AEROSPACE EDUCATION: Gerrity Chapter member leads local Experimental Aircraft Association chapter

January 26 was the anniversary of the first gathering of the newly-formed Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA). Gerrity chapter member, chairman of the Oklahoma Aeronautics Commission and president of the local EAA chapter Jim Putnam (pictured with his grandsons at Altus AFB) tells us all about the EAA.

“The Experimental Aircraft Association is mostly in the US with some overseas chapters. We have about 900 chapters and over 120,000 members. The original mission was to help people build their own aircraft and fly them safely, and now that has expanded to encourage general aviation in as many ways as possible. There are now over 60,000 homebuilt aircraft flying. The FAA requires them to be listed as "experimental" as they are not commercially produced. The aircraft are monitored while being built and are inspected by the FAA and required to be test flown 40 hours before they are licensed with the FAA. The result is a fleet of safe and affordable aircraft flown by enthusiastic owners and builders.

I was involved for the first time with the EAA around 2002 or so when I was a Merit Badge counselor with the Boy Scouts and went through the local chapter of the EAA to fly our Boy Scouts for the Aviation Merit Badge. I learned a lot about the chapter then. Then in 2006 my Son and I drove to the huge EAA aviation exposition, called Air Venture, up at Oshkosh, Wisconsin. It was 8 days of non-stop flying, presentations, displays and airshows. It was heaven for pilots and aviation nerds! I joined the local chapter sometime around 2008 and in 2011 bought my airplane from a member with the help of another member and it was off to the races! Since then I have flown over 400 kids in the EAA Young Eagle program and have flown my plane to Oshkosh three times and gone on flying adventures to Alaska, Nova Scotia, Canada on the Atlantic coast, and flown into the high Rocky Mountain grass strips in the Idaho River-of-No-Return wilderness. Somehow I was wrangled into being a VP of the chapter in 2010 and have been the President for about 8 years now. We meet monthly, and were very active until the pandemic hit and now we are on hold for most things. Our chapter was active enough to be in the top 5% of all chapters (out of some 900) and won the Gold Level award for best chapters. Our fly-ins, landing contests, pancake breakfasts, Young Eagle kids flights, learn to fly days, chapter picnics and Oshkosh trips, as well as some in the chapter meeting once a week to build an airplane keeps us busy.

Right now we plan to fly kids six times this year. We'll meet at the Sundance Airport in North Yukon on Sara Road on the 4th Saturday of the month in April, May, June, August, September and October. Show time is 9 AM and the kids must have a parent or guardian to sign a release to let them fly. Kids must be between 8 and 17 years old. We take them up on a local flight for about 20 minutes and if they want to, they may gently handle the controls if they are in the co-pilot's seat. After the flight they get a log book, a free membership in the EAA and a membership card that gets them into over 200 science museums across the country for free. Since 1993 EAA chapters have flown over 2.5 million kids! We find that this exposure to aviation has the effect of kids being five times more likely to be involved in aviation in some way.”