Experimental Aircraft Association Chapter 952 out of Cottonwood is offering free flights for children ages 8 to 17 on its biannual Young Eagles event on Saturday, Oct. 25, starting at 8 a.m. and going to about noon.
“Registration will be right out there on the lawn,” event organizer Chuck Losinski said standing on the Tarmac of the Cottonwood Airport. He pointed to the line of planes next to the taxiway. “Then the child will be paired up with a pilot, and then the pilot will go through a pre-flight [check]. So they’ll do like … a little educational session on the ground. And the child will sit in the front right seat, the passenger seat.”
Parents or guardians are required to escort their kids and sign waivers for them at the registration desk, but the flight is for the children.
There will be a variety of airplane types to fly in: Cessna 172s, Beechcraft Bonanza and Piper Cherokees.
“There might be more than one kid in the plane, but for the most part, we try and do one-on-one,” Losinski said. “Of course, the pilot will explain what’s going on, and potentially — depending on the age of the child, if they can seeover the dash — a little stick time.”
The airplanes will most likely take off to the south. Losinski said the wind often comes from that direction. They’ll fly toward Camp Verde and Interstate 17, loop around to fly near the Immaculate Conception Catholic Church over State Route 89A and then land back at the Cottonwood Airport. The whole flight will take 30 to 35 minutes.
“We flew about 50 in April,” Losinski said. “Probably have about 50 here in October.”
As of Tuesday, Sept. 30, he said about 25 kids have registered online. There will be about a dozen pilots participating, including a couple from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University’s Prescott campus.
“They’ll also be a couple of vendors, so to speak,” Losinski said. “Flight school out of Sedona, called Untethered Aviation, a guy by the name of Greg Brown out of Flagstaff will be here. He is a very well-known aviation author.”
At the moment, the EAA club does mostly educational programs on historical aircraft more than anything else, but a few of its members do own experimental airplanes.
“We shouldn’t call them ‘experimental,’” Losinski said. “We should call them ‘home-built.’”
He said most of them are Van’s Aircraft RV variants. Van’s Aircraft is a Oregonbased company from which customers can buy airplane kits from and build them, according to the company’s website. RV is a term it uses for nearly all its various lowwing monoplanes construction designs.
Losinski said one EAA member “built an RV-6 , which is a two seater, and then he built an RV-10, which is a four-seater hot rod.”
While most of the planes flown on Oct. 25 will be standard airplanes flown all over the world, there will be a few experimental options to fly in, but Losinski said they’re as safe as any of the other planes.
“Even the home-built ones have to go throughout [Federal Aviation Administration] approval,” he said. “So there’s an FAA guy that [comes], as you’re building an airplane. There’s … stage approvals that you have to go through.”
Each child is paired with a pilot who will then fly out on what they’re comfortable in, so they won’t fly an airplane they haven’t flown before. The pilot will go through an inspection of their aircraft before taking off. The focus for Cottonwood’s EAA is mainly education. It offers scholarships for ground and flight schools to get certifications.
“Through the generous support of the Ray Foundation, EAA provides up to $12,000 to deserving youths to help cover their flight training expenses, totaling $2,250,000 in annual scholarship funding,” the chapter’s website reads.
It says the scholarships are for ages 16 to 19 pursuing a Private Pilots license or for ages 15 to 19 pursuing a Glider Pilot certificate.
“In fact, we have one girl — she’s 17 — and … she’s completed almost all of her requirements, and we’re hoping by the end of the year, she’ll have her private pilot’s license,” Losinski said.
After the flights on Oct. 25, participants will receive a free pilot logbook, which pilots use to track their hours flying, and free access to an online private pilot ground school course, which is valued at $279.
Visit events.eaachapters.org/event-details/SY2052V3O to register.
