January 30, 2025 • 37 mins
Captain Beverly Bass was one of the first female pilots for American Airlines. On the morning of 9-11, she was flying her crew and passenger on a 777 from Paris to Dallas when she received the call to land in Gander, Canada. The veteran pilot says she knew something was wrong because a pilot is never given an order to land. She was number 36 of 38 planes that would land there that day. She parked inches from other planes. For 28 hours her crew and passengers stayed on the plane with no cell service or televisions. When they disembarked they realized they were among 7,000 other people sent to this small town. The broadway musical, Come From Away tells the story of Gander through the lens of Bass and her passengers. In this conversation she shares the story of her career and her courage as a leader on that day.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Being a trailblazer isn't easy. It takes grit, courage, and
being a woman. My guest today is all that. As
one of the first female commercial airline pilots, Beverly Bass
was hired by American Airlines as a captain in nineteen
seventy six. Almost twenty three years later, she found herself
flying over the Atlantic. On nine to eleven, she was
(00:21):
forced to land in Gander, Canada, and spent twenty eight
hours on the plane before they would allow her and
her passengers off. The Broadway play Come From Away tells
the story of the six thousand passengers and pilots who
all landed in Gander and features Beverly as a ballsy
trailblazer even in a dark time. She's retired as a
(00:44):
commercial pilot but continues to mentor young women through the
program she co founded, the International Society of Women Airline Pilots.
She joins me now to inspire all of us to
go after what drives us, even when the odds are
not our favor.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Good Bye, We're going live, Going live, bad liveing bing live.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Home.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Captain Beverly Bass, Welcome, Thank you so much for taking
the time today.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
Sure, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
And I see that American Airlines plane behind you, which
you're not flying anymore. You're actually flying private, right, but
you're still flying.
Speaker 3 (01:38):
I'm still flying. I'm flying a much smaller jet that
is privately owned by two individuals. So yes, I'm still
flying full time.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
How many years have you been flying since you got
your pilot's license?
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Well, I got my license in nineteen seventy one, so
fifty three years.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Wow, good for you. How many flights? How many flights
would you say you've piloted?
Speaker 3 (02:01):
I couldn't even begin to guess. I have well over
twenty thousand hours of flight time.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Wow. What goes through your mind ten seconds before takeoff?
Speaker 3 (02:13):
Well, as airline pilots and actually any pilot were very regimented,
and ten seconds before takeoff, what goes through our mind
is we're just making sure that we've completed every single checklist,
We are lined up on the proper runway, and as
we throw those throttles forward, that we have the proper
(02:34):
power settings for the departure that day, for that airplane
and that trip.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
I fly a lot myself. When I get on the plane.
I love when the pilot comes on and has a
little personality and says something. But it also occurs to
me that there still are not that many women pilots.
That's true, even fifty years after you started. What's going on?
Why is that? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (02:59):
When I started we at American there were three of us,
so we represented one half of one percent. Today there
are approximately seven percent who are female pilots. So when
I'm at the airport and I fly all the time
on American and other airlines, I feel like I see
(03:19):
women pilots everywhere on so many airlines. It's just that
it's so different from back when we started forty some
years ago. But our percentages are still quite small, and
we wrestle with that. Our organization, the International Society of
Women Airline Pilots, does a lot. I mean, we've given
(03:43):
over one point four million dollars in scholarship money to
enhance other women abators to come into our field, because
we think it is one of the best jobs.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
In the world.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
And what is it? Why is it that there are
so few women still? I mean, seven percent is a
huge increase, but it's still not where it.
Speaker 3 (04:06):
Could be exactly. And we've discussed that a lot amongst
ourselves and you know, the saying, if you see it,
you can be it. And we feel like so many
people are still in all of the fact that there
are women airline pilots. They say, you know, I've flown
for years and years and years, and I've never walked
(04:27):
on an aeroplane and seen a female pilot. Well, we
just find that hard to believe because we think we've
grown in numbers. But I think a lot of people
think that it's a very difficult job to have and
be married and raise a family. But if you think
about it, it's no different than a flight attendant. Our
(04:49):
schedules are the same, our days off for the same.
As a matter of fact, pilots have probably a little
better schedule. We have more days off. My last ten
years with American I worked nine days a month. How
many working mothers can be home twenty one days a month?
Not many?
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Right, So you say that it's tough in part because
women are not seeing enough other women up there and
saying I can also do that. But when you started,
there were no women above you, and you still did it.
So how did that happen for you?
Speaker 3 (05:27):
I was an honree kid, and nobody was going to
tell me no I was eight years old when I
told my parents that I wanted to be a pilot.
I was the kid who was obsessed with airplanes and
I've just I loved them forever. And I can't tell
you why. Because my father wasn't a pilot. Nobody in
(05:47):
my family flew. I had never seen another female pilot
anywhere at any airport. But I wanted to fly, and really,
I wasn't going to let anything stand in my way.
And I was very lucky because of the timing because
Frontier Airlines hired the very first female pilot in nineteen
(06:08):
seventy three. I started flying getting my licenses and ratings
in nineteen seventy one, so I was becoming very qualified
for the airlines shortly after she was hired. So timing
was very much in my favor. If I was born sooner,
(06:30):
I wouldn't be an airline pilot. It just wouldn't have happened.
So really it was just luck the draw, if you
want to know the true But it did take a
lot of work because you know, men weren't just they
just weren't used to seeing women pilots at the local airport.
It was the only female flight instructor at my airport,
(06:51):
and eventually another one came, but there were two of us.
We were at a huge airport, and she ended up
flying for Pete on us there ultimately Americans.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
So yeah, and how did the men respond to you
once you were a pilot and you had the stripes
and you were I'm going to say, manning that plane,
womaning that plane.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
That's okay, that's okay, I'll still call it a convent.
Once I was hired with American, they were wonderful to
me because I think they knew that, you know, we
had to have the same qualifications to get hired. I mean,
you can't pretend to be a pilot. You can't fake
(07:34):
your way through it. You have to have the ability
to fly that jet. So I think the guys were
respectful of that. And I was with American thirty two
years and I could count on three fingers the times
that the guys were not really nice to me and
very supportive. As a matter of fact, I would probably
(07:56):
tell you it was just the opposite. They honestly put
me on a pedestal. I ended up being the first
female captain instructor at American, which I did for sixteen
years on four jets. So you know, I'm teaching the
guys the new airplane, and honestly, they had ultimate respect
(08:19):
for me, which I always appreciated. And my daughter is
a pilot for American today and she's also in the
training department, and she would tell you the same story.
The guys just treat her fatuus.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
Wow, congratulations, your daughter's a pilot as well. Yes, And
were you okay with that? Were you encouraging her to
do that?
Speaker 3 (08:38):
I never tried to make her do it, because it's
just it's too hard to get there. You have to
have the love of aviation and the desire to do it.
