By HENRY M. HOLDEN, For General Aviation News
May 6 was a very special day for Kevin Barbee and his mother, Vickie. It was Kevin’s 16th birthday — and the day that both student pilots soloed for the first time at Henderson-Oxford Airport (HNZ) in North Carolina.
Since Kevin didn’t have his driver’s license, his mother had to drive him to the airport, where both had been taking flying lessons at Empire Aviation’s flight school.
Kevin was the first in the family to express an interest in aviation. “We were sitting down to dinner one night, and I asked him if he had any idea what he wanted to be when he grew up,” said Vickie Barbee. “He said, ‘I think I want to be a pilot.’ He was so matter-of-fact about it I knew it was something that he had given some thought to.”
Barbee decided to go to Empire Aviation, and speak with Paul Hesse, a flight instructor, who told her he had a ground school starting that 14-year-old Kevin could attend, but noted the teen would have to wait until he was 16 before he could solo. That was in September 2008.
“We homeschool so I thought it was important to see what Kevin was doing so I could incorporate it into his homeschooling,” said Barbee. “I asked Paul if I could sit in on the ground school.”
“Vickie was very interested in all the safety aspects,” said Hesse. “She is a very protective mother.”
She also took an active role in the learning process, Hesse said, noting she was getting bored sitting in the classroom, so she decided to go with Kevin on one of his flights. “That was followed by her sitting in the back seat on every flight,” he said.
“I became interested, and I wanted to try it,” she said. “I took my Discovery Flight in February 2009.”
The mother-son duo soon became regulars at the airport. “The environment is just right,” Barbee said. “The pilots are all friendly, and knowledgeable, and help us out whenever we ask. It is a really nice place to be.”
Soon, the two were working at the airport. “At one point Paul said he could use some help around the office,” said Barbee. “I had office experience, so that was easy. Paul asked Kevin if he could wash airplanes, and if he wanted to fly some ferry flights with him. Kevin enjoys that. He likes the mechanical side of the airplanes.”
During all this, the pair continued their flight lessons. Hesse tried to get Barbee to solo a couple of times, but she didn’t want to upstage Kevin.
“She was ready and could have soloed before Kevin, but she didn’t want to leave him behind, in a sense. I admired that in her.”
“It was his challenge, not mine,” she said. “I thought that I’d wait until he soloed and then solo a couple of days later. I also thought I’d see how my nerves were on the day that Kevin soloed.”
Everything went well for Kevin. After the teen soloed in the 172, Hesse walked over to Barbee and extended his hand. “I knew if I didn’t reach out and say, ‘Vickie, it’s time,’ she would continue to postpone her solo,” he said. “She was ready, but a little nervous. It was interesting how she made the transition from excited mother to focused pilot.”
“It was great,” she said. “For Kevin and me to do this on the same day was spectacular.”
Kevin now is researching potential careers as a commercial pilot. “He’s interested in corporate jets or maybe FedEx, and we believe that he’ll find what he wants to do because he’s researching and carefully making decisions,” his proud mother said.
Meanwhile, Kevin continues his flight lessons. “He’s ready for his cross country,” said Hesse. “We’re going to do some instrument work and maybe by the time he gets his license he’ll be ready for his IFR check ride.”
Barbee also plans to get her private ticket.
“We’ve gotten so into aviation that unless the weather is really bad we’re out on the airport every day,” she said. “It’s not just about taking lessons. Every day is an adventure because we never know what we’ll be doing in aviation.”
For more information: Empire-Aviation.com.
Larry, I am a 24 year old self employed male from fly over country. I received my private ticket 3 weeks ago. I guess you could say I’m part of the next generation of general aviation? I read this article and shared in the joy this family must be currently feeling, then I notice your comment. I have a bone to pick with your post. I notice while researching GA sales trends that sales fell on their face in 2005/6… how do you blame that on the current administration? The democrats in congress weren’t sworn in until 2007. As an educated man, why must you view aviation through such politically polarized lenses?
I like to read story’s like this. It reminds me of what it was like, before Carter was President and anybody could afford to learn to fly and did! Many bought used airplanes afterwards and we would have “group fly-ins” and there were a lot of places you could fly to, that had a restaurant across the road or right on the field. Many had great reputations for excellent food and we went often! Aircraft ownership and certificated pilots were at an all time high! America was on a “roll” in aviation and the airlines were expanding by leaps and bounds!
When Carter came into office, the first thing he did was to “de-regulate” the airlines, ushering in their demise! Before he came into office, there were 57 airlines operating in America and they all made a profit! Now we only have 7 left and none is making a profit! Carter “stood the country on its head”, with income tax rates as high as 70% of income! He and the Democrats in Congress passed “massive social welfare legislation” that caused huge budget deficits (does any of this sound familiar, because history does repeat itself!). It caused interest rates to soar to 21.5% and inflation up to 21%.
