoist rescues also.
[00:03:18] John Vance: We do not.
[00:03:19] John Ramstead: Okay. So you know, in this, you know, from the pilot training standpoint and standardization, you know, we did, we just had Warren on and he talked about what, 175 aircraft, 42 partnerships. How do you keep standardization in the training? Because I'm guessing the training in this environment is unique, is a lot of unknown situations. You don't know the weather, you don't know the terrain like you're going out to, and you're going out to an accident scene. So you're not exactly sure what you might find.
[00:03:44] John Vance: Correct.
[00:03:44] John Ramstead: Right. So how do you train for that?
[00:03:46] John Vance: So scenario based training is the best way I know to put it. We put a priority on getting our guys in the building with our people. In the fixed wing world, it's common to send people off to flight safety or other vendors out there that provide excellent aircraft training. But what they don't are not able to provide is that individual, you know, company based training and getting, we call it getting the blue blood back in them. Right. For Metro. And so as many of our pilots as we can, we like to bring into the building. We have level D simulators. As we talked about before, it's a family owned company and Mike has made huge investments and we have level D sims in the building and a couple of FTEs as well, and then partnerships with flight safety. We get them with our instructors, we bring them in the building, we talk to them, we talk about culture, we talk about decision making, and we make sure that they're adequately trained and equipped to go out and do the job that we're asking Them to do.
[00:04:36] John Ramstead: Yeah. And they're dispersed all over the country. Right. How do you centralize that?
[00:04:40] John Vance: Correct. So again, if we could, we would bring every pilot. But the only pilots for Metro Aviation that don't come to the building are pilots that don't have the facilities to train. Meaning if you fly an EC130, we don't have a device for that. So they'll have to go to simulator training. But we send one of our company instructors with them, and they use the same curriculum. So consistency is the key. EC135, EC145, and 407 pilots will come to our facility at least once a year, and they'll be trained in our building by our instructors. They'll see us in the hallways, I'll come talk to the classes, and we make sure that they get that, remember what we're there for, which is aviation.
[00:05:16] John Ramstead: So you're doing the recurrency training, the emergency procedures, Just excellence with the aircraft. But then I'm guessing you add on top of that all the situational and some of the scenario training.
[00:05:28] John Vance: Absolutely. Scenario based training, we try to make it as realistic as we can. From use of the iPad, they're georeferenced in the sim, so as the sim moves along, the tablet moves along with it. So it acts exactly as it does in the field. So we go the extra mile to make sure that we're accurate. We don't say, well, this is simulator training. It doesn't do exactly as we do. No, we make the investment to make it do exactly as it should so we can simulate the weather conditions. We can make them match what's being displayed on your tablet. And we do it all scenario based. We spend the money with flight safety to have accident scenes set up so you can land, and there's flashing lights and ambulances and, you know, all the things on roadways. And we try to keep it fresh enough so the guy hasn't been to the same scene year after year after year. We have 3D modeled, you know, hospital helipads that we go to for trauma centers. So you're actually landing on helipads and you're sitting on the ramp. You look out, you see, you know, the American Airlines aircraft taking off and landing on the Runway. We see, you know, your. The company's name on the hangars. Like, we try to make it as realistic as we can.
[00:06:24] John Ramstead: Yeah. So if you and I got together, let's say a year from now, I know you guys have some big goals at Metro.
[00:06:29] John Vance: Right.
[00:06:30] John Ramstead: What are some Things you know, from, from your seat that you would love to be talking about if it was next spring.
[00:06:37] John Vance: So innovation is one of the incredible pieces at Metro and all the things that's coming along. We're always looking forward to what we can do better or next or what we can provide for our pilots. So there's all kind of things that we continually try to evaluate to try to make it better for our pilots.
One thing we're looking at right now is a way to mount a camera system on the aircraft and have 3D modeling of a landing area. When you land, the AI assess that for power lines and unseen hazards and obstacles and things like that, and give the pilot some real time feedback on the safety of a landing zone.
Make us more efficient and make us more accurate, you know, when we land or get to those locations, we partner with a company that's putting weather sensors on the aircraft so it gets temperature and dew point real time.
And what is that?
[00:07:25] John Ramstead: What does that do for the air crew?
[00:07:27] John Vance: So with the temperature and the dew point that you're getting real time and using AI, it uses surrounding weather from metars and nationally sourced weather sources. And then as you, let's say you take off from a location and you don't know what's going on, you turn the battery switch on and it gets a sensor location. You're between weather reporting points, which often happens like in Great Falls, Montana. There's not a lot of weather for a long distance, Right. So a guy goes out in the middle of the night, he lands on the scene. What's the weather there? We don't really know.
[00:07:50] John Ramstead: You might be on scene for a while depending on what's going on, either half hour, an hour?
[00:07:53] John Vance: Absolutely. So we're sitting there for an hour, he turns the battery on and it says, hey, the temperature in dew point has changed significantly. Now they're closer together, which would indicate incoming fog or the ceiling has lower. Right. So we can put this AI algorithm over it. It knows the route of flight, the terrain, elevations, it can estimate the cloud height, and it can tell you before you take off if you meet the minimum requirements with pretty good accuracy. Well, the further you fly, the further you get along in flight, the more data that it gathers, the better and better it gets.
So we can avoid that inadvertent IMC condition en route, which is what happens, you know.
[00:08:29] John Ramstead: So do you guys avoid imc?
[00:08:31] John Vance: That's the whole goal, right, is to avoid it. Now, we do operate the large majority of our fleet is IFR equipped.
[00:08:38] John Ramstead: Okay.
[00:08:38] John Vance: But it's different being IFR equipped and doing a planned IFR flight and flying along in flight and becoming inadvertently imc. Right.
[00:08:45] John Ramstead: You got to get in touch with ATC and you got.