And my daughter was nine years old when nine to
eleven happened, so she saw over the next ten years
how the airlines went out of business. People lost their job.
(09:00):
I took a huge pay cut. You know, things were
not good. Took us ten years to recover from nine
to eleven. So by then she's nineteen years old. Yeah,
she's in college. So she was a pre med student.
And then she graduated from college and kind of got
(09:22):
discouraged with medical profession and said, Mama, think I want
to fly. So the rest is history. She loves it,
absolutely loves it.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Well, speaking of history, you were flying on nine to eleven,
you were en route from Paris to Dallas, and you
got rerouted. Take me through the morning that whole day
of when you took off to what ends up happening.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
We took off from Paris Charlestball Airport INTE to Dallas,
which is usually about a ten hour flight, and it
was an exceptionally beautiful morning. We commented over the North Atlantic,
how clear the skies were, just a beautiful day. And
the copilot and I were sitting there eating lunch, and
we have a frequency on the airplane called air to
(10:12):
air frequency, and it's a frequency that when you are
over an international waters we all monitor it and you're
not in touch with air traffic control. So it's a
frequency where we as pilots communicate with each other, like
we'll say we're not getting a good ride at thirty three,
what is your ride like at thirty five or something
(10:34):
like that, So it's mundane conversation. Somebody came over that
frequency who was ahead of us, they were farther west,
and said that an aircraft that hit the World Trade Center.
So the copilot and I talked about it, and we thought, gosh,
must be like airplane that we knew. The weather was
beautiful in New York. How could that happen?
Speaker 2 (10:56):
And that was it.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
And then about twenty minutes later, that same aircraft came
on the radio and said the second tower has been hit,
and with that came the word terrorism, and I was
just so naive. I was thinking, what does that even
mean terrorism? We don't know that it's an airliner, We
don't know whose airplane it is, we don't know the
(11:19):
airplanes have been hijacked. We really don't know anything. And
then as we proceeded farther west, we came into contact
with Gander Control, which is normal, and they told us
that New York's airspace was closed. Then all of the
US airspace was closing. And when they said all of
(11:40):
the US airspace was closed, we knew then that we
would be diverting somewhere in Canada. And I mean it
was very normal to think that we would go into
a big city like Toronto or Montreal. You know, we're
a big airplane. And they said no land your airplane
(12:01):
immediately in Gander, Newfoundland, which was pretty unusual because airline
pilots don't get orders. If we're going to defert that
airplane that's sitting behind me, we make the decision. The
captain of the airplane makes that decision and coordinates it
with our dispatchers at American Nobody orders us to land,
(12:24):
but they did that day. So we landed in Gander
and parked the airplane and the Canadian officials came on
and said, did you land overweight? And in fact we
did not. We dumped seven thousand pounds of fuel so
that we wouldn't be overweight on our landing. And I said,
(12:45):
thank you so much, because if you land over weight,
it's okay. The airplane can structurally handle it, but you
have to have an inspection done by specifically qualified maintenance people.
And I didn't know how many of those books they
had in Gander. I didn't know how many airplanes that
had landed ahead of me. So I went ahead and
dumped the fuel and landed at my normal landing weight.
(13:09):
We were thirty six out of thirty eight wide bodies
to touch down that day, and they came on the
airplane and said you will not be getting off until tomorrow.
And we landed at about ten ten thirty on nine
to eleven in the morning, and we didn't get off
until about seven thirty in the morning. We'd already flown
(13:30):
seven hours, so heince we were on the airplane twenty
eight hours. So that was our day on nine to eleven.
Speaker 1 (13:38):
Wow, and what were you thinking? What were you how
were you guiding your crew? The passengers? They must have
been getting anxious. Were there televisions? Were the cell phones working?
Speaker 3 (13:50):
Now? You know, very few people had cell phones back then, right,
A few people in first class had them, but you
couldn't charge them. We didn't have the receptacles to charge them.
No TVs, no Wi Fi, none of that. And we
knew very little. I mean, the only information we were
able to get is we could listen to the BBC
(14:13):
radio on our aircraft radio. That that was London's version
of what was happening in the US, you know, so
it was pretty obscure information. And my passengers actually were great.
The airplane holds two hundred and forty seven people. I
only had one hundred and fifty seven on board that day,
so they were able to get up and move around,
(14:35):
and you know, we invited them up to the cockpit
one at a time and everything to try to occupy
the time. The flight attendants had one more meal service,
so they treated that as dinner, passed out blankets, put
movies on, and then that's how we went through the night.
We as the crew, did not sleep all night, obviously,
(14:55):
but again our information that we were able to receive
was very lamented and very sparse. We were getting fragments
of information. We eventually knew before dark that the towers
had fallen. We did know that.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, was anyone telling you hang tight, you're going to
come in, you know, in ten hours, or we'll make
you you know, we'll make room for you and tomorrow
or were you just getting no information.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Not much information other than knowing at ten in the
morning that we were not getting off until the next day.
So it wasn't like you were thinking, gosh, we'll get
off in an hour, maybe fifteen more minutes. It was
actually good to be told that it wasn't until the
next day, because that way we weren't sitting there thinking,
okay when.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
And as a pilot and a leader of all of
those people and crew, how were you personally handling that
you had kids at home, you had a family at home.
How are you handling that?
Speaker 3 (15:59):
You know what I've realized over the years, especially watching
the musical and watching it with my family, is I've
realized that that day was actually much harder on my
family than it was for me, because I had a
job to do. I had a crew to manage, I
(16:19):
had passengers to manage, so I was at work. My
family was not able to talk to me until four
point thirty that afternoon, so they literally went all day.
My husband went to the school to pick the kids
up at you know, eleven in the morning, which is
extremely abnormal. You would never do that. Their schools were
(16:45):
full of airline employees' kids, so they were on lockdown.
And the kids now know that airplanes have been hijacked,
they know whose parents are flying. So it was a
very traumatic day for my family. But I didn't know
that that was happening. I didn't learn that until much later,
(17:07):
years later, years later.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Really, and did you know the pilots that were on
planes or any of the other crew Had you flown
with any of those people before.
Speaker 3 (17:16):
I knew the captain on our airplane that hit the Pentagon.
He and I lived in the same apartment building in
New York early in our career, So yes, I knew him,
but I didn't know anybody else.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
And you didn't know at that time that it was him.
You probably were runt later, right, correct?
Speaker 3 (17:35):
But all of my crew knew somebody on those airplanes. Yeah.
And you know, it doesn't matter whose airplane is in
a situation like that, that whole airline family and community
comes together. We are very close and very connected, so
(17:57):
it doesn't matter what airline is. Even though it was
two American airplanes and two United airplanes, Delta felt it
just the same.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
It's very hard. So you're on the tarmac in Gander,
thirty eight planes not small planes. How close are you
to the plane next to you?
Speaker 3 (18:19):
A foot?
