Ramping Up For 2010

2009 was a spectacular year for me in terms of aviation and social media. I was able to finally meet my co-host Will Hawkins. We attended the 6th Annual Living Legends of Aviation Awards in Beverly Hills. I volunteered at Sun ‘n Fun Radio with Dave Shallbetter for the entire week of the 2009 Fly-In. Through some miracle, I was able to attend EAA AirVenture Oshkosh. Better still, I was able to fly there with Jeb Burnside of the Uncontrolled Airspace Podcast. AOPA and myTransponder.com teamed up for the 2009 AOPA Aviation Summit in Tampa, FL and brought Mandy Irwin and I on board to co-host the meetups area. And finally, I was able to participate in the epic NASA Tweet-Up to see the launch of Space Shuttle Atlantis with a group of nearly 100 like-minded Twitter users.

2010 started off with a bang when I attended the media day for the 4th annual Valkaria Air Fest at X59. I was able to rub shoulders with some of the best in the airshow business, like Patty Wagstaff, Freddy Cabanas, Corkey Fornoff, John Black, and Chuck Vincent, among others. The airshow on the following day was nothing short of awesome, and dinner with the performers after the show generated some of the best hangar-flying in which I have ever had the pleasure of partaking.

April is here now and there is no time to relax. The 2010 Sun ‘n Fun Fly-In is barely over a week away, and the Editor-In-Chief of Sun ‘n Fun Radio (that is, yours truly) has a lot of work to complete before the show starts. We are really upping the ante this year in terms of the technology in the radio station. Much of it is behind the scenes, but there is one huge change that should excite many of you: thanks to the folks at LiveATC.net, Sun ‘n Fun Radio will streamed liveover the Internet for the first time! Oh, and this jet team, the USAF Thunderbirds, will be flying. Maybe you’ve heard of them?

On a side note, I stopped by my local Leinenkugel’s supplier today to order two full cases of Berry Weiss. I intend to return home with exactly none of it.

There will be very little time for me to recover from Sun ‘n Fun before I have to head to Michigan for Acro Camp. The event intends to make four ‘ordinary’ pilots, with little to no aerobatic training, and turn them into aerobatic pilots, capable stringing a series of maneuvers together into a short airshow – in four days. The entire event will be shot on camera and made into a movie. I have been asked by Steve Tupper (a.k.a. Stephen Force) to film some of the segments and manage the logistical behemoth of swapping memory cards and batteries as well as the offloading of the video files. The entire gig is going to be a non-stop whirlwind of tornadic activity, and I am thrilled to be a part of it.

Afterwards, I get to step away from the aviation stuff for a short time in preparation for the birth of my daughter in July. I consider this an investment of time and love to bring yet another future aviator into the world.

Later in the year is the Cocoa Beach Airshow. The USAF Thunderbirds are scheduled to be there this year, and I intend to bring it to you. Yes, that’s twice I will get to see them this year, a fact about which I am super-stoked.

I am sure there will be more events, more airshows, and more aviation and aerospace goodness than I have mentioned here, but this is a good start. Yes, 2010 is shaping up nicely.

Tagged as: Air show, Events, Sun 'n Fun, Volunteer