[00:08:47] John Vance: And there's a recovery maneuver and the risk that's involved in the terrain that could be in front of you that you have to turn to avoid patient in the back. Situational awareness. Right. So we don't want, we don't want, you know, we want people encountering in it, you know, IMC inadvertently. Will it be a planned event? Right. If we do so. So that weather sensor, it's really exciting. At first I was, you know, as with all pilots. Right. We're a little skeptical. Hey, you're giving me something. But it's, it's incredibly accurate and it's incredibly, you know, a good tool for us to use in these areas where we operate a lot where there's no weather. Because you're typically not going to have an accident at the airport. No, it's going to be off airport. And so, you know, you're halfway between two reporting stations. Well, now I can turn the battery on and I can get a real estimation.
[00:09:27] John Ramstead: I was 45 minutes from great Falls, which I'm sure there's no accurate way. It's going to be similar to Great Falls, maybe. Yeah, but there's. It's not going to be what the.
[00:09:36] John Vance: Pilot needs in Great Falls, as you know, there could be a mountain range between you and 45 miles, and then the weather could be totally different on the other side of that mountain, Correct?
[00:09:44] John Ramstead: Yep.
[00:09:44] John Vance: So as you're flying along and the atmospheric conditions are changing, you know, it's, it's, it's calculating that, applying AI to it, and then interpolating the weather for you, and it's feeding that real time back to our operational control center so they can reach out. We have push to talk in all of our aircraft anywhere in the world. So they can reach out and say, hey, are you aware. Right. That this weather conditions are occurring and, you know, what are you seeing in front of you? You know, would you like to. I can direct you to an alternate. You know, there's a known airport here that has good weather conditions or whatever, so we can proactively make decisions rather than reactively.
[00:10:15] John Ramstead: So it sounds like some more safety tools, better situational awareness. What else would you like to be talking about a year from now?
[00:10:23] John Vance: I think just.
[00:10:23] John Ramstead: You got a whole bunch of new helicopters coming in the fleet, too.
[00:10:26] John Vance: Absolutely, we do. And you know, that's challenging with training. Right. Making sure. That we, we get the same standardization of training and we, we don't deviate from what we know brings everybody home every day.
But I think one of the biggest things we got to talk about in the industry is where's the next generation of pilots coming from? Right. We have to invest in that, you know, because they're certainly, certainly getting harder and harder to come up with, you know, with, with highly qualified and trained pilots. And for us, you know, with a 2,000 hour minimum, we have to figure out a way to help those guys bridge that gap and not only get experience, but the right experience, get good experience, you know, come to us prepared to go work and do the things that we do. Right. Make the mistakes, but in a safe and controlled environment, learn the lessons and then come to us being prepared to do what we do. Because as you mentioned earlier, right. It's 2:00 in the morning. The phone rings. Where am I going to go? Well, I don't know till I answer the phone. Have no idea what's the mission going to entail, you know, those kind of things. And then I need to make a decision and get along my way. Because Air Ambulance is about time. That's what we're selling. Right. Because there's qualified people that can do by ground transport. But like in your condition, time, time is what mattered in your case. Right. That's what we're.
[00:11:28] John Ramstead: That golden hour was, was truly golden.
[00:11:31] John Vance: Right. So you can't, you can't spend 20 minutes trying to plan and make a decision. You need to be professionally prepared. So that's one thing unique about our business is every day you need to come to work to do every job.
[00:11:40] John Ramstead: Yeah.
[00:11:41] John Vance: That's never going to be defined for you. When you walk in the door, you're never going to know what you're going to do, which is exciting. But from a training standpoint, you know, judgment. Right. That's, that's the thing. But the next generation of pilots, that's one of the biggest challenges that I think we all face.
[00:11:54] John Ramstead: Yep.
[00:11:54] John Vance: Is, is how are we going to invest in the future, you know, future aviators.
[00:11:58] John Ramstead: Yeah. Well, I love that, John. Thank you for what you guys do.
[00:12:01] John Vance: Thank you.
[00:12:02] John Ramstead: I truly appreciate it. And so does my family and so does probably the thousands and thousands of people.
[00:12:07] John Vance: Absolutely.
[00:12:07] John Ramstead: You saved. I got to share a stat with you that when you save a life, like you guys do, there's 71 other lives that are profoundly impacted from one life saved.
[00:12:17] John Vance: Oh, wow.
[00:12:18] John Ramstead: So just think about the multiplication effect. You guys could probably do some research on that and share it internally. But think about what that number might be for just the work you guys have done well over your history, and.
[00:12:28] John Vance: I don't know what the math works out to be the statistics, but we fly about 8,000 hours a month in air ambulance work, so we impact a lot of people.
[00:12:36] John Ramstead: It's a lot of people.
[00:12:37] John Vance: It's a lot of.
[00:12:37] John Ramstead: And now times that by 71.
[00:12:39] John Vance: Right? That's pretty incredible.
[00:12:40] John Ramstead: Think about that.
[00:12:40] John Vance: That's pretty incredible.
[00:12:41] John Ramstead: So, man, love to have you guys on Anytime. John, great to get to know you, and I'm so glad we met here in.
[00:12:46] John Vance: All right, well, look, you want to fly a helicopter, come see us.
[00:12:49] John Ramstead: I would love to fly helicopter.
[00:12:50] John Vance: All right.
[00:12:50] John Ramstead: All right. Where do I go?
[00:12:51] John Vance: Shreveport? Yeah, absolutely. Okay, I'll come get you. We'll get you in a full motion. Sam, you can play.
[00:12:56] John Ramstead: Okay, yeah. You got a deal.
[00:12:57] John Vance: All right.
[00:12:58] John Ramstead: Thank you, sir. All right, all right.
