0709: Pilots To The Rescue with Michael Schneider

Do something that you care about, make a difference, and watch what happens in your life. Because I have miracles and countless blessings in my life that I can only attribute to this type of work. And, um, in my previous businesses, I made way more money, but I didn't feel the same sense of purpose and fulfillment.

I'm Phil Hatterman, and you're listening to Dog Words presented by Rosie Fund. Michael Schneider, founder of Pilots to the Rescue, discusses how they transport at-risk animals from overcrowded shelters to rescue organizations where they have a stronger chance of getting a adopted. You can help their mission with a donation at any time, but this June, your contribution is doubled with a match from Tito's Vodka. If you're looking for a creative way to donate to your favorite cause, find inspiration in Michael Schneider's story of the rock legend who helped them get more animals in the air and one step closer to their forever home. If you're new to DogWords, in each episode we explore the world of dog care and companionship. "We save each other" is the motto of Rosie Fund, which simply means, "The more we do for dogs, the more they do for us." And they already do a lot. Support Rosie Fund by making a donation on our website or Facebook page. You can also contribute by making a purchase from the store on our website, buying a t-shirt at bonfire.com, or buying our note cards featuring Rosie, Peaches, and Maggie. Just click shop at rosiefund.org. Another wonderful way to support Rosie Fund and create beautiful artwork of your loved ones, including the cherished animals in your life, is to book a session with Claire Shelley at Bee Legendary Photography Creations. Learn more at the letter B legendaryphotographycreations.com. For every referral from Rosie Fund, Claire will donate $100 or 10% of the order total, whichever is greater. All those photos on your phone provide quantity, but years from now you'll treasure the quality that's been captured by Claire with your B Legendary Photography session. Regardless of how you contribute to Rosie Fund, your generosity helps fund the Rosie Life Starter Kits that make sure senior and harder-to-adopt dogs have some of the items they'll need in their forever home. Grow Rosie Fund by downloading, subscribing, rating, and most importantly, sharing DogWords. Follow us on social media even if you aren't looking for a dog. Watching and sharing the videos helps our channel gain exposure, bringing awareness to our cause and giving shelter dogs much-needed attention. Our free Rosie Fund YouTube channel offers great videos of Rosie, Peaches, Vinny, Rosie Fund Ambassador Maggie, and shelter dogs looking for their forever home. We welcome your thoughtful and respectful comments, questions, and suggestions, especially if you have an idea for a topic or guest. Go to the podcast page at rosiefund.org to share your thoughts. The mission of Rosie Fund is to provide humans with the resources and education they need to give senior and harder-to-adopt dogs a better life. We thank you for joining our mission. Joining us today via Zoom from Greenpoint, Brooklyn is founder and executive director of Pilots to the Rescue, Michael Schneider. Michael, welcome to DogWords.

Thank you for having me on, Phil.

We had, uh, Julian Javore on in our first season of DogWords 7 years ago, who is a pilot that flies rescue out of California, so mostly West Coast. And then I found out about you working the East Coast, uh, with Pilots to the Rescue. So tell our listeners a little bit about how you got started and what you do.

Absolutely. So I started Pilots to Rescue back in 2015. This is our 11th year in operation, so we had a big milestone last year being our 10th anniversary. And it was really just to combine my love of aviation and rescuing animals. I think we just exceeded 7,000 animals saved. We have a really good shot at 10,000 this year, but at the end of the day, we're a transport company. So we provide a much-needed service for these shelters to transport at-risk animals. These are animals that are at risk of being euthanized, mainly due to overcrowded shelters or lack of funds. And we own and operate 2 aircraft out of Essex County Airport in Fairfield, New Jersey, and we have 7 transport vans. And, you know, by providing this much-needed service, these animals get a better chance of being adopted.

The need, I think, is invisible to most people because they, uh, either live somewhere that the shelter's just overcrowded and unfortunately euthanasia becomes, or at least appears to become, necessary, or there's someplace where the shelters are mostly empty and anybody wants an animal just goes in and gets one, aren't aware of the network and the need for sort of leveling out the supply and demand and saving lives. How did you become aware of the need to, to transport?

