Page 9 - January 2022

His flight career started at Sierra Aeronautical Academy in the Bay Area right after he finished high school. After flight training, he worked as a flight instructor in the academy’s Air China and Korean Air training programs. He earned his first type rating at the age of 20, flying cargo in the Fairchild Metroliner SA227. He next moved
to a regional airline on the East Coast and then
in 2005, the 23-year-old Stockton accepted a
job as captain of a King Air 350 owned by four
real estate developers in Southern California.
He flew the airplane and coordinated with a local charter and management company that the owners were using to manage the King Air. His entrepreneurial spirit emerged quickly, though, and he wanted to do more than just fly the airplane.
“I reached out to my bosses, who are now my partners, and proposed starting our own charter company,” said Stockton, now 40. “The original response I got was no. So I said we can either start the company or consider this my letter of resignation and I’ll go fly for the airlines. They responded back, ‘Well, it looks like we’re starting a new charter company.’”
“The key to Advanced Air’s success has been taking the assets we have and finding opportunity with them.”
Advanced Air launched in 2005 and in November 2007 was issued a Part 135 Air Carrier Certificate. As they started to grow their fleet of managed and owned aircraft,
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JANUARY 2022
KING AIR MAGAZINE • 7