Lynn Rippelmeyer is the first woman to fly a Boeing 747 (SWA F/O July 2, 1980), and the first to captain the "Jumbo Jet" across the Atlantic ocean. On July 18, 1984 she was captain of People Express Airlines flight #2 from Newark International Airport to London Gatwick airport, departing at 7:35pm. She was also part of the first all-female crew for a scheduled US carrier (with Captain Emily Jones, Air Illinois, DHC-6 Twin Otter, 30 December 1977).
This female pilot began her career in aviation as a TWA flight attendant in 1972. After taking lessons to become qualified, she became TWA's second female pilot as a Boeing 727 Flight Engineer in 1978. She has been honored with her uniform being placed in the Smithsonian Institution, being named as Woman of the Year in England (1984), and being featured in a BBC documentary, Reaching for the Skies.
Lynn and her colleague, Beverly Lynn Burns, shared the honor of creating the first all female Boeing 737 crew at People Express as co-Captains in 1982. Lynn went on to fly for Continental Airlines when People Express was merged.
Famous quotes containing the word lynn:
“In the quilts I had found good objects—hospitable, warm, with soft edges yet resistant, with boundaries yet suggesting a continuous safe expanse, a field that could be bundled, a bundle that could be unfurled, portable equipment, light, washable, long-lasting, colorful, versatile, functional and ornamental, private and universal, mine and thine.”
—Radka Donnell-Vogt, U.S. quiltmaker. As quoted in Lives and Works, by Lynn F. Miller and Sally S. Swenson (1981)