When I got my pilot's license, which I discovered general aviation through skydiving, and I've come to find a lot of pilots, you know, that was their first introduction. And for anybody listening to this, if you ever gone skydiving, it's probably the first time you were in one of these tiny planes.

Um, but, uh, and you, you, you decided it was better to stay in the plane than to jump out?

Like, I would like to do this again, Yeah, I have 4 jumps, but I'm not a great skydiver. I, it's very exhilarating, but I have a tendency to pass out, which happens to some people. And it's not, it's a, it's a little bit of a scary situation. It has to do a lot with the, like the adrenaline rush and, you know, sometimes you have trouble breathing because the oxygen's coming in. A lot of it's psychosomatic. It's called, it's a vasovagal response. So 2 of the jumps I had, one of them I actually passed out. So when you're going tandem, you have someone strapped to your back and the— your, your get— your passenger or your, your paying passenger basically goes limp. That's really scary. So that was the first time that happened. The guy was like freaked out when we hit the ground. The second time I got all the way to the ground and then I passed out. So skydiving is probably not the best sport for me. And now my life insurance doesn't allow me to even do it. Flying is okay, but not skydiving.

And what is it about flying that made you move past the passing out while you're skydiving to, I'm still going to fly?

Yeah, so the other reason I got my pilot's license— rather, skydiving— is because I started asking questions of the pilot, and he made a good point. He's like, skydiving is a lot of fun, but it's kind of a lonely sport because, um, most skydivers, they're— after a while, they're not jumping with the same people. They might get used to like a facility that they run into friends and stuff, but if you travel, you end up jumping by yourself. Part allure of skydiving is you can go to Abu Dhabi, you can go to Dubai, you can go to London, you can jump anywhere.

Mm-hmm.

Um, so it's kind of lonely, but with a pilot's license, you can take your friends to lunch on a, on a tour of the Manhattan skyline. So that seemed more practical.

Mm-hmm.

And, um, you know, it's a lot of time, it's a lot of money either way. He encouraged me to take a discovery flight, which anybody can. There's 4,000 airports in the United States. So there's probably a small airport nearby that you can pay a couple hundred dollars and go with an instructor and get the feel. Feel for what it's like to power these amazing machines. I did that and I got hooked. I signed up for lessons immediately.

Well, I, I short-circuited my own question where I asked you about, uh, how you became aware of the need for transport. But this is such a fascinating topic, it's going to be hard to stay on course, but I'll do my best. So I'll, I'll circle back and let you actually answer my question about how— yeah, transport.

When I moved back to New York, I got my pilot's license in Cincinnati. When I sold the business back in 2008, I moved to Cincinnati. And when I moved back to I work and I have my pilot's license. I joined a flying club, which is not quite like a rental. It's not owning. It's sort of like you're in the club and you've access to multiple aircraft and the rules are a little looser than renting. I got tired of like flying somewhere and having lunch or taking people on the Manhattan skyline. I mean, never, it never gets old, but as an aviator, you're looking for, they call them missions. What's your mission? So after a while, you're looking for other reasons to fly. And I heard about people using their license and renting planes to help, like, terminally ill patients get pro bono medical procedures. Maybe they couldn't afford it in their hometown, but you could fly them to, like, Boston, and there's a doctor that'll treat them pro bono. So I did that for a while. And then I heard about animals being transported. And as a young child, I always had a connection with animals, especially rescue animals. And that was my calling. So I started doing some of that work and being the entrepreneur that I was, I consider myself a recovering serial entrepreneur.

Mm-hmm.

Um, I wanted to create my own organization, but I also selfishly wanted to acquire a plane that I couldn't afford. So a lot of the planes that we have access to as aviators, they're very small. And it's because insurance companies, they don't wanna insure for more than like 2, 2 to 4 people. When you get into the larger aircraft, they get very nervous and the prices are high. So I couldn't personally afford this larger aircraft and I saw fundraising as a necessary means to acquire a larger aircraft so that I could not be controlled by all these limiting factors of a flying club, but also because I could fit more animals, right?

