That rang true with him after 16 years’ experience flying American Airlines MD-80s.
A pilot “could do badly and no one would know unless there is a tragedy,” he said. “I’m proud to be a part of a profession that requires us to do the right thing when no one is looking.”
  
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“When I was flying, it meant everything — my life, my passion, something I was good at and proud of,” she said. “I’m still a pilot (but) I’ve filled my life with other passions” like appearing in local theater with Kennedy.
She’d grown up around flying: her father is a retired United Airlines pilot and she “used to play dress-up” in her stepmother’s stewardess outfit in the early 1960s.
When United Airlines hired its first woman pilot in 1977, her father suggested she go for it. She got her commercial instrument instructor’s and private pilot’s license in 1978.
Kennedy loves to tell how his father discovered aviation: Considering his future, Larkspur native John thought of law – until he visited a courtroom and found it boring. As he left the courthouse, he looked up to see a jet roar overhead. Enthralled, he enrolled at the Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and got his private license in 1975.
Both Ginger and John Cutter recall their first flights.
Ginger had “the kindest, best flight instructor” named Wheat — whimsically nicknamed “Buck” – who told her to just take off.
“I did it, gingerly,” she said, giggling. But as the plane nosed up, her life touched down. “That first flight, I thought, this is what I want to do with the rest of my life.”
John felt the same: “It is magical that we could use machines to get so high and go so fast.”
They worked through licensing levels – private, commercial, instructor, multi-engine, instructor for all those classes; flying by instruments (required in foggy situations,) Airline Transport Pilot which Ginger called “the Holy Grail” and flight engineer.
And both logged time. Ginger flew turbo-props, the 100-seat British Aerospace 146 and U.S. Geological Survey six-seat “sniffer flights” sampling the air over Mount St. Helens after its 1980 eruption. “We always, always had a landing spot picked, in case the mountain blew,” she said.
Toward women in cockpits, “most of the time, people were very welcoming.” Harassment was quickly resolved in-house, she said. And there were light moments: Ginger piloted an early-morning business flight to Los Angeles when she cheerfully told passengers they were making history on a flight with one of PSA’s first all-female crews.
She and her co-pilot “could see all the heads of the men looking back. So I said, ‘If you want off, get off now.’ Everybody laughed.”
John left Embry-Riddle to fly Bahamas-bound gamblers in older, 44-seat, piston-prop Convair 240s. “For a 20-year-old, that was a learning experience,” he said.
When he left Convair, he worked unrelated jobs and as a charter and traffic-watch pilot until American hired him.
At least half of commercial pilots are married to other aviators, the pair estimate. “It’s wonderful to talk to someone who understands what I’m doing,” said John. “It’s who you meet,” said Ginger.
Her world changed abruptly on Oct. 19, 1992, with a diagnosis of Type 1 diabetes. Following a 1956 ruling, the FAA does not issue licenses to anyone taking insulin, fearing a hypoglycemic reaction.
“I think I burst into tears,” she said. “It was a crushing blow.”
While coming to terms with it, she contacted other pilots with diabetes. They brought about changes in FAA rulings that permitted them to fly small planes, though not for hire. She began volunteering, married John and spent time with their son. “I’m sad that I lost (the job,) but really happy that I didn’t have to make the decision of my son going to day care,” she said wistfully.
Another unpleasant jolt came early Sept. 11, 2001, when a friend called Ginger to worriedly ask if John was flying. Both Cutters watched the day unfold on TV — upset that United and American airlines jets hit the World Trade Center — and reflecting on what might have been.
“I had a lot of frustration that no one listened to pilots’ voices screaming for 10 to 15 years for reinforced cockpit doors,” he said.
Among the changes brought by that dark day are increased security measures that treat every passenger is a potential suspect.
“It’s sad,” said Ginger.
Her husband turns to wry, dark humor. “They’re frisking me (in front of) the passengers, to ensure that I’m not able to slit my own throat to gain control of a plane I’m already flying, into a building anywhere I want, any time I want,” he growled.
Their mood doesn’t lighten when they ponder the airline industry today. Pay cuts, fewer benefits, less vacation and sick time and short-term fatigue are taking a toll on the quality of the next generation of pilots, said John. “Instead of scraping the cream off the top of the pool of candidates, they’ll be forced to take a great percentage of wanna-bes.
“I don’t recommend that my son take up flying as a career,” he said.
That’s fine with Kennedy. Though he’s been “in the pilot’s seat a few times” with his dad in private planes, he sees himself in the kitchen, not the cockpit. He dreams of culinary school, to focus on breakfasts and pastries, with maybe a side career in theater.
John brightens when discussing aviation’s positive side: What many people don’t know, he said, is that pilots “give back” by volunteering in the field. Ginger chose the scheduling committee and John, the union safety committee.
With that, recently, he made a detailed assessment of options for navigating safely out of Reno, a city located in a mountainous “bowl” at 4,000 feet where there is less oxygen, which means less power for engines.
“Before each takeoff, we talk with each other about the normal departure course” and mentally prepare for the course, he noted.
The pilot’s seat is what the Cutters recommend for anyone with fear of flying, because that’s where you learn the reasons for those sudden, spooky bumps and squeaks. “If they’d take lessons, they would probably lose a lot of that fear,” said John.
Despite economics or post-Sept. 11 doldrums, John still finds joy in flight. When he lands a plane, “I see people go into the waiting arms of loved ones. That gives us (pilots) a good feeling,” he said. “What we do with our hands reunites people.”
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