Capt Gordon Scott - a Sunstate Legend!
In a career spanning close to four decades, Captain Gordon Scott has accumulated over 25,000 hours in the air. A wonderful mentor to so many pilots, Gordon will be very much missed by his colleagues in Qantaslink (particularly the Sunnies Nth Qld base in Cairns xxx). Hopefully retirement will give him time to go for a blast with the Mareeba Warbirds. You might be able to catch him doing a demo at the next Airshow west of Cairns. And if he gets desperate for an aviation fix I’m sure his talented daughter, Sally, the CFI of the Nth Qld Aero Club, will let him loose in the Cairns circuit.
When I first joined the company Gordon was the fleet manager for the Twin Otter, a mighty little 18 seat aircraft we operated out to the resort islands off the Queensland coast. He successfully steered me, and many others, through our initiation into multi-crew airline operations. His quiet humour and ability to listen to people (and to actually hear what they really meant) ensured we all lined up for some of his wisdom.
I can remember a young male First Officer asking me wistfully how come Gordon (‘an old bloke’) was the only pilot in the base who got a welcoming kiss from the female staff (both cabin crew and tech crew!) I tried to explain it was because he took a personal interest in each and every staff member. When he asked you a question about how your weekend had been, he was genuinely interested in the reply. Weeks later he would refer to that conversation. It’s a skill that can be learnt, but with Gordon it was innate and a measure of his ability as a manager to care for his crews. Crew members, both past and current, turned out to farewell him on Sunday at a barbeque at Trinity Beach.
Nat and Dickster - The walking wounded
Richard (Capt Dicksta) made a surprise appearance looking amazingly good for someone who’s tried head butting a jetski while it was traveling at full speed… Fantastic to see him looking so well despite the wired jaw. Hell of a way to give up smoking though…
And the lovely Nats was sporting a broken arm from beating her boxing coach. That’s how tough we expect our cabin crew to be!!!
