A CAP Love Story Takes Flight Over California

“Sometimes, flying feels too godlike to be attained by man,” Orville Wright said. “Sometimes, the world from above seems too beautiful, too wonderful, too distant for human eyes to see ...” The same could be said of real love, a thing seemingly too heavenly for mortal men and women.

But sometimes, heartstrings zing and the perfect person makes eye contact in an unlikely place – like Civil Air Patrol mission aircrew school. Just ask Capt. Jenny Lynn Burnett and 1st Lt. Travis Carney of the California Wing. Both are CAP mission pilots.

Burnett is a production accountant for the film industry, working on modern-day hits like “Lincoln” and “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.” She joined CAP in 2004 and is an advocate for the Ninety-Nines, the organization for women pilots that Amelia Earhart founded. She’s also the primary diversity officer for the California Wing as well as a a member of Hawker Senior Squadron 128, based at Van Nuys Airport.

Carney is a web application developer and a musician; instruments of all sorts fill the couple’s log home in the mountains.

He joined CAP as a cadet, left after two or three years and rejoined as a senior member in 2015. He’s commander of Cable Composite Squadron 25, serves as IT officer for inland Empire Group 3 and conducts training in aerial photography and CAP’s small Unmanned Aerial Systems program (sUAS).

Love stories happen every day—across crowded rooms, in gin joints, in Sunday school classes and on social media.

But the Burnett-Carney story is something else, especially as one of love in the time of COVID-19. In fact, the couple—married June 28—has already been on three honeymoons.

“It’s very unique for two CAP mission pilots to find love,” Burnett said. A  mutual good friend in their mission aircrew ground school class introduced them, Carney recalled.

(ANN thanks the CAP's Paul South for the story).

FMI: www.gocivilairpatrol.com