And the, the transport of the animals, right? How do, uh, the rescue groups find you? Like, they know they're overcrowded, and then there's a place that knows, I've got space. And you are the connector between those. How does that triangle all get connected?

Absolutely, great question. So we have over 100 shelter partners across the country. It is true, we're primarily based on the East Coast right now, but we're making our way out more out west. And these 100 shelter partners often re-up. I think the statistics, like 82% of them re-up. So they hear about our service, uh, the requirement for us is that they have a place for us to bring them to. So as you can imagine, we get a ton emails and phone calls. These animals are going to be euthanized in 24 hours. Can you rescue them? And we're always like, okay, where are we bringing them to? So we focus on the transport because the origin shelter and the destination shelter, they're— they often have existing relationships that are already vetted, and they know how procedurally how they operate and what is going to be in demand up here in the Northeast. So we have existing partnerships, and then, um, we seek out some new ones, uh, based on, um, We were involved in that Rigland Beagle case. I don't know if you're aware of that in the Midwest, in Wisconsin. There was a medical boarding facility that— there was a huge protest. So we got involved in that. When we heard about that, we just interjected ourselves. We had to be involved in that because it's a really great opportunity. It's not just the 16 beagles we saved in that situation. It gave us a platform to talk about why it's so important to adopt. And why we have to make a stand for cruelty against animals in that case. So we, we cherry-pick opportunities. We hear about new existing, new relationships. We lean on our existing rela— there is no shortage of animal rescue. I mean, we could fly that plane every day. So we're starting to get a little bit more selective with the aircraft because it's so expensive. I don't need to tell you the price of jet fuel is going up. And that big rescue plane that we have has a 320-gallon tank. Think about that for a second. And jet fuel's national average is probably about $6-something a gallon. Figure that out. That's $2,000 to fill up that plane. So the price of aviation has skyrocketed, and that's where the vans come in. We're not as well known for the vans, and we have 7 rescue vans. We have one in Dallas, Texas, Greenville, South Carolina, Vero Beach, Florida. We have 2 in New Jersey. We're putting one in Indianapolis. And the vans are like this hub and spoke model, hybrid model that allows us to extend our range. So the van in Dallas will load up the animals at night. So they sleep at night, they drive through the night, and they meet us in Tennessee, and we fly back the rest of the way. So that's a great utilization of an aircraft to cut down on that stress and distance of those animals.

Oh yeah. It shortens the, their journey.

Exactly. Exactly. It's more realistic. It's more economically viable and it's more sustaining for our organization. I've seen a lot of groups in the nonprofit rescue space with this attitude, like rescue 'em all at all costs. And I wish we could save them all. But you have to think, I'm a businessman, an entrepreneur, and I think that's why we've been successful is because I look at this organization and I think about how can we scale it, what practices can we put in place that are sustaining, and how can we provide this transport service to everyone and be equitable and save as many lives as possible? And it's not about flying the plane every day. I can tell you that.

It's about efficiencies. And as a person who's come from the private sector, I think you understand that better than a bureaucrat or someone who's always been in not-for-profits. Like, we got to raise awareness, we got to raise funds. It's like, yes, but let's find the most efficient use for them. Because if we are just doing something that makes us feel good, we're saving everyone, you're deluding yourself because you can't save everyone. You can't save all the animals. And you end up saving fewer because you're using your resources inefficiently.

Exactly.

And so your efficient use of resources, I, I'm sure, has helped you sort of identify patterns, like what is the flow where, um, like obviously if you're a trucker who hauls grain, you know, I'm taking it from the Midwest to the coast, or if I transport oil, I'm taking it from Texas or Denali or whatever to the pipeline. What is the flow of animals?

Yeah, so we're often coming back to New England and everybody wants like puppies, kittens, smaller dogs that are, uh, easier. You know, some buildings here in New York City don't allow what's considered vicious breeds, whatever. So we're transporting the most adoptable animals, um, which is also heartbreaking because, uh, senior animals, large dogs, even black dogs or black cats, which just have, you know, bad reputation or connotation. And it's, it's heartbreaking because they're wonderful animals.

