In his distinguished Navy career, David was an operational flight pilot and Flight Commander at sea, flying the Seahawk anti-submarine helicopter. He was a flying instructor and the Senior Naval Officer at RAAF Pearce for advanced pilot’s course and was then posted as the Navy representative at the Central Flying School RAAF East Sale where he taught flying instructors and was responsible for flying instructional standards across the ADF. David was honoured to be only the 2nd navy pilot selected to fly with the ‘RAAF Roulettes’ formation aerobatic display team and the 1st to fly as Deputy Team Leader and
Leader of the Synchronised Pair. After leaving the Navy, David spent 8 years in Saudi Arabia working for BAE Systems instructing Royal Saudi Air Force pilot and instructor students. As the Head of Training for the King Faisal Air Academy, he developed the Saudi Flying Instructors program bringing instructional training from the United Kingdom to Saudi Arabia for the first time. Since returning to Australia, he helped develop the latest ADF pilots and instructor’s courses and has been working as a Human Performance and leadership coach across Defence and the Oil and Gas industry throughout SE Asia and Australia.
Recently, he has worked within the RAAF Directorate of Human Performance and Safety as the Human Performance and Risk Specialist for RAAF Williamtown, as well as a lead facilitator for the Directorate of Navy Culture in leadership development. He lives in Newcastle NSW with his wife Emma and 4 children and alongside his Navy reserve commitments, he works in his own Human Performance and Leadership consultancy, Purple Communications.