Best day yet for pilots, students
Susie Gruber/Courtesy Photo - Cliff Naser gives students instruction on how to build a plane, demonstrating with this Zenith CH 701 plane he built at Desert Aire.
Susie Gruber/Courtesy Photo - Karl Gruber, manager of the Desert Aire Airport teaches students about flight planning, weather and navigation. He brought his Piper Cherokee for the students to see.
Susie Gruber/Courtesy Photo - Speaking about the importance of aviation to about 30 Wahluke High students, Ken Broda tells his story of flying U-2 Spy Planes for the military. In the foreground is STEM teacher Myron Hamilton.
DESERT AIRE – Students from Wahluke High School visited airplane pilots who reside at Desert Aire last week for the third straight year, and the pilots were pleased with the outcome.
“It was the best one of the three years,” Desert Aire Airport Commission member Ken Broda said.
One reason for that was probably a change of venue for the classroom portion of the day. Instead of the pilots going to the high school, the students gathered at the Sagebrush Senior Center, a popular meeting place at Desert Aire.
“The students were very attentive,” Broda said. “They weren’t distracted by bells (for classroom changes) or other students.”
This exchange was the brainchild of STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) teachers. The goal is to give a new group of STEM students each year a look at how their textbook learning is applied in the world.
In addition to Broda, the presenting pilots were Desert Aire Airport Manager Karl Gruber, Cliff Naser, Vince Himsl and Chuck Fuller.
Himsl had his home-built RV-9 plane for the students to walk around. Fuller had his Grummond Traveler. And Naser brought his home-built Zenith CH 701.
The students arrived after 8 a.m. After some commiserating, they were introduced to the pilots. At 9:30 they were divided into four groups to rotate through the planes and two demonstrations – computer flight planning and riveting, which is key to plane construction.
Teachers, students and pilots had lunch together and visited at about 11:30, and the students went back to the high school in time for 1 p.m. classes.
Broda offered most of the classroom instruction. He spoke about the history of aviation and its many practical uses.
Broda also spoke about how Newton’s laws of motion – inertia, acceleration, reaction – apply to flying. He spoke about Bernouli’s principle of lift generated by an airplane wing.
Broda learned something as well. There is a big difference between a flyer’s lifestyle and economics and those of the students they addressed.
“None of these of these kids had ever been in a plane,” he said. “I was really surprised by that.”