Pilots Bailing Out

I have received a lot of emails from my customer base since I announced
the shutdown of my flight planning software business. In addition to a
lot of nice supportive emails, I have seen a significant number from
pilots who have informed me that they stopped renewing their update
subscription because they stopped flying, and/or sold their airplane.

The main reason given was the higher cost of fuel and the liability
risk/airspace restrictions imposed since 9/11. Losing a medical
certificate was a much smaller number than those that simply quit due
to costs/hassle factor.

How many of you are know pilots that have given up flying as a result
of the increasing cost of flying and the new restrictions? Is the
total active pilot headcount shrinking? By how much? Even if the
total pilot population holds at its current level, the % of the U.S.
population that is pilot rated is declining since the overall
population is growing.

If this trend is real, then it would appear that indeed single piston
engine GA is slowly dying in the U.S. Growth in the VLJ market
respresents a different kind of GA, and tells me that aviation is going
to become the domain of the wealthy individual, corporations, and the
airlines...

Dean Wilkinson
Razor's Edge Software