How This Woman Became a Trailblazing Airline Pilot at 50 After Waiting 15 Years

Is it too late to make a career change at 50? Captain Carole Hopson left Corporate America to become an airline pilot at 50 and went on to become a United Airlines Boeing 737 Captain.

Carole dreamed of flying since age 4, built a successful corporate career—from journalism to the NFL to Foot Locker executive—spent five years saving for flight school, and reset her plan  after 9/11 and becoming a mom.

In this episode of The Tamsen Show, Carole shares how she turned a childhood dream into a practical plan, what it took to enter the airline industry later than almost everyone around her, and why starting over requires more than courage.

They get into:

- How to put a date on your goal and turn a dream into a plan

- The time and money it requires to pivot later in life

- The importance of surrounding yourself with people who believe in your next chapter

- Why deciding which fear is greater: making the leap or living with the regret

- How pioneering aviator Bessie Coleman inspired Carole’s novel A Pair of Wings and her mission to help send 100 Black women to flight school through the Jet Black Foundation

If you’re exploring women in aviation or how to become a pilot later in life, this is your proof it’s not too late.