Speaker 1 (18:20):
Really?
Speaker 3 (18:21):
Oh? We are packed in like sardines. When I was
on final approach coming into Gander, because I was so
late in the daisy chain of number thirty six, all
I see are airplanes nose to tail, nose to tail,
nose to tail, and I'm looking going, where am I
(18:42):
going to park this airplane? And they ended up having
to put me over on the general aviation ramp area
because there wasn't any other space and that surface is
not load bearing for an airplane. The size of a
triple seven. And it was unseasonably warm in the days
(19:02):
that we were there five days, and so my airplane
started sinking into the asphalt. And we've gone back to
Gander six times, and they took me out in a
truck and showed me the ruts that are still there
today from my airplane.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
Wow. So eventually you do park it, you land. I
can't even imagine what that was like. You had a
real runway, you had a legit runway.
Speaker 3 (19:27):
Right. The runway is very good in Gander, Okay, as
the US State Department built that airport for the World
War two theater, so it was the last launching place
for all the airplanes that went to fight in World
War Two. So the airport's very nice. The terminal is
not very big.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
Cannot fit the seven thousand people that showed up, for sure.
So the next day comes and you get word that
you're getting off the plane. What happens then when.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
We get off and we look pretty haggard, I must say,
oh my gosh, and we walk into the terminal and
I think this was the first time that I realized
that we had landed in such a unique place. I
didn't know a thing about Candor. I mean, I just
knew it was an emergency airport that if we have
(20:20):
a problem going to Europe, it's one of the airports
that we'll divert into. But I'd certainly never been there.
So we walk into the terminal and there are so
many tables of food. I've never seen anything like it.
Hot food, cold food, fruits, vegetables, it snacks, anything. And
(20:40):
what it told me, because this was early in the morning,
it told me that every stoven gander had been on
all night long because they had literally prepared enough food
where they handed a plastic bag to every passenger and
every crew member and just said go take what you
and you just went around. It was like Halloween. You
(21:02):
just filled up your plastic bag. It was unbelievable. And
then school bus has transported us to where we were going.
And as you saw in the musical, they were actually
on strike at the time that they came off strike
to transport the passengers.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
And where did you end up going?
Speaker 3 (21:25):
My crew and I stayed at the comfort Inn. They
tried to put the crews in the five hundred hotel
rooms that they have in the town because nobody knew
when we were leaving, so they wanted us to be
as rested as possible. But my passengers read the Knight's
Columbus Lunch and we had told them to take the
(21:47):
blankets and pillows off of the airplane. So, yeah, they're
sleeping on the floor at the Night's Columbus Lunch. But
I went over every day and briefed them, even though
I had nothing knew to tell them because there was
no change. And I would take two or three flight
attendants with me because I had the flight attendants speak
(22:08):
the languages of the people that you have on the airplane,
so that writ my interpreters. And they didn't care that
we didn't have anything new to tell them. They wanted
FaceTime with the group, so we made sure to see
them every day.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
Yeah, and at the time, you didn't know how long
you were going to be there, right, had no idea.
You end up being there for five days? And how
do you leave? What happens on day five that suddenly
they say, Captain, you can get out of those little
holes that you put in the ground because your blane
was so heavy and the ground was so warm.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
What ends up happening, Well, it was eleven o'clock at
night on the fourteenth of September, and you know, we're
all getting ready for bed, and the phone rings, and
I was American and they said, get dressed. We want
you at the airport in an hour. So here we are.
(23:05):
We've been up all day, retired, want to go to bed,
but we get dressed in our dress blues. We go
to the airport and we're the only airplane that is leaving.
It took six hours to get just my passengers through
security because the FAA had changed so many of the regulations.
(23:27):
You couldn't have a nail file, you couldn't have nail clippers,
you couldn't have anything. So even though the passengers didn't
have their luggage because it had to remain on the airplane,
whatever carry ons they had, everything had it had, they
had to go through every piece of carry on luggage.
(23:47):
So it took six hours. And now it's you know,
getting close to being daylight. And as you saw the musical,
one of my flight attendants came to me and was
leary about two pass that they were uncomfortable with, and
she said she wasn't going to go. I can't leave
without her. So I'm like, oh my gosh. So I
(24:10):
went and got security. I got head of security in
the RCMP in Canada, and they plucked the two guys
out and they did a strip search. And I had
to be there for that because the only way I
could go back to my flight attendants and legitimately say
(24:32):
we are okay is if I was there. So I
was there, and they ended up being okay, and we
finally took off at about eight thirty that morning, get
to Dallas, and those two passengers were out on the curb,
and I ran up to him and I said, I
(24:52):
am so sorry that that happened. I'm so sorry. And
they looked at me and they said, got under the circumstances,
we fully understand, and don't you worry about a thing.
And they were actually Egyptians and frequent flyers on American
but they were one of the few that had cell phones.
(25:14):
They didn't mingle with the other passengers. They were always
off in a corner. So the passengers were leary. We
were leary of a lot.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Back then, right.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
It was.
Speaker 1 (25:24):
It was a difficult time. No one knew who to trust,
what to trust. It was a tough time. So you
flew back to Dallas, Yes, and how is that when
you finally got home.
Speaker 3 (25:37):
Oh, it was very emotional because between we have two
big term well we had six terminals at DFW, but
between two of them they hunt this huge sign that said, uh,
welcome home. And you know, the rules had changed, no law,
families could no longer come to the gate to meet us.
(25:59):
All of that was different now. So we had to
go through customs and come up the escalator and all
of our families were there. They had flowers and balloons,
and everybody's kids were there. It was emotional for sure.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
Still to this day, you know, twenty five years later,
it brings you right back there.
Speaker 3 (26:22):
It's just hard to believe. And I've seen the show
one hundred and seventy nine times.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
Yes, And my husband to this day cannot get through
the show without crime camped.
Speaker 1 (26:37):
And what part of it? What part of it really
hits you?
Speaker 3 (26:41):
For him, it's the very first part when she rolls
the chair out and says Hello Tom. He loses it
every time because that scene is so realistic and true
and the way that it happened, and so it takes
him right back to that day. It really is.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
And how about for you that I have several parts.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
Obviously, my favorite part is when she sings me in
the sky, because what you have to realize is the
first time I saw the musical, I didn't know that
that song existed. I didn't know that it had been written.
And I'm sitting in the audience listening to my aviation
life in a four minute and sixteen second song, and
(27:33):
I'm like, I mean, I'm like gasping for air. I
didn't know, and so many people think that I was
involved with the writing of the show. I knew nothing
about the show. The first night Tom and I saw
it was the first time I knew anything about them.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
So they never talked to you. No one ever talked
to you, interviewed you.
