Swayne Martin

Swayne Martin is a famous pilot and YouTuber.

He has more than 200 thousand subscribers on his YouTube channel by the name, Swayne Martin.

Introduction-

Swayne Martin was born on 13 February 1997.

He hails from Richmond, Virginia, United States.

His father Brian was a business school professor.

His mother’s name is Anne Latham.

Swayne has a brother, Everett Martin.

Love for aviation-

Even though his two grandfathers didn’t have an aviation background, they had a great passion for aviation.

They used to take him to air shows and used to build model planes for Swayne and he grew up with these model planes.

Eventually, their interest for aviation rubbed off on Swayne and at a young age, he decided to grow up to become a pilot.

Deciding to become a pilot-

At 15, while studying in high school, Swayne firmly decided to become a pilot.

And he started blogging on his blog by the name, From Private to Professional Pilot (later renamed to Swayne Martin) and started reaching out to many pilots online through emails for guidance.

Even though initially Swayne received little negative feedback, fortunately, he got in contact with two reputable pilot bloggers namely, Petit and Eric and received mentorship from them.

He showed these communications with pilot bloggers to his parents and conveyed to them that he is deeply passionate about becoming a pilot and thanks to this, his parents allowed him to pursue his dream of becoming a pilot.

At 15, Swayne started receiving flight training from a small local flight school.

At 16, he flew his first solo plane and at 17, he got his Private Pilot License.

Education-

Swayne did his schooling from St. Christopher’s School.

After finishing his schooling in 2015, he joined University of North Dakota to study for a four-year bachelor’s degree in Aeronautical Science with a major in Commercial Aviation.

Here, Swayne received professional flight training and he graduated in 2019.

Thanks to this degree, it was sufficient for him to fulfil 1000 flight hours instead of the usual 1,500 flight hours.

Building flight time & working as a First Officer-

Through the flight training program of University of North Dakota, Swayne got around 250 hours of total training time and thanks to this, he got his certificates and ratings.

After around two years of joining the university, he got his Certified Flight Instructor (CFI) certificate.

Swayne along with his friends used to lease airplanes by sharing the cost per hour and he used to fly in them with his mentors, Rod Kellogg and Haley Howard and this also helped him to build flight time.

They helped him to secure the job of a First Officer at Mokulele Airlines in Hawaii.

His Commercial Pilot License and Instrument Rating was enough for him to secure a job at Mokulele Airlines.

Here, Swayne flew Cessna 208 Caravan aircraft inter-island and built most of his flight time.

While working for Mokulele Airlines, he was also studying at university.

Swayne worked for the airlines until July 2018.

He is the first pilot from his family.

No to bush flying & corporate aviation-

Swayne wanted to become a professional pilot from a young age and initially, he wanted to start his career either with bush flying or corporate aviation.

But while studying at college, he decided to become an airline pilot as he was attracted towards the opportunities in this field.

Career-

From June 2015 to August 2016, Swayne worked as a Pilot Intern for Lucky Dog Aviation in Alabama.

From November 2015 to May 2018, he worked as a Student Outreach Coordinator at Student Aviation Advisory Council at University of North Dakota.

From May 2016 to May 2018, Swayne worked as a Social Media Director for Experimental Aircraft Association Chapter 1342.

Then, he worked as a First Officer for Mokulele Airlines from May 2017 to July 2018.

From August 2018 to February 2022, Swayne worked as a First Officer for Envoy Air.

And since March 2022, he is working as a First Officer at United Airlines.

In his career, Swayne flew many aircraft like ERJ145, Cessna 208 Caravan, Boeing 757 and 767 and in 2019, he flew with the United States Air Force Thunderbirds and flew an F-16, thanks to his boyfriend Sam.

He owns Type Ratings for Cessna CE-525, Embraer 145, Boeing 757 and Boeing 767.

Swayne’s favourite cities for layover are Manhattan, Kansas and Cincinnati, Ohio.

Starting his YouTube channel-

Swayne started his YouTube channel by the name, Swayne Martin on 27 February 2013 and started publishing aviation videos on it right away.

He is one of the first aviation YouTubers.

As of June 2022, Swayne has 270K subscribers on his channel and he has 64.8K followers on Instagram.

He delivered a TEDx talk on 6 May 2014.

Swayne blogged about aviation on his blog for a few years but as of now, he is focusing on his YouTube channel.

He uses Bose Proflight Series 2 Aviation headset, Bose QuietComfort 35 II wireless Bluetooth headphones and he shoots his videos with GoPro HERO9.

His business-

While studying at high school, Swayne joined Boldmethod as an aviation freelance writer.

Later, he became a business partner and currently he works as an editor at Boldmethod.

Boldmethod provides aviation and flight training content including software, pilot courses, etc.

Personal life-

Swayne is in a relationship with Sam Eckholm.

Sam works as an Air Force Public Affairs officer at the United States Air Force and he is also a YouTuber.

Swayne is a polyglot as he knows English and French.

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