Trying to add a payment method? You can do this on the 
National Aviation Week starts Wednesday, Aug. 19, the birthday of Orville Wright. In 1903, he became, after a coin flip with his brother Wilbur, the first person to fly a powered airplane.
By the 1930s, the skies above Lane County were busy with these exciting, loud and dangerous contraptions. To help flight grow safely, programs were launched to train pilots and mechanics, one of which would become the Lane Community College Aviation Academy.
The week gives us a reason to pause and celebrate Lane County, with six airports, two aircraft museums, and leading flight training and drone programs.
During the early days of flight, auto dealer and former University of Oregon student Mahlon Sweet promoted construction of a new airport to relieve the noise and safety complaints from the in-town Eugene Airpark. The Eugene Airport would open in 1943 and become the state’s second busiest.
And what about the need for pilots and mechanics? A program at the Eugene Vocational School was born, and became, in 1967, the Aviation Academy within LCC.
In the 1980s, roughly two-thirds of commercial pilots came from the military. Now, even with increased demand, the military portion is one-third, with the difference being made up by flight schools like LCC’s.
But the military has lots of aircraft. To train pilots and mechanics, schools need access to planes — and LCC owns 12 for its flight school alone.
“We’re one of the few community college programs nationwide that owns our own airplanes and does all our maintenance in-house,” said Sean Parrish, LCC’s chief flight instructor.
The popular LCC maintenance program has a two-year waitlist, and a visit to their large hangar is any gear-head’s dream. It has six more airplanes in various states of disassembly, two helicopters and a seemingly endless supply of parts and equipment.
In 2006, a new kind of aviation took off when the Federal Aviation Administration issued the first commercial drone permits. Demand continues to soar, driven by improving technology, falling prices and many new applications.
The LCC aviation program had seen this movie before: the need to train people to pilot, design, build and repair a new kind of flying machine.
So it was natural for them to create a drone program, which began in 2018. Their pitch to potential students: “Not only will you fly drones, you’ll get to design and build them.”
Drone training is not safe at a busy airport like Eugene’s, so that takes place at the main LCC campus, and the more remote Oakridge airport. Kenji Sugahara, director of the Oregon Department of Aviation, has been working to revolutionize what’s possible in Oakridge, with a major renovation just completed.
When asked what that area might be like in 10 years, he said, “It really could be a logistics and emergency management hub. Imagine both fixed wing and vertical takeoff drones, as soon as there’s a fire in the mountains, going out to assess the problem and maybe even put it out. And they’ll be able to move medical supplies quickly.”
That could be a major benefit to the Oakridge area, where wildfires often start from lightning strikes in hills and densely forested areas firefighters can’t reach.
Two local museums provide also provide a close-up look at many types of aircraft built over the years: The Oregon Air & Space Museum at the Eugene Airport, and the Oregon Aviation Historical Society & Museum at the Cottage Grove State Airport. Be sure to check their hours before you go.
