The SFBAA will be hosting its first General Membership Meeting of 2026 on Wednesday, April 22nd in Fort Lauderdale. The meeting will be taking place at the The Fort, in their Pearl Room, from 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm.
Come join us for cocktails, hors d'oeuvres, and listen to our exciting guest speaker: Heidi Porch. She has an amazing story to share with us about having to ditch a single engine Cessna in the middle of the Pacific Ocean while just getting started as a pilot.
Captain Heidi Porch is a retired G-500 and Delta Air Lines pilot whose 35-year career took her from the flight deck of DC-9s and Airbus jets to the iconic Boeing 747-400. However, long before she was logging hours at Flight Level 350, Heidi was chasing flight time the scrappy way, by ferrying single-engine Cessnas from the factory in Wichita to California, and then across the Pacific Ocean to Australia and New Zealand. Because nothing says “building time” like a solo ocean crossing in a 182. Heidi will be sharing some of those early-career adventures — including one flight that tested every ounce of skill, nerve, and luck. It is the true story of a ferry flight gone wrong: an engine failure 540 miles east of Hawaii, resulting in a forced ditching in the vast Pacific. She lived to write about it in her book, Ditching the Sky (soon to be turned into a movie), before continuing on to a successful aviation career.
Captain Heidi Porch is a retired G-500 and Delta Air Lines pilot whose 35-year career took her from the flight deck of DC-9s and Airbus jets to the iconic Boeing 747-400.
However, long before she was logging hours at Flight Level 350, Heidi was chasing flight time the scrappy way, by ferrying single-engine Cessnas from the factory in Wichita to California, and then across the Pacific Ocean to Australia and New Zealand. Because nothing says “building time” like a solo ocean crossing in a 182.
She lived to write about it in her book, Ditching the Sky (soon to be turned into a movie), before continuing on to a successful aviation career.
The Fort (in the Pearl Room) 891 SW 34th St Fort Lauderdale, FL 33315 (954) 222-1965 Google Maps Link
