Pilot Training Resources

Back in 1989, I was flying a Rockwell Aero Commander for a freight company, mostly hauling the US Mail, and mostly flying a regional route back and forth across Nebraska. Being a “real” pilot, the thought of ever flying an ultralight aircraft never even crossed my mind. Matter of fact, in the course of flying all over the place, it was pretty rare that I would even see ultralight airplanes. Then one day, I was overnighting in Alliance, Nebraska, as my job required me to do every other night. If you’ve never been to Alliance, Nebraska, let me save you a trip and tell you that the only things I found to do there were to go to the bar and drink or go to the library and read. Since I was a pilot, I did a lot of reading.

In any event, one day I was bored more than usual, so I actually headed out to the airport to hang out there (yes, I know, I was a sick puppy). The gentleman that ran the FBO there was an older guy who was in the sunset of his years. We would spend time chatting and this guy loved aviation. Anyways, we were talking and out of the blue he said to me, “Come over here, I want to show you something.”

He took me to the side of the hangar where a small ultralight airplane was sitting there looking real fragile. It was one of those small Quicksilver open air, side by side ultralight airplanes. I don’t remember too much about how he got it, but he wanted to know if I wanted to go up in it with him. I was pretty hesitant about strapping my butt into this, well, this thing. Yet, I trusted the old man and figured he wouldn’t be putting me or himself into harms way, so I agreed and we strapped ourselves into this ultralight airplane.

He got it started and I couldn’t get over how my feet were sitting just a few inches above the asphalt of the taxiway. We were taxiing out and a gust of wind caught the wing, and we started to tip over to the right. He made a correction and got both the wheels onto the ground again, but we were still moving along at a pretty good clip. All of a sudden, my buddy, the guy who I put all my trust into, realized that there were no brakes on this ultralight airplane, and we needed to stop. In an act of panic, I tried my best Fred Flintstone imitation and tried to brake us by dropping my feet down to the moving asphalt. What a stupid idea! I was lucky that I didn’t break my ankle or leg with that manuever. Anyway, we finally slowed down and my buddy announced to me that he thought it was too windy to fly this thing todayl. I was kind of glad to hear that and we taxiied back to the hangar. It was 16 years later before I got into any kind of ultralight airplane again.

The year was 2005 and it was a powered parachute. What a thrill! I saw my first powered parachute up close at a fly-in of ultralight airplanes in Marshall, Michigan. I met a gentleman that said he’d teach me how to fly the powered parachute if I would come visit him at his home base in Indiana. With my wife’s blessing, I took off for a few days to see what this form of aviation was all about.

With the high cost of aviation fuel and aircraft rental, it was only a matter of time before my aviation interests turned towards powered parachutes and ultralight aircraft. I saw my first powered parachute up close at an aviation event in Marshall, Michigan in late summer of 2005. It was a powered parachute manufactured by a company called Buckeye in Indiana. This particular powered parachute was called the Legal Eagle, because it contained only one seat and met all of the ultralight requirements of Part 103, the set of FAA regulations that govern ultralight flight.

I sat in the Legal Eagle and immediately knew that flying powered parachutes was something that I wanted to try. Even though I had been flying airplanes since I was 15 years old, I still wanted to get closer to low and slow flight, just like the birds, and powered parachutes offered me that opportunity.

If you’ve never seen a powered parachute, they basically fall into two groups. The first group is called the “butt fans”, and is basically a parachute that is mounted to an engine pack that is strapped onto your back. Your legs and feet comprise the landing gear, and take-off is basically you starting the engine, pulling your parachute into the air above you, advancing the throttle to full speed and running into the wind as the chute lifts you off the ground. It take a bit to master, but is basically the least expensive way to get into powered parachutes.

The other category of powered parachutes looks more like a dune buggy. You climb into it and sit down. Once the engine is started, the chute pretty much comes up on its own, at which time you advance full throttle, but instead of running like a maniac trying to get airborne, you simply roll in your dune buggy-like flying contraption as your chute lifts your dune buggy into the air. This is the type of powered parachtue I decided I wanted to learn in, as I didn’t think my 44 year old landing gear could stand any mistakes on my part. I didn’t know what to think because all my previous flight time was in fully enclosed aircraft. I quickly found out that this type of flying was a real blast. Nothing about this type of flying was all that difficult. Obviously learning how to properly land the pwered parachute is what takes most of the time. Luckily, it is fairly straight forward and usually mastered within a few hours at the most.

Powered parachutes are not all that expensive, but depending on the size of the engine, number of seats and other options, they can get pricey. I’ve never seen a fractional ownership program for a powered parachute, but it wouldn’t surpise me to see someone come up with one in the near future.

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