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Captain Chris, an experienced international airline captain, will be writing a regular column for Simple Flying. He has been a follower of the publication since the pandemic and has participated in their podcasts and met team members at airshows.
Chris’s interest in aviation began during his childhood in Melbourne, Australia. At age 12, he took his first flight on a Trans-Australian Airways Boeing 727. During this trip, he was invited into the cockpit for takeoff. After witnessing the experience firsthand, Chris asked if he could become a pilot. The captain replied, “Yes, of course you can.” Chris credits this moment as shaping his entire life.
He worked various jobs to pay for flying lessons and became a commercial pilot in 1982. To gain enough experience for Australia’s airlines, he flew as an instructor, charter pilot, and performed other flying jobs before being hired by Ansett as a first officer on the Fokker F-27 and later becoming one of their first Airbus A320 pilots. However, following an industrial dispute that led to mass resignations from Ansett and TAA in 1989, Chris moved overseas.