People just quite buying and that included anything “extra” like flying lessons and airplanes! Before then, almost anyone with a good job and the “flying fever” could own an airplane! When you pay income taxes as high as they were back then, you haven’t anything left to buy “luxury items” like airplanes. Things haven’t been the same since. The price of aircraft started going up and up! The price of fuel and flight lessons went up and up! When I started flying, (before Carter), the cost of a new Cessna 150 was $4,000.00 and the cost of avgas was .25 cents a gallon. I could rent a Cessna 150 for $5 an hour wet and the rental cost for a 172 was $7 an hour wet. My first instructor cost $4 an hour! (You could even get a complete meal at McDonalds and get change back from your dollar!) If I wanted to “really splurge”, I could rent a new C182 for $11 an hour wet! Now its $150.00 and hour wet! What’s wrong with this picture? Do you see “the connection” yet?
Then came 1990 and the Democrats in Congress wanted to “Hit the Fat Cats right where they lived”! (I guess they figured that the “average Joe” was a “Fat Cat”.) So they passed the “Luxury Tax” and General Aviation was completely destroyed (as well as boat building and luxury auto manufacturing)! President Bush (I), said no! So they shut the government down, until he said yes, because they told everyone it was his choice! It was a lie, but it stuck! That was a “black period” in aviation history! Every manufacturer of General Aviation aircraft was bankrupted, within 6 months! They’d already been “hanging on by their fingernails”, since Carter bankrupted the country in the late 70’s!
Before the Democrats in Congress “decided to kill General Aviation”, so that they could “buy” welfare votes with the “estimated” $180 million dollars annually the “Tax” was “supposed” to bring in, a new Cessna 172 cost $23,246.00. The “Luxury Tax” added another 10% in federal tax on to the purchase price of the aircraft, over and above the sales and use taxes, that were already being paid by the buyer. That brought the total for a new aircraft up another $10-15,000.00 on average over the “field” of General Aviation aircraft. People refused to pay the price (or it put the cost out of reach) and the manufacture of General Aviation aircraft died! Millions of workers in the industry lost their jobs!
It wasn’t just the people who worked for now bankrupt Beech, Cessna, Bellanca, American Champion, Piper, Aero Commander and a host of others, it was all those who made cables, wiring looms, engines, small parts, batteries, aircraft tires, wheels and brakes and the list goes on. In total over 5 million workers lost their jobs directly. Most lost their homes and that caused a problem for the banks. People stopped buying cars and pickups, TV sets, etc. and it “ricocheted” across the entire economy! The “net loss” immediately to the “public treasury” alone in taxes coming in, was $1.6 trillion dollars, according to the notes, I kept at the time. The loss in wages was so massive, I couldn’t get my arms around it, but it was in the trillions of dollars eventually! The “net result” was the loss of the hundreds of aircraft that were not coming off the assembly lines, year after year. Those in foreign countries, where aircraft manufacturing didn’t exist, became scared and caused “a run” on late model aircraft to overseas markets, particularly in Africa, where distances are great and no roads exist in many countries.
Thousands of new and late model aircraft were being bought up by brokers and flown to “terminus cities”, where they were dismantled, crated and shipped on ocean going cargo vessels to overseas destinations! That drove the price of a near new Cessna 172 from $25,246.00 to over $60,000.00 in just 2 years! All of the company’s and all of their suppliers went bankrupt and then were sold off “piece-meal” to other companies. That is why no aircraft manufacturer is now owned by its “original principles”!
The General Aviation manufacturing industry had paid the highest worker earnings and benefits in the country and was a very stable industry, producing hundreds of aircraft, year after year, before Carter. After the “Luxury Tax” there was no production! When the industry was “bought up” by large unrelated firms and production began again, the price for new aircraft was “sky high” and most people were “priced out of the market”! I bought a new Citabria 7-GCBC in 1972 for “an outrageous” $9000.00. Still have it! Love that airplane! A dream to fly!
It has made me heart sick to see what “the greed for new taxes” to “buy welfare votes” has done to the industry I love! I was reading new aircraft prices in “Trade-A-Plane” the other day and a new “mid-line” Cessna is over half a million dollars! I was shocked!
The industry is now being forced into bankruptcy once again or out of the country, by over-regulation and more taxes! The company’s who build aircraft here, can no longer compete and pay high taxes too! We have “a government, for the government, by the government and of the government” and it’s killing America and stories like the one I commented on above.
It can be “turned around”, but not with the government we have now! It could be again, like it was before Carter, but radical changes would have to be made to our government to “get us back” to the happy care-free days of aviation that everyone could enjoy!
Now you know the “rest of the story”!