On Christmas Day in 1996, Kelly Jeffries was invited to ride in the jump seat of a De Havilland Dash 8. This was, by all means, a fairly standard repositioning hop through Florida for the aircraft. She was traveling from Jacksonville to Tampa to pick up an airplane for a charter flight, and L. D. Jeffries was the first officer on this flight. Once the pair were traveling at cruising altitude, they began to hit it off, talking nonstop and trading the kinds of stories of grit, adventure, and a shared love of flying that only pilots would love.
For Kelly, he read as an experienced pilot with a love of aviation, and, for L. D., she was a fellow pilot who would be capable of keeping the peace. Still, this moment seemed small in the context of both pilots’ careers. The following year, Kelly joined that same airline and ran into him in Tampa, but not long before he left for Continental Airlines in 1998, all while she assumed that goodbye was the end.
A year later, Kelly was hired at American Airlines and received a call at her training hotel from L. D. to congratulate her, all while dropping the important news that he was no longer married. After six months of chatting over the phone and visiting Houston, the two moved in together and subsequently got married. We spoke with L. D. and Kelly to gain a better look at one of the most unique love stories in aviation history.
A Simple Meeting Between Two Aviation Enthusiasts
The spark between these two was not cinematic, with no violin swell or slow-motion glance across an aisle. It was cockpit small talk that continued to improve. Kelly had been deadheading for work, and the captain’s invitation to the jumpseat, where airline friendships are formed, the flight deck. As soon as the De Havilland Dash 8 model climbed above cruising altitude, the conversation between the pair took off. They talked nonstop, in the way that people do when they find matching curiosity, confidence, and the sense of humor that one could only attribute to a pilot.
In our interview, Kelly noted how she clocked L. D.’s background as an achieved pilot with an extensive record, and that he carried himself with the confidence that such a resume created. This moment, however, was nothing specific. They had met, connected, and were then, in classic airline industry fashion, scattered by different schedules. Kelly later joined that airline and bumped into him at Tampa International Airport (TPA). Later, L. D. made a move to Continental in 1998, on Kelly analyzed it as follows:
“I remember saying goodbye to him and thinking that was it (because he was married at the time). A year later, I was hired at American Airlines and received a call from L. D. at the training hotel.”
This was a second connection that the aviation industry was offering that brought them together. L. D.’s call also included a comment informing her that he was no longer married. The rest, evidently, is history. Especially in the aviation industry, one never knows when the next random encounter could be the unexpected beginning of something so special.
Kelly’s Long Journey To The Cockpit
Kelly’s pathway to the cockpit began long before she ever touched the yoke. At nine years of age, she watched a TV program where kids were allowed to try their dream jobs for a day. In one particular episode, a girl who wanted to be an airline pilot was able to try a flight simulator, something which initially made a young Kelly feel rather jealous. This then powered her resolve to be a young pilot. After her mother remarried, her stepdad owned the aircraft, and she performed her first solo flight in high school.
She did not finish her license until she was in the Navy, and, although she wanted to fly there too, hay fever made her medically ineligible to become a certified naval aviator. Instead, she carried the military’s lessons into civilian aviation, discipline, attention to detail, and taking care of people. She also leaned on the GI Bill to fund ratings that could otherwise be prohibitively expensive for those looking to enter the field.
From the early days of calling flight service and updating stacks of paper charts, she watched the cockpit slowly digitize over time, as phones and electronic flight bags slowly replaced the kit bag. She has now flown all kinds of aircraft, ranging from the McDonnell Douglas MD-80 to large aircraft like the 
Boeing 757, 767, and now the 787 Dreamliner. Like most experienced pilots, Kelly cites the Boeing 757 as her favorite aircraft to fly.
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L. D.’s Pilot Career Took Several Turns
L. D.’s path to an airline cockpit came through high-pressure situations only seen in movies. As an Air Force pararescueman, he learned mental and physical discipline, consistently performing under high pressure. He credits his background with helping him carry through the arduous evaluations of commercial flight training. He also learned a habit that matters in both rescue work and aviation. Specifically, he notes that the problem in front of you needs to be solved without panic, even when everything around you seems like complete chaos.
Once he started pursuing airline jobs in 1990, he was initially an enlisted pilot competing in a hiring environment that was dominated by military pilots with huge flight-hour totals. Rather than treating that as a wall, he treated it instead as a mission of its own. Here, he even walked away from a major military promotion at the 20-year service mark.
After failing a first-round airline interview, he prepared ruthlessly and never made the same mistake twice. In the airline cockpit, he loved the concept of structured crews and, above all, the Boeing 757-200. This aircraft, which offers incredibly powerful engines, has been referred to by most pilots as a “rocket ship” or “sports car” due to the capabilities of its impressive Rolls-Royce RB211 engines.
A Romance That Schedules Created
Pilot love stories are often created entirely by chance, based on calendars. Kelly and L. D. learned early on that love between two pilots is often less about candlelight and more about pairing. These two started with paper schedules and then graduated to dry-erase boards that were marked with multiple different colors, all highlighting where these two were able to overlap.
Creating a family as a pilot is also challenging in and of itself, and it became much simpler for the two to be together because neither wanted children. While many two-airline families exist, and it can work, this added complexity just proved too much for them. Whenever possible, they tried to fly on the same days so that their days off were shared as well. Behind these logistics was a shared overall work ethic. As veterans, both sacrifice manners of speaking, hard work, and duty as habits that are carried out instead of slogans that are recited.
The two also take a practical view towards leadership, as their task is to take care of their crew because they are asking people to perform in a tightly choreographed environment where even small lapses can compound. This unique mindset helped shape how they saw some of the job’s best elements, such as trip camaraderie, crew clicks, and the privilege of being trusted with a jet full of passengers for many hours at a time.
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Different Mentors & Choices Leading To A Unique Balance
This pilot love story unsurprisingly includes some advice, as aviation is a craft that is passed down through generations. Kelly and L. D. have expressed their concerns that today’s economics are thinning out the grassroots of flying that once built upon years of training and careful judgment. With training increasingly becoming so expensive, many new pilots have to carefully make decisions lesson by lesson, becoming technically proficient with fewer chances to actually rent an aircraft.
Judgment is simply a thing that cannot be downloaded, but rather honed through decades of shifting weather, plans breaking, and shifting thinking, not just passengers complying. Kelly noted her examiner’s reminder after private check-rides that a pilot’s license is a license to learn perpetually. She continues to treat it this way.
She was quick to highlight her fairly blunt mentorship rule. If student pilots want mentors, they need to be the person that someone wants to mentor. She is interested in helping aspiring pilots, encouraging them to reach out, ask questions, and ultimately follow through. Staying in touch with mentors, taking the initiative, and building a life around the cockpit is ultimately critical.
What Is Our Bottom Line When It Comes To All This?
At the end of the day, this is among the most traditional of pilot love stories, one that involves two young professionals connecting through a passion for the aviation industry. As both were quick to highlight to us, becoming a pilot is no easy task, and one that involves decades, if not years, of continued commitment.
Not only were the two able to make their way into airline cockpits, but they were able to continue pursuing their careers while maintaining a relationship. In a world where pilots have to fly on tight schedules and have somewhat limited control over their own lives, this is especially impressive.
Thus, we reflect upon L. D. and Kelly’s experiences, respecting their extensive careers. These two’s dedication not just to the industry but also to each other is genuinely admirable. As mentors, the two have inspired countless pilots, and they continue to stand out as a unique example of the industry’s best.
