You Can Fly: Only Mite left in Alaska

An Alaska high school employee made plans to pluck a 1950s-era wooden aircraft from the rafters of a Wasilla hangar and transport it by school bus to the tiny village of Nenana, more than 200 miles away, for restoration. Pilot and Nenana school maintenance worker Paul Carattini recognized the quirky Mooney M18C could become a valuable teaching tool.

“We worked out a deal for a little bit of cash and a donation,” said Carattini, who hopes the “only Mite left in Alaska” will inspire the next generation of aviators. The diminutive Mooney has a Continental C65 four-cylinder engine with 400 hours. “It’s properly pickled and the engine is worth more than the little bit of cash we paid for the project,” he said. Students will learn the fine art of hand-propping the little 65-horsepower engine since it has no electric starter system.

Carattini thought a hands-on aircraft restoration would be an ideal teaching platform, because students could apply science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) concepts to a real project while learning valuable skills. After several delays, 12 students studying the school’s STEM curriculum, including seven in the aviation program, piled into a yellow bus for the rescue. 

They were scheduled to pick up the Mooney Mite in early March. However, when they went to retrieve it a transmission line on the bus blew, delaying the trip. The bus was repaired and Nenana School District Superintendent Eric Gebhart said the trip to secure the pint-sized aircraft went off without a hitch in early April.

The small K-12 public school began its aviation program in 2013 with eight students who learn everything from aircraft maintenance to flying skills. Some students carpool an hour to the Fairbanks airport for flight lessons in a Cessna 172. Nenana has an after-school aviation maintenance program on campus for students interested in becoming A&P mechanics. Aviation plays an important role in Alaska’s mostly rural environment, where far-flung villages are linked by a network of small landing strips to resources for health care, food, clothing, and other necessities.

Carattini and Gebhart are also excited about the wood-wing Mite because the school is outfitted with most of the woodworking tools students need to bring the aircraft back to life.

The minuscule airplane fits snugly inside the shop near the Nenana Student Living Center. About 80 students of the 175 enrolled bunk in the center because the school is miles away from their parents’ rural backcountry homes and villages. 

Gebhart, who is not a pilot, proudly points to four students who have already earned their private pilot certificates “and we’ll have two more this year.” He said he imagines “the day when one of my kids will be the pilot flying me around. There’s such a need for pilots in every part of the state and we’ve just been pecking away at it.”