Alumni Updates

Carl Sorg (’79) is the director of aviation at the Johnson & Johnson Family Of Companies in West Trenton, New Jersey.

Capt. Karl Minter (’81) is a captain at United Airlines at Dulles Intl Airport in Dulles, Virginia. He is also a Board of Trustee member at Tuskegee University and a chairman of the Organization of Black Aerospace Professionals Board of Advisors. He is also a national board member for INROADS Inc., a national nonprofit that trains and develops talented, underrepresented youth for business and industry.

U.S. Army Reserve Col. Jeremy R. Baran (’96) graduated from the U.S. Army War College at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, with a master’s degree in strategic studies on July 24, 2020. A former resident of Longmont, Colorado, Baran resides in Saint Louis and supports Scott Air Force Base as a defense contractor. He will become the next chief of the Individual Mobilization Augmentee program and operations officer for Military Surface Deployment and Distribution Command at Scott Air Force Base in Illinois.

Mark Withrow (’02) is president and general manager of Kaman Composites U.S. He has led the composites sector at Kaman for the past three years. His team was recently awarded a 2020 Elite Supplier award from Sikorsky (one of 28 Elite Suppliers recognized from a pool of 11,000), and secured a $118 million contract from a major engine original equipment manufacturer.

Dana Novinskie (’04) is an evaluator pilot for Delta Air Lines in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Ben Hurlbutt (’10) is a SF-50 production supervisor at Cirrus Aircraft in Grand Forks, North Dakota. He is also president of the Cirrus Aircraft Flying Club – Grand Forks Chapter.

Banjaree “Moss” Potjanasit Score (’13), who is an analyst for the FOQA program in safety and regulatory compliance at Piedmont Airlines, was selected for the Piedmont President’s Award. Score has worked for Piedmont for five years.

Kyle Sigler (’16) is a geospatial chief in the U.S. Marine Corps. He was recently promoted to gunnery sergeant and is moving to a new fighter aircraft squadron to serve as imagery intelligence chief.

Oswaldo “Oz” Maitas (’05) married Didem Beydemir on Jan. 15, 2020, in Hong Kong. Maitas wrote: “We met at work in November 2018 on a flight to Munich, which we were both operating. I was born in Venezuela and went to school in the USA. Today, I feel extremely happy and blessed at having found the love of my life in a woman born in Turkey, while working in Qatar, on a flight to Germany and getting married in Hong Kong. It’s never too late, cheers!”

Andrew Fama (‘05), the U.S. Air Force’s (USAF) lead test pilot assigned to the HH-60W “Jolly Green II,” is among several Embry-Riddle alumni working on the USAF’s Combat Rescue Helicopter (CRH) program. He is pictured (at right) with fellow alumni Mike Bornemann (‘04), CRH lead flight test engineer at Sikorsky Aircraft Company (left), and Jordan Pfile (’18), a USAF contractor and flight test engineer civilian, in front of Whiskey 8 at the 2020 Air Warfare Symposium. Other alumni on the CRH team include: Danielle Bardinelli (’16), Sikorsky avionics team member; Dustin Freeman (’16), Sikorsky avionics flight test engineer; David Garza (’04), Sikorsky aircraft technician; Rachel Garza (’04), Sikorsky lead propulsion flight test engineer; Shawn Hammond (’17), USAF HH-60W project manager; Jeff Slayden (’84), Sikorsky manager of mission systems integration team; and Scott Wilkinson (’05), Sikorsky special projects flight test engineer. Fama writes: “What’s been fun about testing on this team is the instant connection that came with the common ERAU background many of us share as alumni. Many of the days feel like going to work with friends. Reminiscing about the old college days before a flight brief, flying together, having an old classmate clearing us from one test point to the next from the telemetry room. What will be rewarding is, in the end we will all have worked together to make something meant to save lives. I think that’s pretty cool.”