Don Schmotzer is our Vice-President and Safety Officer. You can tell right away that he knows what he is talking about concerning aviation. Don routinely delivers presentations on safety and pertinent aviation issues at our chapter meetings, which are well received and much appreciated. Here's what Don says about his background in his own words:

    "I have a commercial ticket for single & multi-engine land aircraft. I have about 1600 hours of flight time in at least 20 different types, but my favorite type of flying is stick & rudder, grass-roots, wind in the wires, tube wood and fabric, tail-dragging, puddle-jumping, leather and googles,  can't-believe-I-found-the-airport, ole-timey, grass-field, bounce-em-in, didn't we have fun today, hedge-hopping, wind-sock, dead reckoning, FUN flying."

    Don bought the very nice Taylorcraft shown in the photos below in June of 2007 ... which he now flies every chance he can get Don is shown with his new beauty in the center photo below. Click on the photos to enlarge them.

    Don and his son, Stan, also jointly own the very nice Cessna 172 Skyhawk shown below. Stan (bottom right) has about 3000 flight hours as a loadmaster on a C-17 in Charleston. He has flown in and out of a lot of "bad" places since 9/11. He was recently honored as Charleston's "Airman of the Year" for 2005. He is also a good pilot with a private license and an instrument rating to boot. He has about 600 hours of pilot in command time now.

     Stan has finished his 4-year college degree and recently graduated from Officer Candidate School (OCS), where his girlfriend pinned on his 2nd lieutenant bars (see photo below). He is now attending 11 months of flight school in Columbus, MS. When finished, he will be flying the very same C-17s on which he was previously a loadmaster. As you can imagine, Don (taking photo) and Diane (2nd from left) are two very proud parents.