Slightly cloudy skies, temperatures working their way up toward the 60s and the smell of sizzling bacon combined for the perfect flight conditions on Saturday for the Animas Air Park Pancake Breakfast and Fly.
More than 50 spectators and pilots gathered at Animas Air Park, a privately owned, publicly used air park about four miles from downtown Durango, around 8 a.m. Saturday for pancakes, bacon, doughnuts and coffee, and friendly flight competitions that would take off a little later in the morning.
More than 20 pilots attended the event, although just several were flying in flower-bombing and spot-landing competitions on the runway. Some attending pilots are hobbyists, others are aerospace engineers. And some are military veterans who have traveled the world, fought in wars and flown Boeing B52 Stratofortress bombers.
Bruce Odiorne, who runs the Animas Air Park Flying Club, said some pilots flew their own planes, parked in rows at the air park, from as far as Grand Junction, Phoenix and Tucson, Arizona.
“We try to get kids involved and show them aviation. The Animas Air Park Flying Club, it’s pretty dang cool,” he said. “I mean, look at this thing.”
He motioned toward a striped 1958 Cessna aircraft parked on the tarmac. He also flies a ’58 Cessna 182.
“This is a pretty good mountain plane. It’s considered a complex airplane,” he said. “You’ve got a GPS and you’ve got an ADSB, which is just basically sort of some safety device that tells people where you’re at, so you know where other planes are at so you don’t run into each other.
“This gives you some weather updates,” he said. “And then you just have your basic weather instruments for direction and speed and all that fun stuff.”
The dashboard intimidated Odiorne when he first started flying two years ago. But over time, he realized it’s pretty similar to a car’s dashboard, except its layout is different.
The day’s main events included flower bombing, where a pilot flies over the runway where a tarp target is situated adjacently and a passenger throws a bag of dirt at the target; and spot landing, where pilots aim to land their tires as close as possible to a line or lines along the runway. The pilot who lands closest to the line wins, Odiorne said.
“Everyone says this is one of the hardest places in the country to learn how to land,” he said. “People say if you can land here you can land anywhere in the country, anywhere in the world, because (other) runways are bigger unless you’re just in the backcountry or doing it in the dirt.”
Durango is known for its mountain and dirt biking, hiking, skiing and the Iron Horse Bicycle Classic, but the men and women of the Animas Air Park Flying Club are no different in their passion and enthusiasm for flying, he said.
“Some of these guys are pretty amazing,” he said.
Dave Rabazzi, who’s been flying for 20 years and started when he was 20 years old, said the people who fly little airplanes like his, a 1965 Cessna 180, which can fly at a maximum altitude of 18,000 feet and reach speeds of 160 mph, are hobbyists who want to share their hobby with other people.
He said the Animas Air Park Flying Club is hoping to make the pancake breakfast and fly more of an annual event.
Del Gregg, the third-generation owner of Gregg Flying Service stationed at Animas Air Park, said his grandfather started the flight business in 1950.
“We always try to promote this kind of stuff just because you’ve gotta get the (people) out to the airport, otherwise it just withers away,” he said.
Despite having flown for 45 years, Gregg isn’t tired of it. The sense of freedom and the ability to travel keeps him coming back. And as for traveling, it’s more about the journey than the destination, he said.
He’s been told by the state’s aeronautics organization the Animas Air Park is the No. 2 busiest private airport in Colorado.
“It’s convenient for a lot of people,” he said.
Odiorne said Gregg Flying Service even has a free shuttle car that people who fly into Durango can use to take a trip into town when it is available.
Callie Burgess, who participated in the flower-bombing competition, said it’s hard to time when to throw the flower bomb at the target. She missed her mark several times, but the weather and flying conditions were “perfect.” She felt a bit of turbulence when she got into the air, but she is so used to it, it didn’t bother her.
She said she’s been flying for four years and now flies jets.
“I came to Del’s hangar and rented his airplane and learned how to fly. And now I fly professionally,” she said. “... Great aviation community over here at Animas. I love to get people involved. I love to show people who aren’t involved in flying what it’s like. Make it fun. Eat breakfast. Make some games out of it. Keep it safe, keep it fun.”
She said the pancake breakfast was a chance to show children the joy of flying and demonstrate that they, too, can make a career out of it someday, just like she did.
cburney@durangoherald.com
