The Aero Experience: Saturday Flight Training and Aircraft Maintenance Activity at Creve Coeur Airport

By Carmelo Turdo

The Creve Coeur Airport community continues to grow and provide more opportunities for people to enjoy the wonders of aviation in this new year. From a high school STEM program to flight training to military grade helicopter operations, we cover it all in this brief story from our visit on Saturday.

The Gateway Youth Aeronautical Foundation hosted week six of their Intro to Flight Program for Sessions 10 and 11. The eight-week course provides a ground school lesson and V/R flight simulation each Saturday for high school students seeking a career in aviation. Here we show the students practicing their pattern work on the simulators and visiting this week's class sponsor, Piston Aviation.

The Piston Aviation fleet was in the air, with students working the pattern and going on local training flights. Here we show Piston Aviation's Bristell LSAs launching throughout the day.

Gateway Flight Training was also active on Saturday. Their Piper Warrior is shown here with a solo student getting some practice in the pattern. We also visited their maintenance hangar, where their Piper Arrow complex trainer is undergoing inspection and a customer's Bonanza recently received an engine replacement.

The Army Aviation Heritage Foundation Gateway Chapter continues to perform winter maintenance on their Huey and Cobra helicopters. Chapter members work on these popular Vietnam-era military aircraft each Saturday, and most weekdays as well, to ensure that they are ready for the upcoming airshow and ride event season.