Speaker 3 (27:52):
Well, yes I was. We went back to Gander for
the tenth anniversary of nine to eleven and I was
interviewed by the playwright for about four hours, and then
we went back to Texas. That was two thousand and eleven,
and I really never thought about it again. And over
the next four years I would maybe get an email
or I guess we texted back then. Yeah, they would
(28:17):
ask me a mundane question, can you clarify this, or
that I have no idea that they've gone into hibernation
for four years. They wrote the music, the lyrics, the show,
they wrote everything, and oh, by the way, they had
a baby for the next four years. So then pass
(28:39):
forward to twenty fifteen. I get a call from the
producers inviting us to the world premiere opening. I come
from Oi in La Joya, and we're like, oh, okay, okay.
So we get on a plane. We would fly to Lahoya.
We have no idea what we're getting to see. And
they talk about putting pins in the math. I mean,
(29:01):
we still have the math with the pens in it.
It was all real, and I think that's what's so
beautiful about the musical is oftentimes people will say, well,
how much that was real? Well, you know what, it
is completely authentic, really, And the only thing I will
tell you about my part that isn't exactly right. But
(29:26):
there's a thing called theater licensing, I guess where they
can alter things a little bit. In the song in
the Sky when she when the other pilots say hey, lady,
hey baby, get me a drink.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
No, didn't happen.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
It did not happen.
Speaker 3 (29:42):
But rather than that, I'm so honored about the way
that I am portrayed you are.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
That's great. I mean, you are such an amazing character,
such a ballsy leader. I mean you just make us
women proud when we watch that. And you know I
I watched it, and that's how we came together today,
is because I watched it and I just said, who
is she? I really wanted to I want to meet
that woman. I mean, you're so inspiring in the show
(30:13):
and then in person, and all that you have done
is just it's really wonderful for women. I mean, forget
about pilots, but for women in general.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
But you know, I didn't start out to do a
hit this. I didn't. I mean I was an only
child and I hunted in the Everglades with my father
on horseback and I the right fle over my shoulder,
and then on Monday morning, I'd be in a fashion
show with my mom.
Speaker 2 (30:38):
So I feel like I.
Speaker 3 (30:39):
Always sort of played both roles, and I always was
kind of a leader. I didn't I wasn't a follower.
I always did things my way, which wasn't always the norm.
But I think that's how I ended up where I
am today.
Speaker 1 (30:59):
Yeah, thank you, Thank you for all that you have done,
and you are continuing to push all that good energy
out to other women. You co founded the International Society
of Women Airline Pilots, So the International Society of Women
Airline Pilots still goes on today.
Speaker 3 (31:18):
Absolutely, Yes.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
And you mentor young female pilots to become pilots. Yeah,
what do you tell them?
Speaker 3 (31:26):
Oh, well, gosh, I tell them what a great career
it is. I tell them it's not easy. It's not
because that would not be true. And every time they
get discouraged, they've got to just pick themselves up and
keep going because the reward at the end is so
worth it.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
Beverly, I have heard you say, don't try to be
a man, be a woman, and I wanted you to
expand on that. What exactly do you mean when you
say that?
Speaker 3 (31:55):
You know, I often say when you're the captain of
an era, it is such a huge role and such responsibility,
and I always say, be the boss without being bossy.
And there's a very fine line about how to manage
what could be chauvinistic guys, because let's face it, a
(32:18):
lot of our pilots are out of the military. They're
very chauvinistic. They're men's men, and they've done things that
a lot of men will never do, flying off of
aircraft carriers, and they've done it all and here I
am this female who is now their instructor. As a
matter of fact, on nine to eleven, the co pilot
(32:42):
was on his first trip in the Triple seventh. I
was training him. That was his training mission. I tried
to assure him, It's not always like that. Wow, But
I've always maintained my femininity. I always thought that was
so important. My nails have always been polished. I've always
tried to have my hair nice. I've always worn makeup.
(33:06):
I've tried to be a girl and what is certainly
a man's job it still is still is. But I've
never lost my feminine and that was important to me,
always has been.
Speaker 1 (33:18):
And it sounds like that is who you are, because
other women may not have their nails done and whatnot,
but they're still I think what you're saying is still
be who you are. Don't try to fit in because
you think it's a man's world and so you've got
to act a certain way. I think what you're saying
is be who you are. And for you, it was
a very feminine woman as a pilot and that's okay,
(33:40):
that's what.
Speaker 3 (33:41):
Worked for you, that's right, But it doesn't mean you
can't still be in charge and very secure in your role.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
As a pilot. Yeah, I love it. Anything I didn't
ask you about that you want to mention or anything
that you want to say before we go, No, I
just I'm just.
Speaker 3 (33:59):
Happy that my daughter continuing the legacy because she's having
the experience of a lifetime and I'm eventually going to
have to live vicariously through her because my job as
a pilot will come to an end soon just because
of my age. So that's hard for me. It's hard
(34:20):
for me to give it up. But I get to
enjoy the experiences now that she that I have passed
the baton to her, and I love that.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
Oh I did have one more question for you. Sure,
is there anything that you say when you get on
the plane and you get onto the you grab the
microphone and you talk to your passengers. What is it
that you say?
Speaker 3 (34:42):
Oh, my gosh. Well, first of all, I haven't done
that a very long time because I don't talk to
the pastors in my small jet. But I always introduced
myself when I made PA's back then, you know, ladies
and gentlemen, this is Captain Bass. And I went on
with my PA. I will tell you that the hardest
PA I ever had to was on nine to eleven
(35:02):
because I had to say what I knew, which wasn't
very much. I didn't want to make up a story.
I didn't want to say, we are landing our airplane
Gander nuplein because we have a mechanical we have a
problem with our left engine oil pressure. I wanted to
tell the truth because I feared that if I didn't
(35:26):
tell the truth I would lose credibility with my passengers
once we got on the ground and I had to
say why we were really in Gander. So my PA
hardest one I've ever made. Ladies and gentlemen, this is
Captain Bass. There's been a crisis in the United States.
We'll be landing our airplane in Gander nupulein and I
(35:47):
will get back to you with more details once we
get on the ground. And I ran that by the
flight attendants before I said it, because remember I'm sitting
behind a locked cockpit door. My flight attendants are with
the passengers, right, So I wrote it down. I said,
are you okay with this? And they said yes and
didn't have any problems, so I said as little as possible.
(36:11):
I did tell them that all of the airspace was closed,
which is why we were diverting to cancer, so and
they handled it very well. My passengers were great.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
I bet a lot of that is because you communicated
very well to them.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
All the time. And that is something that we are
often told as women pilots, that we have a tendency
to communicate very well. I don't want to say better.
Speaker 1 (36:38):
Than the guys.
Speaker 3 (36:39):
Oh let's just say it, but we are often told
that that we are better communicators. Yeah. That segues into
the airplane, right.
Speaker 1 (36:50):
Captain Beverly Bess, thank you so much for your time.
It was such a pleasure to talk to you. You're
such an inspiration, and thank you for connecting all the dots.
