Super Lawyers: Ten Things You May Not Know About Michael Slack

We learned quite a few facts about Slack Davis Sanger Managing Partner Michael Slack after reading his profile in the Texas 2014 Super Lawyers magazine, titled Mission: Control. We thought we’d share here on our website. But, of course, we also highly recommend that you read the article. It’s good!

1. Michael Slack wanted to be an astronaut. A few weeks after Mr. Slack graduated from high school, Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. “I didn’t care about anything other than the space program – that was my world.”
2. An accomplished pilot, Mr. Slack does rolls and aerobatics in a WWII aircraft to experience the “sheer joy” of flying.
3. Mr. Slack received his bachelor’s and master’s degree in aerospace engineering from Texas A&M University.
4. Before becoming a lawyer, he worked at NASA on the Apollo-Soyuz Test project.
5. He almost stayed in Houston. He was offered a spot in the University of Houston law program.
6. He elected to enroll instead at The University of Texas at Austin after receiving advice from an assistant White House counsel that, “he was crazy not to go to Austin.”
7. He met Slack Davis Sanger founding partner Tom Davis (co-founder Mike Davis’ father) while handing in the keys to a plane he had just rented and flown. After this meeting, he went on to work for Mr. Davis as a law clerk.
8. Aviation litigation filled a gap NASA couldn’t: “One of the things that I was missing in my career at NASA was people contact.”
9. Mr. Slack asks for what he wants: “I decided more than 15 years ago, we want to look for something that we can ask for in every case as a change in the behavior or modification.”
10. As a result of a recent case, Mr. Slack helped implement a fuel tank modification for a popular model of helicopters that was very vulnerable to post-impact fires in low-deceleration, survivable impacts.