Meet the Contributors

LEE BENSON is a retired senior pilot for the Los Angeles County Fire Dept. Lee ran the aviation section’s safety and training programs before he became senior pilot. He writes about the "brotherhood of dedicated helicopter crews" for this issue of R&W.

KEITH CIANFRANI contributes this month’s "Safety Watch" column. A retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel, master aviator, and Army instructor pilot, he is rated in both fixed- and rotary-wing. While at the U.S. Army Safety Center, he was an advisor to the director of Army safety and served as an aviation safety officer and accident investigator. He authored many aviation safety articles in the center’s Flight Fax magazine. He holds a master’s in aerospace safety from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. Keith is a certificated flight instructor and has flown commercial aircraft for more than 20 years in and around the New York City area. A risk-management instructor, he teaches at Drexel University and at The Philadelphia Military Academy at Elverson.

STEVE "ELROY" COLBY, Lt Col, USAF (ret) started his helicopter career 28 years ago as a USAF helicopter mechanic. After attending college and AFROTC he went to helicopter flight school and flew in various positions in the USAF flying UH-1N, HH-1H, MH-60G, HH-60G, AH-6, MI-8, and MI-24 helicopters. He is dual rated fixed- and rotary-wing and a CFI. He also holds an A&P. Steve was both a panelist and judge for this year’s Search and Rescue Summit.

GIOVANNI DE BRIGANTI has covered the aerospace and defense industry since the beginning. Born in Italy, he lived in Texas, Virginia and South Australia before settling in Paris. He is currently editor-in-chief of www.defense-aerospace.com, a news Web site, having previously worked for Defense News, Armed Forces Journal and various European defense publications, including two that he founded. A self-avowed total helicopter person, he has been covering European issues for Rotor & Wing since the mid-1980s. This issue he covers operations in the Middle East.

RION HALEY is R&W’s managing editor. She spent more than 20 years working in print and television as a writer and producer. Before coming to us, she spent a year as managing editor of our sister publication, Aviation Maintenance.

TIM MCADAMS holds an ATP and CFI for rotorcraft and an ATP for airplane multi engine land with two type ratings. He has a total of more than 10,000 hr flying various missions from EMS to corporate. McAdams writes a new column for R&W, "Accident Watch."

TYRONE MILLARD is currently assigned to the FAA Rotorcraft Standards Staff as the FAA project manager responsible for establishing and administering rotorcraft certification and continued operational safety policy for restricted category and surplus military helicopters. His career spans more than 26 years of FAA engineering and manufacturing inspection certification experience associated with the type, production and airworthiness certification of helicopters. Millard began his aviation career as a contract aerospace structures engineer on NASA’s STS-2 space shuttle program. He is an aerospace engineering graduate from the University of Texas in Austin.