Aero clubs help Air Force do business

Lt. Col. Stephen Hunter, departing from Florida's Eglin Air Force Base.

In Lt. Col. Stephen Hunter’s nearly four years of service at Florida’s Eglin Air Force Base, he regularly attended out-of-town conferences and meetings.

Hunter and his colleagues coordinated those trips with the base’s aero club, signed out airplanes, and flew off, utilizing the club almost like a motor pool for aircraft. At Eglin, college students and newly commissioned officers whom the Air Force identified as potential pilots underwent flight screening at the aero club to earn their private certificates, Hunter said. Pilots also could rent airplanes for recreational and family use at prices lower than elsewhere.

Hunter estimated that he flew 25 business trips with Eglin’s aero club, to such places as Colorado Springs, Colo., San Antonio, and Washington, D.C. The trips on general aviation airplanes saved a great deal of time and taxpayers’ money, he said.

With two people aboard, the cost was about 25 percent cheaper than flying commercially; for three people, about 50 percent cheaper, Hunter said. “The total travel time was about the same compared to flying commercial … even a little faster,” he explained. “For us, it was a much nicer flight.”

Additional savings on hotel rooms and meals not needed meant that flying through the aero club was “a really good deal for our squadron,” Hunter said.

Capt. Neal George, another member of the Eglin aero club, returns from a meeting in Washington, D.C.

Another advantage was the ability to secure airplanes on short notice. Hunter remembered “several instances” in which he could not have made a business trip “without a GA airplane being available.”

One meeting in South Carolina was called only the night before. To have flown commercially to Columbia, rented a car and driven to Sumter would have required an extra day of travel for Hunter and his two colleagues—time the man they were meeting did not have. Instead, said Hunter, the group requisitioned a general aviation airplane from the aero club, flew in, “sat down with the guy, had a very productive meeting with direct impact on U.S. operations in Iraq and flew home that day to have dinner with the family. I got to spend the time with my family as opposed to a day with the airlines.”

Total cost: under $500. Flying commercially would have cost $3,400, “taken three days and we still would have missed the meeting,” Hunter said.

Hunter recently was transferred to Nebraska’s Offutt Air Force Base, where he works for the U.S. Strategic Command—StratCom in military-speak—analyzing space policy as it relates to national defense. He joined Offutt’s aero club and plans to work on his CFI.

According to Ernie DeSimone, the Offutt aero club’s chief flight instructor, the base was the first on which such a club was established, in 1950, by Curtis LeMay, who later became Air Force chief of staff.

Maj. Natalie Mock, shown accompanying Hunter and George on a flight from Eglin to Texas’s Fort Hood to discuss air component contributions to irregular warfare.

Started to provide recreational flying opportunities for Air Force employees, aero clubs became places for aspiring pilots to train for their certificates. Aero clubs now train pilots on single- and multi-engine airplanes and for private, instrument, and commercial certificates, DeSimone said. Aero clubs at various Air Force bases are self-sufficient entities and help support other on-site recreational places, such as bowling alleys and golf courses, he added.

“It’s a wonderful environment. The rules and regulations are in place to keep [flying] safe and affordable for everyone,” he said. —By Hillel Kuttler

For additional information on Air Force aero clubs, go to www.usafservices.com/aero/directory.htm.