Veteran-Founded Semper Fly Builds Helicopter Pilot Pipeline at University of Oklahoma

Marine Corps veteran Brandi Rector co-founded Semper Fly, a helicopter flight school operating in partnership with the University of Oklahoma School of Aviation, aiming to build career pathways for military veterans and civilian students. Rector, who served two tours as a Marine Corps helicopter maintenance technician and door gunner, struggled after leaving service, at one point briefly experiencing homelessness and living out of a borrowed horse trailer, before earning a bachelor's degree in aeronautics and a master's in applied intelligence.

Rector and co-founder Mike Sanford pitched OU on a rotor program collaboration and received approval in February 2024. Within six months they welcomed their first students, and a year later Semper Fly achieved full FAA Part 141 certification. Program Manager Matt Bergthold, a former Boeing Chinook maintenance technician and Army chief warrant officer who led the certification effort, said the FAA recognized the school as the standard for helicopter training in Oklahoma.

The school currently operates three Guimbal Cabri G2 helicopters for new pilot training and one Bell 206B3 for turbine transition training, functioning as a Bell Certified Training Facility, and it also uses two flight simulators. The Guimbal Cabri G2 is a French-made, carbon-fiber helicopter designed specifically as a trainer, featuring a crash-resistant fuel cell and other safety features. The current semester enrolls 24 students and employs six instructors, a team that includes three former Marines, three former Army pilots, and two civilian hires.

Semper Fly received Department of Veterans Affairs approval to accept VA education benefits for approved training. In 2025 the school won an FBI helicopter training contract and is working on contracts with other law enforcement agencies; in 2026 it began training Oklahoma City Police Department officers to fly helicopters for patrol and other missions. The school's first graduate, Soami Ellis, an OU student, completed all courses in two years and joined Semper Fly as a flight instructor, currently working toward her CFII rating. Rector also launched Cleared4Flight, a consulting business helping pilots, particularly veterans, navigate complex aeromedical cases to obtain or recover their medical certificates, which has assisted nearly 20 pilots to date.

Semper Fly's trajectory illustrates how a small rotorcraft training operation can grow quickly when it pairs an academic partnership with a defined student pipeline: university approval, first students, and full Part 141 certification followed each other within about eighteen months. That sequence matters in a segment where certification timelines and instructor availability, not aircraft cost alone, often determine how fast a new school can scale.

The school's move into law enforcement contracts, first with the FBI and now with a municipal police department, points to a secondary revenue path for training providers beyond tuition and VA benefits: government and public-safety agencies need pilots trained on specific mission profiles, and a certified school with a compatible fleet can bid for that work alongside its core student pipeline.

What remains to be seen is how far Semper Fly's pursuit of additional partnerships, with tribal nations, the Department of Agriculture, medevac operators, the National Guard, air tour companies, and business aviation, converts into signed contracts, and whether its instructor roster and three-Cabri, one-Bell fleet can absorb that demand alongside its current 24-student semester.