So, but you are buying them time because you get that puppy out, that frees up a kennel, and now we've just shortened our euthanasia list for that dog that's been languishing in a kennel and give it a little more chance.

That's right, exactly. So, and then aviation use cases are the animals that cannot endure such a long drive. So we often use it with injured animals, puppies, kittens, senior animals. We do endangered species. We transport critically endangered wolves and sea turtles. We've done some farm animals like pigs. And then we also use the aircraft for disaster response because disaster response is where you have to move a lot of volume quickly. And after a hurricane or a fire, sometimes the roads aren't even passable. So we love doing that work as well because it's critical. It's much needed.

You mentioned the animals that, uh, go beyond what you typically expect to see in a shelter, the dogs and cats. Have you ever gotten a call where you thought, is this legit? What are you asking me to do exactly?

Yes, uh, we got a call from PETA to transport an elephant. Um, obviously we don't have aircraft large enough to do that. Um, we have transported, uh, we transported a spider monkey once. That was interesting. 250-pound pig. So sometimes, you know, big game like tigers and lions and stuff like that. So yeah, it does, it does come up. It definitely comes up.

Yeah. How do some of the animals respond to flying? Is obviously they can get stressed out by the new environment, but what happens in the plane?

Yeah. So the loading is the most stressful part for the animals because they don't know what they're getting themselves themselves into. And, you know, we're putting them in smaller crates and kennels so we can fit them in the plane. Generally, when you start the plane up, they— the vibration, the noise just kind of makes them tired. And it's not— they're unpressurized aircraft, so we can only go up to 8,000 feet. They— but they get tired because it is less oxygen. They just go to sleep most of the time. We don't transport any flight risks. I've been doing this for 11 years. There's been a few animals that when we tried to load them in the crates, they got very aggressive. So we just didn't transport them.

It's too risky.

We've had escape artists, mainly cats. Earlier on when I was doing this work, I used some soft-sided crates for the cats and they were able to get themselves free. So you're flying along and imagine a cat is climbing up from underneath the seat in front of you and they have claws.

Yeah, cats on a plane.

Yeah, cats on a plane. We haven't done Snakes on a Plane. I know that's a movie.

Yes.

But I would welcome that opportunity. So, and then you get, as you can imagine, you get the wafts of smells.

So, oh, imagine, yes.

Yeah. So, but that comes and goes and you can redirect air just like in a car. You can't, you know, you can't necessarily open windows, but you can open up fresh air vents. But yeah, the loading's the most, once you load them in the plane, that's, you know, the hardest part. On the other side, when you unload them, they're sometimes they're a little skittish and they don't wanna come outta the crate, but it's the happy ending part of the story. So they feel that energy. That's the thing about animals is they're way more intuitive and intelligent than we give 'em credit. Credit for. And I get to see that transformation from overcrowded shelter, shelter workers that just, you can see it on their face, they don't want to euthanize, but they're overworked, underfunded, and they're doing this really, they have such huge hearts. So we get a semblance of that when we pick them up because a lot of them come from these really poor rural areas in the South. A lot of times it's animal control. So you see officers with guns and stuff like that. They love what they do because they're dealing with animals and not always with people. But when we get to the other side, it's all the volunteers and all the receiving shelter employees who are, you know, excited to see them and know they came from precarious situation, whether it's abuse, neglect, hoarding situations. I mean, we see some of the stories of the animals and it's horrific. They're chained up and left for dead. They're in the side of a road on a ditch. We see hoarding situations where people, they really do, they start out that they want to do a good deed by rounding up stray animals, but then they get in over their head and it's a health violation and the animals end up suffering as a result. And I'm sure everybody's seen these stories where, you know, animal control discovers a house that's abandoned with, you know, 200 cats. So at some point someone was taking care of their cats but just got way over their head and they just abandoned the situation.

