Dan received his pilot's license in 1966 when he was an aerospace engineer in Southern California. Later he earned a PhD in Meteorology at UCLA.  He obtained data for his dissertation by chasing dust devils around the desert and gained the dubious honor of being called "Dust Devil Dan" by a newspaper once.  He worked as an atmospheric scientist for NASA for about 30 years and retired in January 2007.  His work included flight research to Antarctica and the North Pole as well as the tropical Pacific.  He and his wife Ruth got their plane, a Beech Musketeer, 11 years ago and have enjoyed traveling to many parts of the country, including the Florida Keys, Catalina Island Calif., Sedona, Arizona, Leadville, Colo., Lake Placid, NY, and Bozeman, Montana. They also have a hot air balloon, which is a good platform for seeing things, but is a little harder to maneuver to any particular place at a particular time, since the weather and winds affect it so much.  They have flown their plane over 1500 hours since 1996. Dan volunteered with SouthWings in March of 2007 and flew his first SouthWings mission on April 28th with the Friends of Hurricane Creek in Montgomery, Alabama.