Sojourner - Traveling with the “Canman”

I arrived in Brazil on Saturday, March 21, after the kind of travel day that sounds efficient on paper and feels like a minor act of endurance in real life: DFW to Miami, then overnight to São Paulo. I had chosen first class, thinking I needed to arrive rested, polished, and ready to represent SFTE with dignity.  But if you're not going to eat the food, well, maybe premium economy is good enough... I did start watching a great movie, titled "The Life of Chuck."   Landing in São Paulo, I stepped out of Terminal 3 at GRU, requested my Uber Comfort as planned, and made my way to Hotel Heritage on Rua Fernando de Albuquerque in Consolação. The airport-to-city transition was easier than expected, which is always a pleasant surprise when arriving in a country where your language skills are mostly limited to hope, pointing, and “Obrigado.”  From the airplane window, São Paulo looked endless: towers, neighborhoods, green corridors, haze, density, motion. It was not a city th...

  Bombardier, Airbus Americas, and Textron.  3 birds in on week.  I was impressed with the vitality and opportunity for aerospace in the middle of the flatlands.  Don't think I would want to live my life there unless there was a REALLY cool aircraft to fly.  Word is ShieldAI is building a test facility 40 miles to the north.  A change is acoming.   My SFTE news release is below   Left to right: SFTE Vice President Ben Poval, Airbus Americas Vice President John O’Leary, and SFTE President Jeff Canclini at Airbus Americas Headquarters in Wichita. SFTE President Jeff Canclini recently completed a three-day visit to Wichita, Kansas, strengthening connections with industry partners and engaging with local SFTE members while advancing the Society’s mission to elevate flight test engineering excellence. The visit began with Jeff delivering a remote presentation to the UK Royal Air Force Flight Test Engineer Career Forum, where he spoke on emer...