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Ray Preston

Thanks for showing interest in reading my bio. Compared to my colleagues who fly Boeings and other airliners I am the guy who specialized in flying smaller airplanes. I learned to fly in 1975, became a flight instructor in 1978 and joined Selkirk College in 1980. Along the way I stopped counting at 12,000 flight hours, 10,000 simulator instructor hours and an un tallied number of classroom hours.

I completed my B.Sc. at the University of Waterloo in April 1978 and started instructing at the Waterloo Wellington airport immediately thereafter. I first learned to fly while in University obtaining my CPL, Instrument rating, and Instructor rating. By June 1979 I had risen to CFI. A few months later I become a flight test examiner and was specializing in multi-engine and IFR instruction. I got my ATPL in October 1979. Demographics caught up with me in the spring of 1980; I was interviewed by Air Canada in March, but all pilot hiring was suspended, and as it turns out no pilots were hired again until 1986. By then I had moved to British Columbia, married, started a family, and found my calling. My life would have been very different if I had become an airline pilot and not a college instructor. I would have obtained more riches of one type (money) and less of another (hundreds of great people, life in a small town, summers with my child.) I will give you the short version of the last 28 years.

When I arrived at Selkirk College in September 1980 I was a 2500 hour pilot and I thought I was pretty good. It didn't take long to find out that I knew exactly didly-squat. Looking back on it now I can't believe the pathetic state of flight instruction that is inflicted on young pilots. I was one of the victims. Fortunately my life was changed by the other instructors at Selkirk, especially Captain George MacDonald and Bob Evans, the CFI. Between them they educated me in both the details and attitude of a professional pilot. Now that they have retired I feel, every day, the weight of their legacy as I try my best to honor their commitment to start young men and women off with the necessary foundation for a successful flying career.

1986 was a watershed year for me. The airlines starting hiring again, for the first time in six years, so it was time for me to decide. By then I was starting my sixth year as a college instructor and I discovered that it is my life's calling. To me there is no duty more important than helping young people establish their careers. It is a travesty that in aviation instructors are considered the scum at the bottom of the barrel. I realized that I was one of six instructors (plausibly the only six in the country) earning a good living. My colleagues at the college with Ph.Ds in Biology, Chemistry, Physics, English, etc were earning the same salary as me; so if it was good enough for them it should be good enough for me. I decided to make teaching my career. I have never regretted it.

In the wake of my decision I figured I should do everything I could be be the best instructor possible. Along the way I have developed expertise in educational computer software, which you will see elsewhere on this website, and obtained a Masters degree in education from Simon Fraser University.

I don't have a lot of hobbies beyond creating computer simulations but one is house renovating and construction. I live now in a house that I designed and built with my own hands - something I am very pleased to be able to say. I intend to build another house to retire in a few years from now. Previously I have owned two "fixer upper" houses and was quite happy with my renovations, although I made money on only one of them.

My son was born in 1981, just at the end of my first year at the college. He grew up in Castlegar, which after my colleagues in the Aviation Program has been the greatest influence on the last 28 years of my life. I came from Kitchener Ontario, where I lived on the 10th floor of an apartment building, with lots of restaurants, movie theaters, etc right on my doorstep. Castlegar on the other hand, especially in 1980, was very lacking in these amenities. It had only one theater screen, that seemed to play movies that were well out of date (remember, video had not been invented yet), few restaurants or much of anything else. But what it had then, as now, is beautiful scenery, pristine lakes, miles and miles of hiking trails, ski resorts (with no lines) X/C ski trails galore, no traffic jams, friendly neighborhoods, stores with clerks who know your name, historic museums, and community pride. By my watershed year, 1986, my son was starting Kindergarten and I could see that Castlegar was a great place to raise a family.

Castlegar has bloomed since then. It now has a multi-screen theater, night clubs, Canadian Tire, Wal Mart, but still no traffic jams. Even pollution has gone the opposite direction to the big cities. The local pulp mill that used to stink up the air now uses modern technology resulting in the old "Smellgar" name no longer being applicable.

In the 1990s I began to write textbooks. I have complete three now. The first explores Aerodynamics at a level I judge appropriate for professional pilots. I support this textbook with an extensive collection of computer simulations on various topics in Aerodynamics. Many of these simulations are widely used by university and college programs around the world. Subsequently I wrote a textbook on navigation that covers VFR navigation, but also the basics of instrument navigation, particularly ADF and VOR. Most recently I wrote a textbook on IFR flying that covers everything a pilot needs to know to fly IFR. These books are all available in PDF, free for anyone who wishes to use them (see links to the left.)

My current obsession is multi-pilot crew training. My desire is to put together an entire section of this website devoted to crew resource training. This will likely eventually include another textbook.

Contact me by email rpreston@selkirk.ca