Pilotage

Aviation writer and corporate pilot Mark R. Twombly is based in south Florida.

Jim Dello wanted to do something special for his son Keith's fifteenth birthday. Give him a unique present. Jim's wife — Keith's mother — had died a few years earlier, and Jim was looking for something that might capture his son's imagination. "I was a typical parent," he says. "I was worried which direction he would take."

After thinking it over, Jim drove up to the hilltop airport just south of Wellsville, New York, and spoke to Gary Barnes, owner and chief pilot of Wellsville Flying Service. He left with a gift certificate for one half-hour introductory flight.

As birthday presents go it was a bit of a gamble. Growing up, Keith had shown only a casual interest in aviation. "We liked looking at airplanes," Jim says, "but he had no particular interest in flying."

Keith redeemed the certificate. Barnes took him up in a Piper Tomahawk, but not for a circle-the-house fun flight. "It was a real introduction to flight instruction," Keith remembers. "He was trying to teach me how to fly."

The intro flight accomplished what Dad had hoped — it piqued his son's interest to the point that he went back for more. That was a half-dozen years ago. Now 21, Keith is celebrating his one-year anniversary flying the Bombardier Canadair Regional Jet 200 for Air Wisconsin Airlines.

How did it happen? How did a kid at a vulnerable age suddenly set his sights on learning to fly and then resolve to pursue it as a profession? The odds that a first flight will take root and blossom into a calling are hardly worth betting on, but was this the rare case?

Yes, the intro flight got him started, Keith says, but even after he began taking lessons he never looked at flying as a potential career. Barnes, however, saw potential and made Keith an offer. "He was a heck of a good young kid," Barnes says, "and super as far as his flying ability. I told him that if an opening came up and he was interested, he could work here at the airport, earn some money, and get a discount on his lessons."

The opening occurred, Keith said he was interested, and Barnes hired him to work line service. The part-time job put Keith in regular touch with pilots and airplanes, including the Adelphia flight department based at the airport. That insight, and the confidence he quickly developed in his flying skills, began to shape his thinking. "I slowly got hooked on the whole aviation thing," he says.

Keith joined the recently formed aviation club at Wellsville Central High School. My brother Gerry had helped organize the club with some help from another brother, Steven, and me (the three of us had graduated from Wellsville high), and teacher-volunteer Sue Dibase. We also established an aviation scholarship fund in memory of our father, who had been a pilot mentor to each of us. Gerry and Sue thought Keith should be the first recipient of the annual scholarship. It was an easy choice.

Keith applied the money to his flying account at the airport and continued with his lessons. After graduating from high school he enrolled in a professional-pilot degree program at the Community College of Beaver County, Pennsylvania, where he earned the basic pro-pilot certificates and ratings. He helped fund his instruction by working the line at Beaver County Airport.

After he graduated, Barnes offered him a job — provided he got a flight instructor certificate. Keith spent a month at American Flyers, then with freshly minted CFI/CFII certificates in hand, reported for work. "He is one of those guys who is willing to do anything to further his career," Barnes says.

Keith spent a year at Wellsville Flying Service instructing and flying a Piper Aztec and Navajo with Barnes. At age 20 he was closing in on 1,000 hours' total time when he got a call from one of his former instructors at Beaver County, who was flying as a first officer for Air Wisconsin. "He said they were hiring," Keith remembers, "and he thought he could get me an interview. I didn't believe him, but I went for the practice." He became the youngest pilot hired by the regional carrier.

Today he's based in Norfolk, Virginia, where he shares a crash pad with other pilots. I reached him in Charlotte on a layover. "Oh, I love it," he said. "It's a good job. It's what I wanted. I'm flying a sophisticated airplane, with good crews, and having fun." He doesn't know yet where his piloting career will take him, but he has at least 40 good years ahead to enjoy the flight.

When Jim Dello thinks back to that special birthday present, he must be very pleased. "I'm proud of him," he says. "I think it's great. If more kids were exposed to it [flying], they would choose it as well."

He's right. George Mickle just finished his senior year at Wellsville high, where he served as president of the aviation club, and where he received the Ralph Twombly aviation scholarship for 2006. He's preparing to take his private pilot checkride, he's working the line at the Wellsville airport, and he's looking into professional pilot degree programs at area colleges.