So, and maybe diminishing mental capacity, just aging, and right they lose that, uh, mental discipline to know which— and it circles back to what's efficient use of resources. Their reach has exceeded their grasp, and they're actually hurting more animals than they're helping.

That is true. That is true. Um, yeah, on the receiving end, it's, it's great. That's one of my favorite things to do, even when I'm not flying. And I'm not flying as much these days because I'm busy running the organization. I'll show up at the airport just for the happy ending. It's infectious, you know. It's like You just over and over again, when the plane comes in, the pilots are excited. They have this feeling of accomplishment because I've had that feeling many, many times. It's an amazing mission as an aviator. So I get that. And I also get to see the volunteers and the work, the receiving shelter workers. I get to, you know, help unload. And it's just that overwhelming sense of accomplishment. And, you know, gives you a sense of purpose. And it's why I show up and do this work day in, day out. It doesn't feel like a job. You know, I certainly don't run a charity to make lots of money, let's put it that way.

Oh yeah, yeah, I can certainly understand that. And, and that the fulfillment does make it worth it when you see the success stories. You have, uh, shelters, rescue groups that you've worked with at both ends of the flight multiple times. Do you have, uh, uh, like success stories from places that you've repeatedly rescued from or repeatedly delivered to where they're saying, "We're so happy to see you again. We can update you on, on what's happened with an animal you might remember." Absolutely.

So I would say, of course, the benefit of working with us over and over again is the speed and efficiency. So when we utilize the aircraft, it saves their volunteers or their shelter workers on the sending side The— it's extremely difficult to find, to maintain and find the proper equipment and find the drivers to go really far distances. So we save them that headache. Transport's a huge pain point. Transport programs are very necessary in animal welfare, but it's a big pain point. I've seen it at all the conferences. They're always talking about it. And a lot of these shelters don't even have a way, sometimes don't even have a way to get to the airport. So we save them that headache of dealing with that transport. On the sending side. And the other thing I'll mention is we're huge on telling the story. Like, there's no coincidence that we're talking to you today. Obviously, we put a lot of emphasis and budget into telling our story because there's still euthanizing a million animals every year in this country. So even if we had a fleet of 777s, it wouldn't matter in terms of numbers. But getting to talk to people like you and your audience gives us a platform to talk about why it's important to adopt, Foster, adopt, own, shop, and rescue these wonderful animals. Open up your homes and hearts and, uh, help reduce euthanasia and help spread awareness. It's all about spreading awareness. So these shelters, they also get a little bit of that, um, because they may— maybe they're not as good at marketing and branding and telling the story. And that's always been a big thing in my previous businesses, as I believe in marketing and branding. You have to promote what you're doing or nobody's gonna know it. We can, we can rescue animals all day long, but if we're not talking about it, how are people gonna know about our mission? And that is, it grows exponentially. It grows in terms of fundraising, in terms of press and stories. So we're constantly hitting that messaging over and over again. So those shelters, especially the small ones, they just don't have the staff or the know-how or the budgets to do those kind of things. And we've had some success and tremendous growth keep in mind, I haven't been doing this full time until 2021. So it's in the last 5 years we've skyrocketed because I put all my time and attention into this. We're basically a COVID success story. I had other businesses that got decimated by COVID. So bringing all that knowledge and experience I have and treating this like a business, I've been able to grow it in such a fashion where these other stakeholders, when they do rescues with us, they they get the buzz and they get their name in the social media and the press stories and they get on TV and etc. So there's benefits to them to doing, doing transport with us. Do we need the plane? Unnecessarily, but it brings tremendous attention.

So yeah, I think hope generates more donations. That's better for fundraising than despair. People will donate when they see the emaciated dog that was rescued from a hoarding situation. But when you can show, here's where your money's going, here's the success, here's the outcome of your donation, that these dogs are transported to someplace where they could be adopted and not have to be euthanized, uh, those successes that they can tout on their social media also keep people coming back as followers on social media instead of repeatedly getting hammered with We're out of space, we're out of space, we're out of space. And people don't want to be depressed, right? And if you can throw in more success stories, that keeps them coming back to your social media. That's going to help with fundraising. And it's— God bless you for the work you're doing. And you say you're not doing as much flying anymore. How many pilots do you have that it's taking the— some of that off of your plate?

