Girl Scout comes to the aid of S.C. airpark community

When most people think of Girl Scouts, they do not get too far past cookies.

However, the Girl Scouts of the United States of America have a Gold Award, which is the highest award a Girl Scout can earn. The award indicates the recipient can not only make a difference, but already has.

Earning the Gold Award typically requires a minimum of 80 hours, spread over researching the idea, creating and documenting a plan, gathering feedback, and finally implementing the plan.

Molly Cwian had been struggling to come up with a unique project for her Gold Award when the idea came out of the blue, landing right in front of her house. Molly lives at Williamsport Airpark (SC86) in Easley, S.C., which boasts a 2,400′ grass runway.

The airport community she calls home is 15 to 20 minutes from the nearest fire station, and this caused her some concern. What if someone had an accident on the field? With no fire extinguishers or other emergency equipment at hand, how could we save someone’s life in the event of an accident?

Molly soon realized building and outfitting two emergency equipment stations on her home airfield would be a worthwhile project, plus it would match the requirements for the Girl Scouts Gold Award program.

Given the length of the runway, close to a half a mile long, building two small emergency stations would be best, she decided.

With idea in hand, she presented her idea to her Girl Scout leadership, and approval quickly followed. Next she presented the project to the pilots in the airpark’s Home Owner’s Association (HOA). She contacted the community’s active pilots and invited them to her parent’s home to discuss the project. When the pilots arrived, she had a large aerial photograph laying on the dining room table, and a list of proposed safety equipment.

The pilots pointed out that there were two windsock towers on one side of the runway, a third of the way from each end, and placing the emergency equipment on these existing towers would be both accessible and visible locations.

Because the towers are on private property, Molly had to get approval from both homeowners to mount the emergency equipment to the towers. Due to the nature of her project, approval was quickly granted.

Not only was Molly able to receive permission to use the existing windsock towers to mount her proposed emergency equipment on, the neighbors stepped up and procured halotron and ABC fire extinguishers, as well as crash axes for her project. Halotron is a noncorrosive extinguishing agent that can be used on aircraft, while the ABC fire extinguishers can be used on grass or maintenance equipment fires.

On Sunday, March 15, 2020, Molly held a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new emergency equipment. She also invited a local firefighter to demonstrate to the Girl Scouts of Troops 2831 and 1289, as well as the residents of Williamsport Airpark, how to properly discharge a fire extinguisher.

Williamsport resident Clayton Kerr expressed the feelings of the entire airpark community by stating, “It is important to support kids who express an interest in aviation and here is a young lady who is doing something to support our little aviation community. Not only that, but Molly is doing something that could save our lives and potentially save a house or stop a grass fire. When you have a child who wants to be part of a community, it is important that we support her. We want to encourage and support her because she is part of OUR community.”