John Travolta, a longtime pilot and avid flyer, gave his fans an intimate look into his refresher course on flying a massive jet in a riveting new video posted to his Instagram.
Over decades of flying experience, the 70-year-old movie star has acquired eight jet licenses and reportedly owns at least seven airplanes.
He also owns a mansion at Florida’s Jumbolair Aviation Estates, a 550-acre gated community with the largest licensed private runway in America. John’s home there, which he bought in 2001, has its own separate stretch of tarmac.
Now he has allowed his more than five million Instagram followers to get a glimpse into the process of keeping his skills up to par.
He filmed himself in the flight simulator cockpit, where he was about to practice what he would do in the terrifying event of losing two engines at once.
John Travolta, a longtime pilot and avid flyer, gave his fans an intimate look into his refresher course on flying a massive jet in a riveting new video posted to his Instagram
He filmed himself in the flight simulator cockpit, where he was about to practice what he would do in the terrifying event of losing two engines at once
‘And now, we’re going to do engine out and then we’re gonna lose two of the three engines just for practice,’ he said calmly.
He explained that ‘every year I have to do what they call recurrent jet training’ and shared he was currently undergoing the Dassault Falcon 900EX program.
The training takes four days and, in John’s particular program, is conducted in Dallas by CAE Inc., formerly Canadian Aviation Electronics.
John is not a stranger to emergencies in the cockpit, having experienced what he described as ‘a total electrical failure’ while flying his family in 1992.
‘I knew what it felt like to absolutely think you’re going to die,’ he admitted in an interview with Fox News from November. ‘I had two good jet engines but I had no instruments, no electric, nothing. And I thought it was over.’
He revealed that ‘then as if by a miracle, we descended, as per the rules to a lower altitude.’
In a stroke of luck, he caught sight of the Washington Monument and ‘identified that Washington National Airport was right next to it,’ so he was able to land there.
John began the process of learning how to fly when he was just 15, and he eventually obtained his first jet license in 1978 — the same year his iconic film musical Grease bowed in theaters and cemented his status as a popular leading man.
His passion for flying is so renowned that he has earned a space on the Wall Of Honor at the Smithsonian’s National Air And Space Museum.
‘Every year I have to do what they call recurrent jet training,’ he said. Last year, he told Fox news about suffering ‘a total electrical failure’ while flying his family in 1992. ‘I knew what it felt like to absolutely think you’re going to die,’ he said
He owns a mansion at Florida’s Jumbolair Aviation Estates, a 550-acre gated community with the largest licensed private runway in America
John’s home there, which he bought in 2001, has its own separate stretch of tarmac; his residence is pictured in 2009
He has served as worldwide ambassador for Qantas and been honored by the American Institute Of Aeronautical Engineers; pictured in Brisbane, Australia, in 2005
In 2002, John led a Washington, DC, extravaganza that kicked off a year of festivities to mark a century of manned flight; pictured that year in New York
His passion for aviation is so renowned that he has earned a space on the Wall Of Honor at the Smithsonian’s National Air And Space Museum; pictured in London in 2002
He has been named worldwide ambassador for Qantas and been honored by the American Institute Of Aeronautical Engineers.
In 2002, John led a Washington, DC, extravaganza that kicked off a year of festivities to mark a century of manned flight.
At the following year’s Dayton Airshow, he flew his own Boeing 707, with John Glenn, the first American to orbit Earth, as his passenger.
At the following year’s Dayton Airshow, he flew his own Boeing 707 with John Glenn, the first American to orbit Earth, as his passenger.
