Coast Flight Training has created a new position to foster the highest quality preparation for its pilot trainees and has named Col. Jeff Bushnell, USAF (Ret.) Director of Education and Aviation Standards. The retired Air Force colonel, flight examiner and squadron commander brings 43 years of military and airline aviation experience. Col. Bushnell retired from Continental Airlines with over 20,000 flight hours.

“Jeff brings over forty years of experience training pilots to military and commercial aviation standards,” said Will Dryden, Coast Flight’s President. “Jeff developed scenario-based training (SBT) while in the Air Force, long ago adapting it to the commercial carriers and has developed and ushered through the FAA-approval of Coast Flight’s unique scenario-based training program. Among other benefits of this proprietary scenario-based training, student pilots fly the same routes to the same airports as the airlines while training through various high traffic zones; they finish their training more than prepared for an airline job.”

Col. Bushnell served 29 years in the US Air Force Reserves where he began as a pilot, then instructed and tested new pilots, served as Squadron Commander and Wing Inspector General, and finally retired in 1999 as Reserve Advisor to Director of Requirements for the USAF.

In addition to a successful military career, Col. Bushnell worked in the airline industry for People Express Airlines and later Continental Airlines. He developed People Express’s Scenario-Based Training program for the B727 modeled after protocols he designed for the USAF.

Under its Aviation Career Training (ACT) Program, Coast Flight’s four-tiered pre-screening process, Coast Flight advocates for each applicant to ensure they meet the criteria to become a professional pilot, empowering candidates to make informed decisions prior to investing in an aviation career.

“Candidates don’t waste time and money without first knowing if they qualify. Coast Flight’s primary business goal is to create professional, responsible, highly trained pilots who the airlines will hire,” said Mr. Dryden. “We measure our success by the success of our candidates.”