I had the very unique opportunity to travel to Knoxville, Tennessee and speak with the Deaf Pilots Association about flying clubs in June. It was their 20th annual fly in. They met at the Tennessee School for the Deaf, very conveniently located near KDKX. Among many other activities, they were deciding what to do with a donation aircraft.
Kevin Wills, the DPA president, asked me to share information about flying clubs as one of their options. With Greg Turner, AOPAIS, on the phone to field insurance questions, I chatted with the DPA members via interpreters for almost two hours. I think I learned more about the communication process of forming a club than they did!
As I suspected, the top concerns were insurance and tax filing. These are the topics we featured in our past two webinars. If you haven’t seen them, I suggest you check them out!
Interestingly, there was a group visiting from France. The French interpreter, Henri Corderoy du Tiers, spoke to the group about flying clubs in France. He said that the cost of flying in France can be quite prohibitive, far more so than here! Flying clubs are what makes it affordable. He spoke of all the opportunities he had to fly different types of aircraft in a club, as well as the bond among club members. He spoke passionately about flying clubs being the most sustainable means of staying in the air.
The discussion that afternoon made a great impression on me and it is an example of why the flying club initiative is so important to all of us.