So we have about, uh, I would say 10 pilots that fly our equipment right now. We have the 2 planes in New Jersey, and then we have a database of volunteer pilots, close to 1,000 pilots that do their own transports through our transport board, which is more of a do-it-yourself system. And it's a growing part of our organization because, as you can imagine, a lot of pilots are, you know, they're jealous. They want to fly that type of equipment. But the insurance makes it such that you have to have a certain amount of experience and there's recurrent training every year. So we tend to favor the ones that are closer to our airport so they have the ability to do it. But we don't want to say no. So of course the pilots can sign up as volunteers and fly their own mission. And then a lot of the missions, a lot of the transports are just too small and it doesn't make sense economically to fly them in their planes. So the Transport Board gives these shelters an opportunity to post it there, and then the pilots will get a notification and they could take it on themselves if they wish.

So you're always looking for pilots, you're always looking for, uh, somebody with a van. And, and people can do this independent of you. If you contact your local rescue, I guarantee they are at one end of the spectrum or the other. They either can take in pets or they have a surplus of pets. And tell them, I can be transport, where do I need to go to get you a pet, or where do you need me to take these pets? So that would be a great volunteer opportunity for for anyone if they're looking for something beyond volunteering at a shelter, because I know how emotionally draining that can be to repeatedly go to the same shelter. And there's some people that that fits for them perfectly. By all means, keep doing that. But for someone who's like, I want to help with this issue, but what else can I do? Follow your example. Yeah, get started. PilotsToTheRescue.org if they want to learn more about your organization or want to donate anything that they can can do to help, or if they're inquiring about how can we use your services, I assume just go to pilotstorescue.org, and that'll be linked in the description. Your two planes— I, uh, couldn't help but notice, as someone who has been to more Boston concerts than I can count, yeah, that Tom Scholz gave you a plane. So for those who don't know, What's the matter with you? How do you not know who Tom Scholz is? He created the band Boston, writes all the songs, plays all the lead guitar. And the story of the production of the first two albums is fascinating. And I don't know how a movie hasn't been made about that yet, where they fooled the record company into thinking, we're in LA producing our debut album. But it was— everyone was there except for Tom, who was back in Boston in a basement apartment with equipment that he'd mostly assembled himself. Himself recording everything except for the vocals. And, and then the record company is like, this is amazing. He's like, yeah, we didn't use your studio, we did this in Tom's apartment basement. But the phenomenal success of the band Boston allowed him to become a pilot, have planes, fly planes on tour instead of riding the tour bus, and then he gives you his plane. How does that happen?

Yeah, pretty amazing. Uh, I've been very fortunate to get to know Tom and speak to him for hours about this aircraft. It gave me some insights into his mind, and it's a— he's a brilliant—

I was going to say, that would be a fabulous journey to take inside of Tom Scholl's mind.

Yeah. Um, so obviously he was very focused on aviation. Actually, the first conversation we had, I didn't even know who he was. I knew the band Boston, obviously have heard his songs, but I didn't follow it as close as you did. And I just— I wasn't quite sure because he often goes by Donald T-SHOLLS. At least that's the way it is with the FAA. And he, I don't know if he does that to kind of hide his identity, but how he came to about it is he just filled out a form on our website and he, I don't have it in front of me, but it was something to the effect of, I have this beautiful aircraft with these great modifications. Um, I'd love to talk to you about donating it to your organization.

It's like, I can't answer that call fast enough.

Yeah. So I spoke to him on the phone. The first conversation we had for over an hour about this plane. I had no idea who he was. And then it was someone in our office who recognized the name and did some Googling and put two and two together.

'Cause Scholz is an unusual spelling. It's like Schultz except O-L instead of U-L-T-Z.

Yeah.

O-L-Z.

Right.

And so, yeah, that, that would catch my eye if I saw Scholz. I, my first thought would be, oh, I wonder if you're related to Tom Scholz. And then if you see like his area code is Boston, It's like, oh, wait a minute, you've got to at least know who this is.

