John Dutcher is very good at getting people up in small planes. The owner of the former Dutcher Paint building (now Love and Lace in Waverly) is the coordinator of the Young Eagles Kids Fly Free program out of the Waverly and Waterloo airports. He was recently recognized as one of the top three Young Eagles program coordinators out of 900 programs in the United States.
“We have one of the most outstanding Young Eagles programs,” he said. “They designated me as one of the three Young Eagles Coordinators of the Year.” On Saturday, he and other pilots from the Experimental Aircraft Association welcomed around 130-140 kids to the Kids Fly Free event at Waverly.
(At mid-morning he wasn’t sure of the final number.) The Kids Fly Free program is an annual event that invites children ages 8-17 to ride in a small plane with a private pilot. This time, one mom of a special needs child and one reporter who easily gets motion sick also got to tag along.
“We ended up with 170 kids registering,” said Dutcher. “Normally, we’ll have about 80% of that [who show up], because kids were registered two or three months ago, and all the suddetn they have an important soccer game or a wedding to go to and they can’t make it, but that’s OK.” Ronan Zollars, 9, of Waverly was one who made it, even though he didn’t know he was going to.
He was waiting for his flight, which would be his first time on a plane. “I think it might be pretty fun,” he said, and indicated that he wa.