That is really fun for me. I enjoyed the show
so much, and I enjoyed your character, and I enjoy
now knowing the real person and and that's really fun.
Thank you so much.
Speaker 3 (37:11):
Well, thank you. I really appreciate you having me on
Being a trailblazer isn't easy. It takes grit, courage, and
being a woman. My guest today is all that. As
one of the first female commercial airline pilots, Beverly Bass
was hired by American Airlines as a captain in nineteen
seventy six. Almost twenty three years later, she found herself
flying over the Atlantic. On nine to eleven, she was
(00:21):
forced to land in Gander, Canada, and spent twenty eight
hours on the plane before they would allow her and
her passengers off. The Broadway play Come From Away tells
the story of the six thousand passengers and pilots who
all landed in Gander and features Beverly as a ballsy
trailblazer even in a dark time. She's retired as a
(00:44):
commercial pilot but continues to mentor young women through the
program she co founded, the International Society of Women Airline Pilots.
She joins me now to inspire all of us to
go after what drives us, even when the odds are
not our favor.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Good Bye, We're going live, Going live, bad liveing bing live.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
Home.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Captain Beverly Bass, Welcome, Thank you so much for taking
the time today.
Speaker 3 (01:27):
Sure, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:29):
And I see that American Airlines plane behind you, which
you're not flying anymore. You're actually flying private, right, but
you're still flying.
Speaker 3 (01:38):
I'm still flying. I'm flying a much smaller jet that
is privately owned by two individuals. So yes, I'm still
flying full time.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
How many years have you been flying since you got
your pilot's license?
Speaker 3 (01:51):
Well, I got my license in nineteen seventy one, so
fifty three years.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Wow, good for you. How many flights? How many flights
would you say you've piloted?
Speaker 3 (02:01):
I couldn't even begin to guess. I have well over
twenty thousand hours of flight time.
Speaker 1 (02:08):
Wow. What goes through your mind ten seconds before takeoff?
Speaker 3 (02:13):
Well, as airline pilots and actually any pilot were very regimented,
and ten seconds before takeoff, what goes through our mind
is we're just making sure that we've completed every single checklist,
We are lined up on the proper runway, and as
we throw those throttles forward, that we have the proper
(02:34):
power settings for the departure that day, for that airplane
and that trip.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
I fly a lot myself. When I get on the plane.
I love when the pilot comes on and has a
little personality and says something. But it also occurs to
me that there still are not that many women pilots.
That's true, even fifty years after you started. What's going on?
Why is that? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (02:59):
When I started we at American there were three of us,
so we represented one half of one percent. Today there
are approximately seven percent who are female pilots. So when
I'm at the airport and I fly all the time
on American and other airlines, I feel like I see
(03:19):
women pilots everywhere on so many airlines. It's just that
it's so different from back when we started forty some
years ago. But our percentages are still quite small, and
we wrestle with that. Our organization, the International Society of
Women Airline Pilots, does a lot. I mean, we've given
(03:43):
over one point four million dollars in scholarship money to
enhance other women abators to come into our field, because
we think it is one of the best jobs.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
In the world.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
And what is it? Why is it that there are
so few women still? I mean, seven percent is a
huge increase, but it's still not where it.
Speaker 3 (04:06):
Could be exactly. And we've discussed that a lot amongst
ourselves and you know, the saying, if you see it,
you can be it. And we feel like so many
people are still in all of the fact that there
are women airline pilots. They say, you know, I've flown
for years and years and years, and I've never walked
(04:27):
on an aeroplane and seen a female pilot. Well, we
just find that hard to believe because we think we've
grown in numbers. But I think a lot of people
think that it's a very difficult job to have and
be married and raise a family. But if you think
about it, it's no different than a flight attendant. Our
(04:49):
schedules are the same, our days off for the same.
As a matter of fact, pilots have probably a little
better schedule. We have more days off. My last ten
years with American I worked nine days a month. How
many working mothers can be home twenty one days a month?
Not many?
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Right, So you say that it's tough in part because
women are not seeing enough other women up there and
saying I can also do that. But when you started,
there were no women above you, and you still did it.
So how did that happen for you?
Speaker 3 (05:27):
I was an honree kid, and nobody was going to
tell me no I was eight years old when I
told my parents that I wanted to be a pilot.
I was the kid who was obsessed with airplanes and
I've just I loved them forever. And I can't tell
you why. Because my father wasn't a pilot. Nobody in
(05:47):
my family flew. I had never seen another female pilot
anywhere at any airport. But I wanted to fly, and really,
I wasn't going to let anything stand in my way.
And I was very lucky because of the timing because
Frontier Airlines hired the very first female pilot in nineteen
(06:08):
seventy three. I started flying getting my licenses and ratings
in nineteen seventy one, so I was becoming very qualified
for the airlines shortly after she was hired. So timing
was very much in my favor. If I was born sooner,
(06:30):
I wouldn't be an airline pilot. It just wouldn't have happened.
So really it was just luck the draw, if you
want to know the true But it did take a
lot of work because you know, men weren't just they
just weren't used to seeing women pilots at the local airport.
It was the only female flight instructor at my airport,
(06:51):
and eventually another one came, but there were two of us.
We were at a huge airport, and she ended up
flying for Pete on us there ultimately Americans.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
So yeah, and how did the men respond to you
once you were a pilot and you had the stripes
and you were I'm going to say, manning that plane,
womaning that plane.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
That's okay, that's okay, I'll still call it a convent.
Once I was hired with American, they were wonderful to
me because I think they knew that, you know, we
had to have the same qualifications to get hired. I mean,
you can't pretend to be a pilot. You can't fake
(07:34):
your way through it. You have to have the ability
to fly that jet. So I think the guys were
respectful of that. And I was with American thirty two
years and I could count on three fingers the times
that the guys were not really nice to me and
very supportive. As a matter of fact, I would probably
(07:56):
tell you it was just the opposite. They honestly put
me on a pedestal. I ended up being the first
female captain instructor at American, which I did for sixteen
years on four jets. So you know, I'm teaching the
guys the new airplane, and honestly, they had ultimate respect
(08:19):
for me, which I always appreciated. And my daughter is
a pilot for American today and she's also in the
training department, and she would tell you the same story.
The guys just treat her fatuus.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
Wow, congratulations, your daughter's a pilot as well. Yes, And
were you okay with that? Were you encouraging her to
do that?
Speaker 3 (08:38):
I never tried to make her do it, because it's
just it's too hard to get there. You have to
have the love of aviation and the desire to do it.
And my daughter was nine years old when nine to
eleven happened, so she saw over the next ten years
how the airlines went out of business. People lost their job.
(09:00):
I took a huge pay cut. You know, things were
not good. Took us ten years to recover from nine
to eleven. So by then she's nineteen years old. Yeah,
she's in college. So she was a pre med student.
