Scam Flight Schools at KVNY (Van Nuys Airport)
Posted by Bubbly-Law10@reddit | flying | View on Reddit | 7 comments
Hey everyone,
I became a CFI about a month ago and wanted to make it clear to new students and other pilots of the flight schools at Van Nuys Airport who make false promises, take students' money, and operate unsafely. Some of these may be a surprise since online they appear to be legit. Hopefully, someone who reads this will be less likely to give these schools their money and time.
Essence Flight School (Formerly Encore):
- Owner (Alex) had his certificates revoked for falsifying student records.
- One of their aircraft has been involved in two separate incidents: a loss of control on landing and a ground collision with another plane.
- One of their aircraft disappeared off the coast of Catalina.
- Multiple lawsuits against them including fraud and wrongful death.
- Has students pay upfront for their whole certificate only to not provide the training and take their money.
- Fake reviews to get to the top of google search history.
Ascent Aviation Academy:
- Advertise in house DPE Seth Lake u/Beechdude on their website when he doesn't live in SoCal, from my understanding (Seth's content is great if you haven't seen it).
- Advertise PPL-MEI in 7-12 months when no one is earning certificates, and they don't even have a multi-engine airplane.
- Advertise as a cadet program partnered school with SkyWest Airlines when they are not.
- Have the most poorly maintained planes on the field.
- Give students free instruction in exchange for a 5-star google review.
- Flight instruction is poor, with instructors only there to milk students for hours.
Flight Schools you SHOULD be flying at KVNY:
- LA Flight Academy
- ActivePilot
- Corsair
Please feel free to add something to this list/ join in on the conversation. It seems the FAA needs to do a better job at the monitoring of flight schools.
EliteEthos@reddit
We know…
This oddly sounds like advertisement for other schools.
I have plenty I could say about Corsair as well…
Bubbly-Law10@reddit (OP)
I'm not affiliated with the recommended schools. What did Corsair do?
Mad_Rooster_7164@reddit
You’re an independent CFI?
UnsophisticatedOlive@reddit
Corsair is terrible, several of my CFI’s and myself call it the evil empire for a reason. Mike, the owner, will attempt to milk you out of money constantly. They have several 150+ hour student pilots there for a reason and Mike will intentionally prolong your training.
Aviators - they had the Pipestrel LSA that crashed and killed the pilot/CFI on the east side of the airfield back in 2022
LA Flight Academy - shot that prank video with one of the 172s a couple years ago and did acrobatics in a non rated aircraft. Lots can be said about them
Encore - no explanation necessary, but one of the PA28s parked on Alpha with their logo on it has been used to film several adult films. Don’t ask me how I know this…
Tbf most of the flight schools at KVNY are just spite schools of former CFIs that started their own thing. At the end of the day they’re just schools in name since all the CFIs are 1099 employees anyway
There are some decent places to train out of KVNY, just gotta know what to look for. And even the “good” places have flaws aswell
CrossBamboAtTen@reddit
Avoid Aviator’s Flight Academy too. I won’t go into the drama of it. Just avoid it.
The owner of ActivePilot is an airline pilot and I’ve flown with him in that setting. Good guy and I’ve only heard good things of his company.
ReadyplayerParzival1@reddit
Yeah, I’ve heard about that school. It probably would have been better to leave off the bit of where you should be flying, it takes away from credibility even if locals know about what that school is doing.
rFlyingTower@reddit
This is a copy of the original post body for posterity:
Hey everyone,
I became a CFI about a month ago and wanted to make it clear to new students and other pilots of the flight schools at Van Nuys Airport who make false promises, take students' money, and operate unsafely. Some of these may be a surprise since online they appear to be legit. Hopefully, someone who reads this will be less likely to give these schools their money and time.
Essence Flight School (Formerly Encore):
Ascent Aviation Academy:
Flight Schools you SHOULD be flying at KVNY:
Please feel free to add something to this list/ join in on the conversation. It seems the FAA needs to do a better job at the monitoring of flight schools.
Please downvote this comment until it collapses.
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