NBAA-BACE Newsmakers Luncheon Offers Lessons on Achievement, Sustainability and Safety

Oct. 23, 2024

The final Newsmakers luncheon at the 2024 NBAA Business Aviation Convention & Exhibition (NBAA-BACE) featured moments of inspiration and impassioned calls for action on the matters of safety and sustainability.

“Today, we have an opportunity to celebrate and recognize some of the people who have been foundational to business aviation [and] some people who in a time of crisis have stepped forward and presented the professionalism we’re known for,” said NBAA President and CEO Ed Bolen. “We also have an opportunity to recognize an extraordinary building of young leaders who are propelling the future of business engagement.”

NBAA Young Professional (YoPro) Council liaisons Ashley Granda and Elayna Hall asked the 2024 Business Aviation Top 40 Under 40 class to stand. “Last year, I was so excited to say we had over 500 nominations,” said Granada, NBAA senior marketing manager, “but this year, we have had another record-breaking year of over 700 nominations.”

“YoPros truly embody NBAA’s core value of leading from any seat,” added Hall, NBAA manager for professional development. “They are innovators, leaders, mentors, advocates and professionals. Most importantly, they are the future of our history and are already making a mark today.”

Learn more about this year’s award recipients.

Recognizing Continuous Learning and Improvement

Next, NBAA recognized Jim Lara, principal at Gray Stone Advisors and a longtime advocate for business aviation safety and professionalism with the association’s John P. “Jack” Doswell Award for his lifelong achievement in the industry.

Lara, in turn, encouraged YoPros to focus on the cornerstones to building a successful career in the industry, including continuous learning, building great teams (“it’s not about you. It’s about all of those who you lead”), find tough mentors and to follow and pursue their passions.

Lara also discussed the significance of business aviation throughout his career, beginning with operating a single-engine aircraft that allowed him visit as many job locations in a week as he was able to drive to in a month.

“It’s really quite simple,” he added. “Business aviation has the power to produce our only own non-renewable resource, and that is more usable time. That can drive business successes and fulfill our personal lives with rich experiences.”

Surviving Adversity and Rebuilding in Its Aftermath

In her first public remarks since surviving a February 2024 fatal business jet accident in Naples, FL, professional flight attendant Sydney Bosmans accepted NBAA’s Above and Beyond Award for Heroic Achievement in recognition of her actions that saved her own life and those of her two passengers onboard.

Following a moment of silence for the two pilots who lost their lives in the accident, Bosmans shared she continues to grapple with post-traumatic stress disorder. “My processing has only just begun,” she said. “A dear friend of mine recently said, there is a survival of the event, and then there is a survival afterwards. That is where survival truly begins.

“I am not up here with it all together, and that’s okay,” Bosmans added. “I hope you can give yourself the same permission, regardless of what you have been through.”

Bosmans also called for mandated safety training for business aviation flight attendants. She credited such training – which she sought out and paid for on her own only months prior to the accident – for quickly locating and opening the rear baggage door they escaped through.

“I see a day where there’s no such thing as a cabin server with no safety functions,” she said. “This entire business of aviation is based on a first-class, high touch experience. So why are you comfortable with not providing safety on a first-class level?

Young Leaders in Sustainability

The luncheon closed with a panel discussion featuring industry YoPros and their perspectives on business aviation’s work on the CLIMBING. FAST. campaign and its pledge to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.

Companies like 4Air are assisting business aviation flight operations with their sustainability goals. “Four years ago, about 40% of Fortune 500 companies reported their emissions publicly,” noted company president Kennedy Ricci. “Now we have 99%. There’s a huge demand for transparency around what corporations are doing, and that’s actually bringing more attention to appropriate use of aircraft.”

Jabili Kandula, associate editor for Women in Aviation International, recounted a recent discussion with other women her age. “One of them asked, ‘Would you want to have kids?’ Another replied, ‘Yes, I would like to, but it depends on where the planet is because it would be unfair to them.’ That’s the reality of this situation.”

Avfuel Executive Vice President C.R. Sincock noted stocks of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) continue to grow, with innovative technologies promising to shift the industry’s current reliance on feedstocks such as oils and greases to enable new means of SAF production.

“I think we see a lot of advantages there, but it’s a lot further out on the technology adoption,” he added. “All these [new production methods] will be needed to continue to drive the price down and to provide enough supply to meet the growing projected demand for SAF.”

Kandula urged flight operations to look beyond SAF to other means of fostering greater sustainability, including the pillars of NBAA’s Sustainable Flight Department Accreditation Program.

“We have to look at it from a micro and macro standpoint,” she added. “All these little things start to add up.”