In celebration of the 35th anniversary of the EAA Air Academy in 2018, we’re featuring Air Academy graduates whose stories inspire and exemplify the impact of the program.
Young Eagles flights can have a dramatic impact on young people. Kyle Chmielewski, EAA 1180535, got his first airplane ride when he was 12 years old. By age 13, young Kyle was in flight training.
Years earlier, Kyle would often accompany his father to work at UPS in St. Petersburg, Florida. The airplanes there captivated him and held his attention while his father was making sure every cargo pallet got to the right place.
After his Young Eagles flight, Kyle heard about an opportunity to further delve into aviation from the same chapter who provided his first flight.
“We heard about the Air Academy but there was really no way to get in,” Kyle said. “My mother talked to somebody that was part of the Sarasota chapter, and they had some leftover funds. They gave me I don’t know how much money, but they paid for part of my academy in ’06, that’s how I ended up going there.”
Like many EAA Air Academy graduates, while the airplanes and other aircraft were great, it was the other people there in Oshkosh who loved flight as much as he did that stood out to Kyle.
“I was just with like-minded people, who were enthusiastic about aviation as I was,” he said. “From the staff, to the kids, to everything I guess you could say, which is pretty neat.”
Just as he went rapidly from his first flight to flight training, Kyle made great progress in the years immediately after he attended the Air Academy. By age 17 he had his private pilot certificate. By 18 he had his instrument rating, and at age 19 Kyle obtained his multi-engine rating, as well as his commercial and CFI certificates.
Kyle became an independent CFI, working with roughly 20 private clients. As his reputation and skill grew, the airplanes he got to fly became bigger, and then an opportunity arose.
“I had a friend who had an opportunity for me to get an internship at FlightSafety International,” Kyle said. “I had about 2,000 hours of flight time by then. For a whole year I moved to California. I sat in the sim for a Gulfstream V. I got a GV and GIV type rating, which is really what got me into corporate aviation, which is what I do now.”
These days Kyle runs his own company, iFLYPLANEZ, where he does contract and mentor flying, in addition to his work as a lead captain at Rapid Air in Michigan.
“Basically if you buy a King Air 350, a King Air 200, a Citation Sovereign, you guys would call me, and I’d teach you and your company how to fly the airplane,” he said of his work at iFLYPLANEZ.
Although Kyle said he loves a lot about what he does, he said being able to instruct and watch his students learn to fly their airplanes is the best part of his career.
“Now that I’m in the role where I’m kind of being a mentor to these owners/pilots, it’s pretty cool when you can give a guy the keys to his own King Air 350 and he can basically fly his family all around the world, and you were a part of it,” Kyle said. “The mentor flying is the most fun.”
Once he decided what he wanted to do, Kyle said the drive to constantly work towards his goal was the reason he made it as a corporate pilot after putting in so many hours on the way.
“Some of this stuff seems so impossible, but it’s really not,” Kyle said. “As long as you want it bad enough, you’re going to get it. I think the more I got into it, the easier it became. I just had to want it bad enough.”
If you or someone you know has an Air Academy story to share, e-mail us at twindisch@eaa.org.