Williamsburg woman reaches aviation pinnacle

WILLIAMSBURG — The Airline Transport Pilot certification is the pinnacle of pilot’s licensing, said pilot Dennis Oliver, and his neighbor and protege Kelsi Cox has reached that height.

“I had to go down to Dallas for a week of training there,” Cox said Friday. She completed class work in Iowa County and took her final training at Classic Aviation in Pella.

“So I have my license now,” said Cox.

“I could go to the airliners if I wanted to, or fly corporate or business jets,” Cox said. “But I do have a baby coming in December.”

She and her husband, Colin have a son, Lee, and with a second child on the way, Cox isn’t sure when she’ll get to use her new license. But it’ll keep.

“It’s just like any license,” Cox said. “For any FAA license, in order to keep it, you have to do a biennial review.” She’ll have to renew the license every two years, but it’ll be good for her lifetime, she said.

“It’s the highest rating in the FFA. The hardest and highest, so very exciting,” said Cox. “Yes, it was tough, but [I] kept at it, and it became easier. It’s just like a sport — practice makes it better.”

Cox received an Airline Transport Pilot-Certification Training Program scholarship from Iowa Business Aviation Association and International Flight Safety earlier this year to pay for her ATP training. She was hoping to complete the training in a year, but she finished in half that time.

Cox earned her private pilot’s license in 2017. She became a flight instructor in February of 2019.

It’s not an easy business because of insurance costs, said Cox in May. Most of her instruction was given in the students’ planes, she said. That way the student has the burden of providing the insurance.

  Buy Photo

Cox owns a little red and white, two-seater Bellanca Decathalon which she purchased from Oliver. She’s not using it for business right now, she said. It’s just a hobby.

“It’s fun,” said Cox in May. The plane is built for aerobatics. “You can take off pretty fast.”

Cox likes the inverted fuel and oil systems in the Decathalon. “You can fly upside down and the engine won’t quit,” she said. And she does like to fly upside-down sometimes.

Oliver bought the plane new in 1975. The Decathalon is built for stresses between +6g and -4g, said Oliver. “This is built stronger than commercial planes.”

Oliver introduced Cox to flying when she was in high school. He provides the runway and the hanger for the Decathalon.

Cox grew up in South English and is a graduate of Williamsburg High School. She had intended to become a veterinarian. She graduated from Iowa State University in Ames with an animal science degree.

While in graduate school, writing a thesis for a master’s degree in biomedical sciences, Cox was taking flying lessons. She earned her license from Hap’s Air Service at the Ames Municipal Airport.

Cox had some instrument training in Cedar Rapids and got her commercial license in Iowa City. She received advanced ground training in Waterloo.

Cox and her husband Colin have a farm on which they raise horses, cattle and some exotic animals such as llamas and alpacas.