Doug Byrd
I did not grow up around airplanes. I grew up around a program that put me in one.
The Tuskegee Airmen essentially built and paved the runway that I have the privilege to take off from today. That is not a nice line I came up with for a website. I wrote it in 2016 and I have not found a better way to say it since.
Sixteen
I started flight training at 16 and had my pilot’s license at 17. That happened through the East Coast Chapter Tuskegee Airmen’s Youth in Aviation Program. I was a 2008 graduate.
Those are the same two numbers a youth aviation program aims a kid at. Solo at 16, private pilot at 17. I know the program works because I am what it made.
It took a while
In April 2016 I wrote that I was about a week away from my commercial license.
I got it in September 2024.
In between I was cutting grass, teaching guitar, playing bass and steelpan at churches and clubs, and buying flight hours when I could afford them. Nobody was paying for this. That is most of the reason it took eight years and it is not a story I am embarrassed by. It is just what getting into aviation costs when you are paying for it yourself.
Eight contests
Between 2012 and 2021 I flew eight sanctioned aerobatic contests with the International Aerobatic Club, starting in Primary and working up to Intermediate.
Competition aerobatics is not an airshow. You fly a called sequence inside a box in the sky about a kilometre on a side, and a line of judges on the ground grades every figure. It is the least forgiving flying there is and it is where you learn precision.
I fly a borrowed airplane. The Extra 300L I competed in belongs to Sheldon Apsell and Neville Hogan, who granted me access to their absolute dream machine of an aircraft. I have never owned an airplane. Not yet.
The other half
Before the flying there was music, and there still is. Bass, lead guitar, and steelpan. I play with Eclipse International. I have taught guitar for a living.
I am a member of the Flying Musicians Association and I have played their stage at Oshkosh and Sun ’n Fun.
A year ago I flew my own band to a gig for the first time. I did NOT break even financially. Still one of the best days I have had.
Where I’m at right now
I would rather you read this here than wonder.
What I hold: Commercial pilot certificate, single and multi-engine land, instrument airplane. Issued September 2024.
What I do not hold yet: a Statement of Aerobatic Competency. That is the card the FAA and ICAS require before anybody flies an aerobatic act at a North American airshow. I do not have one yet. Until I do, I am not flying airshow acts and I am not going to imply otherwise.
What I am doing about it: flying the Intermediate sequence with Rob Dumovic at Spread Aviation, and I went to my first ICAS convention in December 2025 to learn how this actually works.
What I fly: borrowed airplanes, mostly the Extra 300L. I am looking for sponsors to get into a GameBird GB1.
If you are an event organizer and you want to talk about what I can do for your show today, that conversation is open and honest.
What I can do todayPaving the next one
A program built a runway for me when I was sixteen and had nothing to offer it. Everything since has been me trying to pave one for somebody else.
That is the whole business. The airplane is just how I get people to listen.
The youth work