From Doug Kelly - Student, Friend

I wanted to write you this email because I don't think I will be able to get this out if I see you.

I was Dave's student, and went to Alaska with him a few weeks ago in 7189T. My CFO at work are both instrument rated (I have about 1000 hours) and together own a Piper Seneca, a twin-engined airplane, and were were intrigued with the idea of getting a helicopter. So Tony showed up at Palo Alto airport to get the safety briefing (one of about 10,000 such briefings in my time with David), and also got the logbook endorsement from David about the R-44. It turns out that Tony and my firm had been one of Brainstorm's first customers, and Tony and Dave remembered each other.

I have been to the Misty Fjords several times, and to pilot myself there has always been high on my wish list. So when I heard he was planning a trip up there, I jumped at the chance. So did a bunch of other people, but I guess I jumped faster. I had a lot of time to get to know David after spending the huge number of hours in the helicopter flying up to Alaska and back, and then getting soloed by him about 10 days ago.

David talked about safety stuff literally about every other sentance. Mast bumping, tail rotor strikes, care and feeding of the helicopter, inspection after inspection. We did autorotation practice until I would do it any time we got up to 1000 feet in altitude, figuring if I could beat it into myself before he could, he might stop talking about it for 10 minutes. We must have done hundreds of autorotations. He would turn off stuff or pull fuses to see if he could catch me missing something (he couldn't), but he was _really_ diligent. We must have practiced every kind of emergency we could have.

He was encyclopedic in his knowledge of the R-44, and incredibly obessive about everything in it.He finally soloed me at the Marina airport on August 24th, always scary and thrilling. I was really proud of myself, but I was sure ready, and David made sure I was. He was a great instructor.

I had referred all of my friends to him. In the time we spent flying up to Alaska, I told him about my extensive and semi-tragic romantic/dating history. I told him about wild times, about sad times, about times of great love and great loss. But mostly about the wild stuff, because, hey, I don't need anybody else to think I'm a loser or misfit; my friends are enough. But every time he spoke of you, it was with such love and tenderness, and it obviously came from a place of great depth of feeling.

He talked about how you met, about your time in college, about living with you, and about the very simple things that you did together that gave his life meaning. He truly, truly loved you. He told me he was going to retire up in Alaska, and I asked him "you've talked to Corey about this, right?" This was after we landed in a field and walked to the post office in Hyder, a place where if you added up all of the teeth town, you would get half a set of dentures.

But he thought a life with you that involved flying, heirloom tomatoes and electronic gadgets would truly be a complete life.

I will miss him terribly.

Doug Douglas E. Kelly, M.D.