And then she graduated from college and kind of got
(09:22):
discouraged with medical profession and said, Mama, think I want
to fly. So the rest is history. She loves it,
absolutely loves it.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Well, speaking of history, you were flying on nine to eleven,
you were en route from Paris to Dallas, and you
got rerouted. Take me through the morning that whole day
of when you took off to what ends up happening.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
We took off from Paris Charlestball Airport INTE to Dallas,
which is usually about a ten hour flight, and it
was an exceptionally beautiful morning. We commented over the North Atlantic,
how clear the skies were, just a beautiful day. And
the copilot and I were sitting there eating lunch, and
we have a frequency on the airplane called air to
(10:12):
air frequency, and it's a frequency that when you are
over an international waters we all monitor it and you're
not in touch with air traffic control. So it's a
frequency where we as pilots communicate with each other, like
we'll say we're not getting a good ride at thirty three,
what is your ride like at thirty five or something
(10:34):
like that, So it's mundane conversation. Somebody came over that
frequency who was ahead of us, they were farther west,
and said that an aircraft that hit the World Trade Center.
So the copilot and I talked about it, and we thought, gosh,
must be like airplane that we knew. The weather was
beautiful in New York. How could that happen?
Speaker 2 (10:56):
And that was it.
Speaker 3 (10:57):
And then about twenty minutes later, that same aircraft came
on the radio and said the second tower has been hit,
and with that came the word terrorism, and I was
just so naive. I was thinking, what does that even
mean terrorism? We don't know that it's an airliner, We
don't know whose airplane it is, we don't know the
(11:19):
airplanes have been hijacked. We really don't know anything. And
then as we proceeded farther west, we came into contact
with Gander Control, which is normal, and they told us
that New York's airspace was closed. Then all of the
US airspace was closing. And when they said all of
(11:40):
the US airspace was closed, we knew then that we
would be diverting somewhere in Canada. And I mean it
was very normal to think that we would go into
a big city like Toronto or Montreal. You know, we're
a big airplane. And they said no land your airplane
(12:01):
immediately in Gander, Newfoundland, which was pretty unusual because airline
pilots don't get orders. If we're going to defert that
airplane that's sitting behind me, we make the decision. The
captain of the airplane makes that decision and coordinates it
with our dispatchers at American Nobody orders us to land,
(12:24):
but they did that day. So we landed in Gander
and parked the airplane and the Canadian officials came on
and said, did you land overweight? And in fact we
did not. We dumped seven thousand pounds of fuel so
that we wouldn't be overweight on our landing. And I said,
(12:45):
thank you so much, because if you land over weight,
it's okay. The airplane can structurally handle it, but you
have to have an inspection done by specifically qualified maintenance people.
And I didn't know how many of those books they
had in Gander. I didn't know how many airplanes that
had landed ahead of me. So I went ahead and
dumped the fuel and landed at my normal landing weight.
(13:09):
We were thirty six out of thirty eight wide bodies
to touch down that day, and they came on the
airplane and said you will not be getting off until tomorrow.
And we landed at about ten ten thirty on nine
to eleven in the morning, and we didn't get off
until about seven thirty in the morning. We'd already flown
(13:30):
seven hours, so heince we were on the airplane twenty
eight hours. So that was our day on nine to eleven.
Speaker 1 (13:38):
Wow, and what were you thinking? What were you how
were you guiding your crew? The passengers? They must have
been getting anxious. Were there televisions? Were the cell phones working?
Speaker 3 (13:50):
Now? You know, very few people had cell phones back then, right,
A few people in first class had them, but you
couldn't charge them. We didn't have the receptacles to charge them.
No TVs, no Wi Fi, none of that. And we
knew very little. I mean, the only information we were
able to get is we could listen to the BBC
(14:13):
radio on our aircraft radio. That that was London's version
of what was happening in the US, you know, so
it was pretty obscure information. And my passengers actually were great.
The airplane holds two hundred and forty seven people. I
only had one hundred and fifty seven on board that day,
so they were able to get up and move around,
(14:35):
and you know, we invited them up to the cockpit
one at a time and everything to try to occupy
the time. The flight attendants had one more meal service,
so they treated that as dinner, passed out blankets, put
movies on, and then that's how we went through the night.
We as the crew, did not sleep all night, obviously,
(14:55):
but again our information that we were able to receive
was very lamented and very sparse. We were getting fragments
of information. We eventually knew before dark that the towers
had fallen. We did know that.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
Yeah, was anyone telling you hang tight, you're going to
come in, you know, in ten hours, or we'll make
you you know, we'll make room for you and tomorrow
or were you just getting no information.
Speaker 3 (15:25):
Not much information other than knowing at ten in the
morning that we were not getting off until the next day.
So it wasn't like you were thinking, gosh, we'll get
off in an hour, maybe fifteen more minutes. It was
actually good to be told that it wasn't until the
next day, because that way we weren't sitting there thinking,
okay when.
Speaker 1 (15:47):
And as a pilot and a leader of all of
those people and crew, how were you personally handling that
you had kids at home, you had a family at home.
How are you handling that?
Speaker 3 (15:59):
You know what I've realized over the years, especially watching
the musical and watching it with my family, is I've
realized that that day was actually much harder on my
family than it was for me, because I had a
job to do. I had a crew to manage, I
(16:19):
had passengers to manage, so I was at work. My
family was not able to talk to me until four
point thirty that afternoon, so they literally went all day.
My husband went to the school to pick the kids
up at you know, eleven in the morning, which is
extremely abnormal. You would never do that. Their schools were
(16:45):
full of airline employees' kids, so they were on lockdown.
And the kids now know that airplanes have been hijacked,
they know whose parents are flying. So it was a
very traumatic day for my family. But I didn't know
that that was happening. I didn't learn that until much later,
(17:07):
years later, years later.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Really, and did you know the pilots that were on
planes or any of the other crew Had you flown
with any of those people before.
Speaker 3 (17:16):
I knew the captain on our airplane that hit the Pentagon.
He and I lived in the same apartment building in
New York early in our career, So yes, I knew him,
but I didn't know anybody else.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
And you didn't know at that time that it was him.
You probably were runt later, right, correct?
Speaker 3 (17:35):
But all of my crew knew somebody on those airplanes. Yeah.
And you know, it doesn't matter whose airplane is in
a situation like that, that whole airline family and community
comes together. We are very close and very connected, so
(17:57):
it doesn't matter what airline is. Even though it was
two American airplanes and two United airplanes, Delta felt it
just the same.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
It's very hard. So you're on the tarmac in Gander,
thirty eight planes not small planes. How close are you
to the plane next to you?
Speaker 3 (18:19):
A foot?
Speaker 1 (18:20):
Really?
