A short YouTube video (Coffee with Kenny) in which pilot/instructor Kenny Keller reflects on feeling unwell and urges pilots—especially students and flight instructors—to cancel flights when sick. He shares personal anecdotes about fatigue, contagion risk, and the impact of illness on decision-making and training schedules, emphasizing rest over medicating and the pilot-in-command responsibility to decline flying if not fit.
Chapters
Man, this is a video I'm going to try to get through without too many mistakes, get right to it so I can just upload this thing. And I want to talk about today. I don't really feel like making a video. Not because I don't love making videos. That's what I do. And I've been doing for 10 years. Today I don't feel good. And I'm an energetic person. I almost never get sick. Today I just don't feel good. And I want to talk about flying when you don't feel good. You know, as parents, we tell our kids if you don't have a fever and you're not throwing up, you're going to school as a law enforcement officer. The chief said if you call in sick, I better find you that you're halfway on your deathbed. You know, a lot of us get put in those scenarios in life where, you know, you just because you don't feel good go anyway, right? Flying is different. And I'm on my second cup of coffee and I barely even make it through the, through the second one. And you know how I am about coffee, right? I normally get up every morning kind of drug or tired and sluggish. And today, man, it's just like the first cup coffee went cold. And I was just sitting there going, man, do I want to make a video. And I thought, you know what, make the video and talk about not flying when you don't feel good. Okay. Just feels like a 24 hour bug or something. I'm tired. Yesterday, after the Coffee with Kenny video, I just started feeling kind of funny. Ended up sleeping half the day and all night just not feeling good. And I thought, hopefully I'll get up today feeling better. And it makes me think about, you know, let's say in the EMS environment when you have a job and you call in sick, you're shutting down a whole base for an entire day. Or in my case, you know, this week I had a student drive four hours to come fly with me. Luckily, he went home two days ago. Next week I have a student coming in from out of town. If I had a student there waiting for me, I'd sure hate. And they travel a long way to come see me. Do I want to turn that person down or do I want to tell them, oh, sorry, I'm not coming today, I don't feel good. You know, on one hand it makes you, makes you sound like being a sissy. But if you don't feel good, you are not going to fly. Well, you're not going to make the best decisions in the 20 years I've been doing it. I'm telling you what we know fatigue is a problem. So it's just not feeling well. And we know, we're trained all through our ratings, right? We know every single rating. You know, we hear, don't fly when you're ill, don't fly when you have a cold, be careful when you're on medication. And you know, this is one occupation that when you don't feel good, you really shouldn't fly. And those of you who are working on advanced ratings or add on pilots, you'll already know this, but I thought for you, those of you that are just getting into this in the student realm, man, if you don't feel good, you're not going to have a good lesson, or if you're brand new to it and you just got your first CFI job, you know, and you want to get out there, last thing you want to do is call in sick to your job. So this is one in the industry that, you know, we talk about it in training and tell you to not do it. But how many people really go fly when they're sick? Many, many do. And if I just have like a, you know, a flu bug or something, what if I just tried to put on a happy face and muster it up and go fly with somebody, Then I'm exposing that person in the cockpit. Whatever I've got, I'm going to give it to that person or people around the office. So I just thought, you know what? I don't really feel like making a video today. As much as I love coffee with Kenny and making new videos, making videos for 10 years, I rarely ever get sick. Rarely ever, ever, ever get sick. I'm a very lucky human being that it rarely ever happens to me. And I think I screwed myself two days ago because I was just thinking, man, I haven't been sick in a long time. You know, I got this house in June of last year and I know I haven't been sick since then. And I can't remember the last time I didn't feel good. So I'm going to wrap this up, but this is something I want you to really think about. If you are not at your best, you don't feel the greatest when you climb in that aircraft, you are not going to do as well as you would on a day when you feel good. Your decision making is going to be slow, you're going to make mistakes and you're going to put yourself in Positions that you know are not only just dangerous, but could be fatal. So standing up for yourself when you don't feel good, sometimes you just got to call it off. You got to turn the flight down. You got to call in sick. You got to do whatever you got to do and not worry about what people think. You know, if they think you just don't want to fly, then let them think that, I guess, because your pilot in command, it's your decision to decide whether you're fit to fly or not. And, you know, I'm the type of guy that I don't really like taking medications. You know, medications are good for helping symptoms, But I'm a firm believer in if you're sick, the best thing that's going to help you get over that is rest. And I'm a firm, firm, firm believer in that. So I spent the last night resting. You know, I got stuff that I want to do today. My daughter just took off on a spring break with her friends, and I'm like, man, I'm going to do this, I'm going to do that. And I have this urge to go to the airport. The other part of me is saying, make the video for today, lay back down, watch some tv, and just rest. Rest, number one, the absolute best medicine. I don't. That's my opinion. Not saying I won't take medication, because I will, but in general, I choose not to. I'd rather just try to get feeling better, and I'd rather just try to do it by getting the rest that I need. That is the fastest, fastest way to get over being sick. So leave your comments down below. Please like and subscribe. Thanks for tuning in and putting up with me. Gonna put this up, this, load this thing and get it out to you so I can now get some rest. And we will see you tomorrow in day 86.
