Beverly Lynn Burns
| Beverly Lynn Burns | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
August 15, 1949 Baltimore, Maryland, USA |
| Occupation | Retired Continental Airlines captain |
| Known for | First woman in the world to captain the Boeing 747 jumbo jet. |
| Spouse(s) | Captain Robert Allen Burns, Flight Instructor of Year, 1972 |
| Parent(s) | Milton & Marilyn Grodnitzky |
Captain Beverly Lynn Burns is the first woman to captain the Boeing 747 jumbo jet. On the afternoon of July 18, 1984, Burns made her maiden voyage as Captain when she commanded People Express aircraft 604 from Newark International Airport to Los Angeles International Airport.
By the time she retired, in February 2008, she had been a captain with the airlines for twenty-seven years and amassed over twenty-five thousand hours of flight time. While with People Express she captained the Boeing 727, Boeing 737 and Boeing 747. Between 1987, when the company merged with Continental Airlines, and 2000, she added the DC-9, DC-10, Boeing 757 and Boeing 767 to the list of jetliners she had captained. Then, in May 2001, Burns became captain on one of the most technologically sophisticated airliners of its time, the Boeing 777.
In addition to her qualifications on the flight deck, Burns had acquired an understanding of the airlines as a business. From 1971 to 1978, she worked as stewardess for American Airlines while attending flight school. In 1978, she held positions as a flight instructor and charter pilot for Hinson Airways. The following year, she flew as captain for Allegheny Commuter until 1981, when she went to work for People Express.
While with People Express, Burns had a number of non-traditional duties. She worked in reservations; in scheduling; and as a gate agent, baggage handler, and avionics trainer. Varying the duties of pilots — an operating approach novel to the industry in the early 1980s — required the company's CEO to obtain special FAA authorization, an action that facilitated a number of firsts in the industry. For Burns it meant becoming the first woman to ever work as a certified aircraft dispatcher while performing duties as a line captain.
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Wikipedia