That's right. And there's not a lot of articles.

I'm him. Yeah.

And there's not a lot of articles online about him flying. The biggest indication of that aircraft is on his Facebook page. Um, there's hundreds of photos of the wing and in different destinations. You can look on his Facebook page, but not very— none actually that I could find really of him in the flight deck, him with the plane. So he's very careful about that. Even the FAA registration of the plane was private. We're working on getting it public. He didn't want people to know he was flying that and where his whereabouts were. And don't blame him, understandably so. He's a private individual, and I've come to find that's because a lot of people make fake pages, try to benefit off of Boston's identity, etc. So, uh, long story short, He was trying to sell the plane. It's a fine example of a Beechcraft Bonanza, which they've sold like 17,000 of them. They're very popular aircraft. They just stopped making them last year. And, uh, obviously had an emotional connection with the aircraft. He wasn't getting offers that he liked. Um, not that he needs the money, but because it was his baby, his wife Kim found our organization and suggested to him to donate it. And that's how it came to pass. And we went out to Boston, we picked it up and we got to meet him and his wife. And, you know, I've been keeping in touch with Kim and giving her glimpses of the good work we've done with the aircraft. We transported turtles and dogs and cats, and it's been a great workhorse. We call it our special ops plane because it's smaller. And apparently he's flown this thing over 700,000 miles. He's owned it since new. It's a 1980. And he, I think he told me he flew nonstop from Boston to Palm Beach, Florida. It was like 9 hours. I don't know anybody who could sit in a plane that long, especially him.

Oh yeah, he's a tall guy. He's like 6'5", 6'6". Yeah.

I don't know how he did that. Hats off to him. But, you know, flying that plane, it's like I'm sitting in the seat of a legend. And this is such a nice aircraft. And I'm so, I have so much gratitude for him donating it to our cause. And the interesting thing is after that, we had some other musicians donate, like, or, uh, people that are related to musicians. The late Prince, one of his wives, Mayte Garcia, she don't— she has a charity that, um, is very much behind animal welfare. She's donated. I think the lead guitarist of Lynyrd Skynyrd donates to us. I don't think it's related, but I also don't believe there are coincidences. Every— we're all connected, you know.

Yeah, it's connected. And I'm sure word gets out that someone in a production studio overhears someone talking about, it's like, "Oh yeah, Tom Scholl's got a new plane. Oh, what'd he do with his old one?" And then someone else talks about that. And then it's like, "Oh, I have this charity." "Oh, I heard about this great charity." Yeah, the word's gonna spread. So that's the ripple effect. Do something good and get it out there. And not that we should question someone's motives, But this isn't a rock star who's just like throwing money away. That he has a degree from MIT, worked at Polaroid while he was still pursuing his music, gets a band together, gets noticed, they hit it big. So it wasn't too much money or too much success too fast and then this crazy lifestyle. He's always been smart. He has patented, uh, inventions that are amps and plugins and stuff for guitars and production. Smart businessman. And so he did this, probably seeing, I'm not getting a good price for this, but I can get a tax write-off as a charitable donation. But more importantly, I can put this plane where it's needed more than somebody buying it just because they want Tom Scholl's airplane, then just sits in a hangar. It's going to be used for a good cause. And that's a great example for other people. It's like, look a little deeper. Like, if you have something you're trying to sell and you're putting it on Facebook Marketplace just to get rid of it, think about a charity that can use it, whether you get the tax write-off or not. But certainly, you know, the donating cars, donating airplanes— maybe look at, uh, helping with your donation rather than just making it a sale. So So thank you to Tom for doing that. And obviously the, the ripple effect that, that others are donating. Is there any way we can help you beyond just directing people to the donation tab on your website? Are there any fundraisers or anything you have that, uh, people need to be aware of?