Speaker 3 (18:21):
Oh? We are packed in like sardines. When I was
on final approach coming into Gander, because I was so
late in the daisy chain of number thirty six, all
I see are airplanes nose to tail, nose to tail,
nose to tail, and I'm looking going, where am I
(18:42):
going to park this airplane? And they ended up having
to put me over on the general aviation ramp area
because there wasn't any other space and that surface is
not load bearing for an airplane. The size of a
triple seven. And it was unseasonably warm in the days
(19:02):
that we were there five days, and so my airplane
started sinking into the asphalt. And we've gone back to
Gander six times, and they took me out in a
truck and showed me the ruts that are still there
today from my airplane.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
Wow. So eventually you do park it, you land. I
can't even imagine what that was like. You had a
real runway, you had a legit runway.
Speaker 3 (19:27):
Right. The runway is very good in Gander, Okay, as
the US State Department built that airport for the World
War two theater, so it was the last launching place
for all the airplanes that went to fight in World
War Two. So the airport's very nice. The terminal is
not very big.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
Cannot fit the seven thousand people that showed up, for sure.
So the next day comes and you get word that
you're getting off the plane. What happens then when.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
We get off and we look pretty haggard, I must say,
oh my gosh, and we walk into the terminal and
I think this was the first time that I realized
that we had landed in such a unique place. I
didn't know a thing about Candor. I mean, I just
knew it was an emergency airport that if we have
(20:20):
a problem going to Europe, it's one of the airports
that we'll divert into. But I'd certainly never been there.
So we walk into the terminal and there are so
many tables of food. I've never seen anything like it.
Hot food, cold food, fruits, vegetables, it snacks, anything. And
(20:40):
what it told me, because this was early in the morning,
it told me that every stoven gander had been on
all night long because they had literally prepared enough food
where they handed a plastic bag to every passenger and
every crew member and just said go take what you
and you just went around. It was like Halloween. You
(21:02):
just filled up your plastic bag. It was unbelievable. And
then school bus has transported us to where we were going.
And as you saw in the musical, they were actually
on strike at the time that they came off strike
to transport the passengers.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
And where did you end up going?
Speaker 3 (21:25):
My crew and I stayed at the comfort Inn. They
tried to put the crews in the five hundred hotel
rooms that they have in the town because nobody knew
when we were leaving, so they wanted us to be
as rested as possible. But my passengers read the Knight's
Columbus Lunch and we had told them to take the
(21:47):
blankets and pillows off of the airplane. So, yeah, they're
sleeping on the floor at the Night's Columbus Lunch. But
I went over every day and briefed them, even though
I had nothing knew to tell them because there was
no change. And I would take two or three flight
attendants with me because I had the flight attendants speak
(22:08):
the languages of the people that you have on the airplane,
so that writ my interpreters. And they didn't care that
we didn't have anything new to tell them. They wanted
FaceTime with the group, so we made sure to see
them every day.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
Yeah, and at the time, you didn't know how long
you were going to be there, right, had no idea.
You end up being there for five days? And how
do you leave? What happens on day five that suddenly
they say, Captain, you can get out of those little
holes that you put in the ground because your blane
was so heavy and the ground was so warm.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
What ends up happening, Well, it was eleven o'clock at
night on the fourteenth of September, and you know, we're
all getting ready for bed, and the phone rings, and
I was American and they said, get dressed. We want
you at the airport in an hour. So here we are.
(23:05):
We've been up all day, retired, want to go to bed,
but we get dressed in our dress blues. We go
to the airport and we're the only airplane that is leaving.
It took six hours to get just my passengers through
security because the FAA had changed so many of the regulations.
(23:27):
You couldn't have a nail file, you couldn't have nail clippers,
you couldn't have anything. So even though the passengers didn't
have their luggage because it had to remain on the airplane,
whatever carry ons they had, everything had it had, they
had to go through every piece of carry on luggage.
(23:47):
So it took six hours. And now it's you know,
getting close to being daylight. And as you saw the musical,
one of my flight attendants came to me and was
leary about two pass that they were uncomfortable with, and
she said she wasn't going to go. I can't leave
without her. So I'm like, oh my gosh. So I
(24:10):
went and got security. I got head of security in
the RCMP in Canada, and they plucked the two guys
out and they did a strip search. And I had
to be there for that because the only way I
could go back to my flight attendants and legitimately say
(24:32):
we are okay is if I was there. So I
was there, and they ended up being okay, and we
finally took off at about eight thirty that morning, get
to Dallas, and those two passengers were out on the curb,
and I ran up to him and I said, I
(24:52):
am so sorry that that happened. I'm so sorry. And
they looked at me and they said, got under the circumstances,
we fully understand, and don't you worry about a thing.
And they were actually Egyptians and frequent flyers on American
but they were one of the few that had cell phones.
(25:14):
They didn't mingle with the other passengers. They were always
off in a corner. So the passengers were leary. We
were leary of a lot.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Back then, right.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
It was.
Speaker 1 (25:24):
It was a difficult time. No one knew who to trust,
what to trust. It was a tough time. So you
flew back to Dallas, Yes, and how is that when
you finally got home.
Speaker 3 (25:37):
Oh, it was very emotional because between we have two
big term well we had six terminals at DFW, but
between two of them they hunt this huge sign that said, uh,
welcome home. And you know, the rules had changed, no law,
families could no longer come to the gate to meet us.
(25:59):
All of that was different now. So we had to
go through customs and come up the escalator and all
of our families were there. They had flowers and balloons,
and everybody's kids were there. It was emotional for sure.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
Still to this day, you know, twenty five years later,
it brings you right back there.
Speaker 3 (26:22):
It's just hard to believe. And I've seen the show
one hundred and seventy nine times.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
Yes, And my husband to this day cannot get through
the show without crime camped.
Speaker 1 (26:37):
And what part of it? What part of it really
hits you?
Speaker 3 (26:41):
For him, it's the very first part when she rolls
the chair out and says Hello Tom. He loses it
every time because that scene is so realistic and true
and the way that it happened, and so it takes
him right back to that day. It really is.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
And how about for you that I have several parts.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
Obviously, my favorite part is when she sings me in
the sky, because what you have to realize is the
first time I saw the musical, I didn't know that
that song existed. I didn't know that it had been written.
And I'm sitting in the audience listening to my aviation
life in a four minute and sixteen second song, and
(27:33):
I'm like, I mean, I'm like gasping for air. I
didn't know, and so many people think that I was
involved with the writing of the show. I knew nothing
about the show. The first night Tom and I saw
it was the first time I knew anything about them.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
So they never talked to you. No one ever talked
to you, interviewed you.
Speaker 3 (27:52):
Well, yes I was. We went back to Gander for
the tenth anniversary of nine to eleven and I was
interviewed by the playwright for about four hours, and then
we went back to Texas. That was two thousand and eleven,
and I really never thought about it again. And over
the next four years I would maybe get an email
or I guess we texted back then. Yeah, they would
(28:17):
ask me a mundane question, can you clarify this, or
that I have no idea that they've gone into hibernation
for four years. They wrote the music, the lyrics, the show,
they wrote everything, and oh, by the way, they had
a baby for the next four years. So then pass
(28:39):
forward to twenty fifteen. I get a call from the
producers inviting us to the world premiere opening. I come
from Oi in La Joya, and we're like, oh, okay, okay.
