High School Students Restoring Vintage Cub, Flying To Oshkosh
By Tom Patton
At Sun 'n Fun this week, you can step onto a time machine and help support the efforts of some young pilots to get to Oshkosh this summer.
The time machine is one of EAA's Ford Tri-Motor airplanes. Recognized as the aircraft that created the airline industry, the 10-seat airplane is making several flights each day boarding from the Warbirds area on the flight line of the airport.
A ride in the Tri-Motor, which we took Tuesday morning, takes you back to a time when there were no real airports, and the aircraft operated out of 40 acre fields across the country maintained by private landowners for Airmail service. EAA's captain for the airplane at Sun 'n Fun, Cody Welch, said that at the beginning of scheduled air service, one of the problems was a perception that airplanes were dangerous, and the three-engine configuration of the Tri-Motor was in large part to convince the public that air travel was safe.
The seats on the Tri-Motor are more comfortable than a coach airline seat today, but the noise level is high. Every seat has a large window, and every seat is also on the aisle.
During Sun 'n Fun, a portion of the price of each ticket for a flight aboard the Ford Tri-Motor "Spirit of Wichita" ... a 5-AT-B model … goes to support the projects of the Lakeland Aero Club, a high school flying club associated with the the Central Florida Aerospace Academy located on the Sun 'n Fun campus at Lakeland Linder Airport. Walk-up tickets are $75, according to the EAA Tri-Motor website. Mike Zidziunas, Lakeland Aero Club sponsor, said that the money raised will go towards paying for six new private pilots from the club to go to Oshkosh this summer.
To make the trip, the club has spent the last three years restoring a 1953 Piper LA-15C (pictured in photo from the Lakeland Aero Club Facebook page), the military version of a PA-18 Super Cub. "The project was donated to the club, and high school students spend every day after school working on the airplane," Zidziunas said. "We get 12 or 15 kids every day after school working on it. It's taken three years, it's a complete restoration." The students will be "barnstorming" from Florida to Wisconsin in the Cub, camping out along the way, Zidziunas said.
Two of those students, who were helping out getting passengers on and off the airplane Tuesday morning, as well as other marshalling duties, are Michael Jenkins (pictured, right) and Stephen Ohsiek (left). Jenkins, who also gave the seatbelt briefing aboard the Ford Tri-Motor, said that he's looking forward to flying to Wisconsin in the historic aircraft. "We put a lot of time in it. It's a fun ride," he said.
Ohsiek said that he's hoping to build some flight hours, but "I don't know if I want to go in that plane because I built most of it," he joked.
Both said that coming to Sun 'n Fun over the past several years had inspired them to get involved in aviation. Now, they'll have a chance to head to Oshkosh in July, thanks in part to those folks who take a trip back in time aboard a classic airplane this week at Sun 'n Fun.
(Staff images)
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