Uh, yes, we haven't launched it yet. It's coming the fourth quarter this year, but we had a very generous donor who's putting up $250,000 as a match. Um, and this is going to help us be able to purchase a second larger rescue plane, which is called a Kodiak 100. And we're looking to open up another location in Vero Beach, Florida. So look for that coming in September. But right now we still have a match with Tito's Vodka. Tito's Vodka is a terrific brand. They have vodka for the dog people. They've given like over $5 million to animal welfare.

Can't tell you how many times Tito's has been mentioned on this website.

I bet.

By people like you who run a nonprofit and they say Tito's is the best.

Yeah, they really are. So we have a $50,000 match with Tito's that is happening right now through the end of June. So any donation is doubled. Certainly sharing this post on your social media is extremely helpful because they're going to share awareness about our charity, our cause. And then, you know, if you happen to know of any wealthy people who are looking, who care about animals, telling them about our cause and inspiring them, is helpful. I mean, we, uh, we have some very generous donors, and it means a lot when we get these big, big donations. I mean, it's— they're game changers. And then I always encourage people, and you alluded to this before, about rolling up your sleeves, make a difference, getting involved directly in something that you're passionate about. If it's not animal welfare, fine, but do something that you care about, make a difference, and watch what happens in your life. Because I have miracles and countless blessings in my life that I can only attribute to this type of work. And, um, in my previous businesses, I made way more money, but I didn't feel the same sense of purpose and fulfillment. So go out and directly get involved. Go to your local shelter, take care of these animals, take a dog out for a walk. They have wonderful programs where you— if you can't have an animal at home, you can foster, or you can take a dog out for a walk, and you'll make a huge difference in an animal's life, and you'll feel good about yourself also.

So it makes that animal more adoptable because it goes back to the kennel which will break your heart when you have to say goodbye to it at the end of the day, but that the stress you've taken off that animal and the socialization you've given it makes it more likely to be adopted.

Exactly.

It's not selfish that, oh, I just got a dog for a day.

It's—

you've, you've made a difference for sure.

Yeah, we have to take care of these animals. They take care of so many of us. Now, I'm always telling people about the loneliness epidemic we have in this country, and animals fill that void. They're great companions for, for that reason. Um, the elderly population, they're excellent, especially for cats. So, uh, yeah, you got to take care of our furry friends that don't have a voice.

And what you're doing is solving the transportation problem that's connecting the people with the pets. People talk about food shortage. There's no food shortage problem in this world. There's plenty of food. There's a transportation problem getting the food to the people who don't have it. Same way with the animals, there's a transportation problem. Let's just get them where they can have a home, and Pilots to the Rescue is doing that. Michael Schneider, thank you for the work you do, and thank you again for being on DogWords.

Thank you, Phil.

I'm Phil Hatterman, and you've been listening to DogWords presented by Rosie Fund. All the links referenced in for discussion are in the episode description as promised. If any of the links we provide either do not work or fail to appear in the description, that is likely due to the limitations of the podcast platform that you're using. If you have difficulty, go to our podcast page at rosiefund.org for a fully functioning description and access to the entire DogWords archive. Please visit BeLegendaryPhotographyCreations.com to learn more about preserving precious memories of your loved ones, including the cherished animals in your life. All those photos on your phone provide quantity, but years from now you'll treasure the quality that's been captured by Claire with your B Legendary Photography session. That's the letter B, legendaryphotographycreations.com. A big thank you to alternative string duo The Wires, featuring cellist Sasha Groshong and violinist Laurel Morgan Parks, for playing the wonderful music you've heard on today's and previous episodes of Dogwords. Supporting The Wires supports our mission. Learn more about The Wires, including their concert schedule, at thewires.info and download their music on iTunes. Check out fiddlelife.com and learn to play fiddle and cello fiddle online from Laurel and Sasha, even if you've never played before. Go to rosiefund.org to shop and get links to our social media. As always, please download, follow, rate, and share Dogwords. This helps us with sponsorships, then Rosie Fund can help more dogs. Send us your comments, questions, and suggestions via the contact form at rosyfund.org, and let us know if you would like to be a sponsor or a guest of the DogWords Podcast. Thank you for listening to DogWords, and remember, we save each other.