So we get on a plane. We would fly to Lahoya.
We have no idea what we're getting to see. And
they talk about putting pins in the math. I mean,
(29:01):
we still have the math with the pens in it.
It was all real, and I think that's what's so
beautiful about the musical is oftentimes people will say, well,
how much that was real? Well, you know what, it
is completely authentic, really, And the only thing I will
tell you about my part that isn't exactly right. But
(29:26):
there's a thing called theater licensing, I guess where they
can alter things a little bit. In the song in
the Sky when she when the other pilots say hey, lady,
hey baby, get me a drink.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
No, didn't happen.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
It did not happen.
Speaker 3 (29:42):
But rather than that, I'm so honored about the way
that I am portrayed you are.
Speaker 1 (29:50):
That's great. I mean, you are such an amazing character,
such a ballsy leader. I mean you just make us
women proud when we watch that. And you know I
I watched it, and that's how we came together today,
is because I watched it and I just said, who
is she? I really wanted to I want to meet
that woman. I mean, you're so inspiring in the show
(30:13):
and then in person, and all that you have done
is just it's really wonderful for women. I mean, forget
about pilots, but for women in general.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
But you know, I didn't start out to do a
hit this. I didn't. I mean I was an only
child and I hunted in the Everglades with my father
on horseback and I the right fle over my shoulder,
and then on Monday morning, I'd be in a fashion
show with my mom.
Speaker 2 (30:38):
So I feel like I.
Speaker 3 (30:39):
Always sort of played both roles, and I always was
kind of a leader. I didn't I wasn't a follower.
I always did things my way, which wasn't always the norm.
But I think that's how I ended up where I
am today.
Speaker 1 (30:59):
Yeah, thank you, Thank you for all that you have done,
and you are continuing to push all that good energy
out to other women. You co founded the International Society
of Women Airline Pilots, So the International Society of Women
Airline Pilots still goes on today.
Speaker 3 (31:18):
Absolutely, Yes.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
And you mentor young female pilots to become pilots. Yeah,
what do you tell them?
Speaker 3 (31:26):
Oh, well, gosh, I tell them what a great career
it is. I tell them it's not easy. It's not
because that would not be true. And every time they
get discouraged, they've got to just pick themselves up and
keep going because the reward at the end is so
worth it.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
Beverly, I have heard you say, don't try to be
a man, be a woman, and I wanted you to
expand on that. What exactly do you mean when you
say that?
Speaker 3 (31:55):
You know, I often say when you're the captain of
an era, it is such a huge role and such responsibility,
and I always say, be the boss without being bossy.
And there's a very fine line about how to manage
what could be chauvinistic guys, because let's face it, a
(32:18):
lot of our pilots are out of the military. They're
very chauvinistic. They're men's men, and they've done things that
a lot of men will never do, flying off of
aircraft carriers, and they've done it all and here I
am this female who is now their instructor. As a
matter of fact, on nine to eleven, the co pilot
(32:42):
was on his first trip in the Triple seventh. I
was training him. That was his training mission. I tried
to assure him, It's not always like that. Wow, But
I've always maintained my femininity. I always thought that was
so important. My nails have always been polished. I've always
tried to have my hair nice. I've always worn makeup.
(33:06):
I've tried to be a girl and what is certainly
a man's job it still is still is. But I've
never lost my feminine and that was important to me,
always has been.
Speaker 1 (33:18):
And it sounds like that is who you are, because
other women may not have their nails done and whatnot,
but they're still I think what you're saying is still
be who you are. Don't try to fit in because
you think it's a man's world and so you've got
to act a certain way. I think what you're saying
is be who you are. And for you, it was
a very feminine woman as a pilot and that's okay,
(33:40):
that's what.
Speaker 3 (33:41):
Worked for you, that's right, But it doesn't mean you
can't still be in charge and very secure in your role.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
As a pilot. Yeah, I love it. Anything I didn't
ask you about that you want to mention or anything
that you want to say before we go, No, I
just I'm just.
Speaker 3 (33:59):
Happy that my daughter continuing the legacy because she's having
the experience of a lifetime and I'm eventually going to
have to live vicariously through her because my job as
a pilot will come to an end soon just because
of my age. So that's hard for me. It's hard
(34:20):
for me to give it up. But I get to
enjoy the experiences now that she that I have passed
the baton to her, and I love that.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
Oh I did have one more question for you. Sure,
is there anything that you say when you get on
the plane and you get onto the you grab the
microphone and you talk to your passengers. What is it
that you say?
Speaker 3 (34:42):
Oh, my gosh. Well, first of all, I haven't done
that a very long time because I don't talk to
the pastors in my small jet. But I always introduced
myself when I made PA's back then, you know, ladies
and gentlemen, this is Captain Bass. And I went on
with my PA. I will tell you that the hardest
PA I ever had to was on nine to eleven
(35:02):
because I had to say what I knew, which wasn't
very much. I didn't want to make up a story.
I didn't want to say, we are landing our airplane
Gander nuplein because we have a mechanical we have a
problem with our left engine oil pressure. I wanted to
tell the truth because I feared that if I didn't
(35:26):
tell the truth I would lose credibility with my passengers
once we got on the ground and I had to
say why we were really in Gander. So my PA
hardest one I've ever made. Ladies and gentlemen, this is
Captain Bass. There's been a crisis in the United States.
We'll be landing our airplane in Gander nupulein and I
(35:47):
will get back to you with more details once we
get on the ground. And I ran that by the
flight attendants before I said it, because remember I'm sitting
behind a locked cockpit door. My flight attendants are with
the passengers, right, So I wrote it down. I said,
are you okay with this? And they said yes and
didn't have any problems, so I said as little as possible.
(36:11):
I did tell them that all of the airspace was closed,
which is why we were diverting to cancer, so and
they handled it very well. My passengers were great.
Speaker 1 (36:20):
I bet a lot of that is because you communicated
very well to them.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
All the time. And that is something that we are
often told as women pilots, that we have a tendency
to communicate very well. I don't want to say better.
Speaker 1 (36:38):
Than the guys.
Speaker 3 (36:39):
Oh let's just say it, but we are often told
that that we are better communicators. Yeah. That segues into
the airplane, right.
Speaker 1 (36:50):
Captain Beverly Bess, thank you so much for your time.
It was such a pleasure to talk to you. You're
such an inspiration, and thank you for connecting all the dots.
That is really fun for me. I enjoyed the show
so much, and I enjoyed your character, and I enjoy
now knowing the real person and and that's really fun.
Thank you so much.
Speaker 3 (37:11):
Well, thank you. I really appreciate you having me on
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