A team of dedicated volunteers with the Citation Jet Pilots Owner/Pilots Association (CJP) recently celebrated the official introduction of the Russ Meyer Citation Library (RMCL), a vast online information resource for CJP members to use in operating their Citations.

Believed to be the largest such online repository for type-specific aircraft information, the library is the culmination of more than four years of discussion, web design and content aggregation. “This has been an incredibly fun project to work on,” said CJP member Steve Vollum, who along with CJP treasurer and director Tracy Forrest spearheaded creation of the RMCL. “I’ve waited two-and-half years to announce that the Russ Meyer Citation Library [is now] a reality.”

Vollum made that announcement in early September during CJP’s 2015 convention in Colorado Springs, Colo. He was joined onstage by Cessna chairman emeritus and RMCL namesake Russ Meyer, Jr., who told attendees that he was “still in awe of the tremendous amount of material up here.

“When we developed the very first Citation more than 40 years ago, we gave as much thought to supporting the product as we did to the aerodynamics and engineering,” Meyer said. “The RMCL is a natural, twenty first-century continuation of that ideal.”

More than 900 articles are loaded into the online library, grouped and cross-referenced among six categories (Purchasing and Owning, Training, Safety and Human Factors, Regulatory, Procedures and Techniques and Operational and Maintenance.)

The library includes a complete set of Cessna’s “Specification & Description” documents for each Citation model, as well as training and maintenance materials, accident analysis, pilot reports and many diverse articles selected specifically to interest Citation pilots and owners.

“CJP, as an organization, began as an information exchange,” Vollum explained. “It has evolved into the organization we see, with more than 900 members from 30 countries. Through our online forums, CJP has created a vast social exchange for information, but our success has also led to information overload.”

Organizing that information in a concise manner and drawing from content relevant to the Citation owner community from across the broad spectrum of the business aviation industry were the primary goals for the RMCL team. The team comprises researchers, software engineers, web designers and CJP members who volunteered their time and resources to build the library.

Library content was organized and curated from across a wide range of sources by a dedicated team of students at the Prescott, Ariz. campus of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, led by ERAU faculty member Randy Rehbach.

“Our intent was not to simply recreate content from other sources, but to revise it to address the specific needs of the Citation community,” Vollum said. “Without question, we have had tremendous success toward accomplishing our goal...but by definition, that goal will never be met. The RMCL is a living, breathing thing that will continue to evolve.”

The RMCL is available to CJP members at www.citationjetpilots.com.