These pilots are flipping planes on purpose
FORT MORGAN, Colo. — Between the calm of puffy, mid-morning clouds, a half-dozen drifting parachutes and fluttering spring butterflies slices the glistening red of the MSU Aerobatics Team’s GB1 GameBird, climbing and diving, twirling and torquing, rearing and roaring, until returning smoothly to the runway below. Describing the performance is enough to turn a stomach. MSU Aerobatics coach Dagmar Kress assures the trip becomes more digestible after a few flights. “We learn in aerobatics how to handle an extreme situation that can happen, to learn how to recover from a spin, because it’s not a reflex if you’ve never done it before,” said Kress. “It’s miraculous… and it’s a tool to become a safer pilot.”
Video: Chase McCleary, Rocky Mountain PBS
Kress and her five-time national championship-winning aerobatics team at Metropolitan State University (MSU) Denver are feared names in college aerobatics. The Roadrunners are regulars in the Collegiate National Aerobatic Championship, often competing against the two other aerobatic high-achievers, the U.S. Air Force Academy Falcons and the University of North Dakota Fighting Hawks (two institutions with more aerially inclined mascots).
Competitions resemble figure skating, according to Kress, in that aerobatic athletes perform a series of maneuvers before a panel of judges, who rate performance on a 10-point scale. Flyers must stay within the “Aerobatic Box,” an imaginary 1,000 meter x 1,000 meter cube of air starting anywhere from around 330 to 1,500 meters above the ground. Marks on the ground to illustrate the box, and boundary judges monitor the sides for boundary infractions. In this box, flyers often demonstrate a pre-planned set of skills including rolls, loops and spins that must follow a strict line. Typically, athletes are penalized one point for every five degrees of error in their line. So if a pilot is meant to be flying at a 45° angle, but is actually flying at 65°, they will be deducted four points. Flyers get three flights, and their scores are cumulative. Total possible points depend on a pilot’s flight plan. “The judging is very strict, but we’re here really to become better aviators,” said MSU Denver flyer Kyle Wren.
Wren is from the small southeastern Colorado town of La Junta. His parents enlisted in the U.S. Air Force but served in non-flying capacities. His mother was a cook and his father was a printer.
“[My father] would print out the sheets, the flight schedules, all that stuff,” said Wren.
“But they always told me the cool stories around the flight line, and everything they said about the airplanes really stuck with me.”
Wren received his private pilot’s license when he was 18 years old, becoming the first student in his high school to earn their license before graduation. He accepted a full scholarship to attend MSU Denver from Wings Over the Rockies, an air and space museum based in Denver.
Now a sophomore, Wren is already captain of the Roadrunners’ about 12-student aerobatics team, which includes men and women pilots. Because space and time is limited on competition days, only a few of the pilots will fly; others practice with the team, assist on the sidelines during competition days and tryout to earn a competition spot.
He hopes to fly professionally as a commercial pilot post-graduation.
Airline pilots are tasked with keeping a plane stable and upright, but Wren sees his time in aerobatics as the ultimate training ground.
“You can see in the news all the time that we have pilots who get into those unusual attitudes, unusual situations, and it ends up taking their airplane, or their life,” said Wren.
“[Aerobatics] shows you the limits that you can have both in your airplane and as a pilot.”
In order to compete on the MSU Denver aerobatics team, students are required to take Kress’ “Fundamentals of Aerobatic and Glider Flight” class, which includes lectures on the physics of extreme flying and crisis response, as well as the rules and regulations of competitive aerobatics.
MSU Denver freshman Liam Shetterly is taking the class this year. He praised the course’s in-depth instruction and array of interesting guest speakers. Shetterly is already familiar with a fair amount of the content.
“Aerobatics have been in our family for a very long time,“ said Shetterly. “I’m a fourth-generation pilot. Competitions, air shows… I’ve been exposed to it all.”
Shetterly’s great-grandfather began flying decades ago after picking up a cheap, used plane from a friend. Shetterly’s grandfather followed, as did Shetterly’s grandmother, father and uncle.
Today, Shetterly’s father and uncle are commercial pilots with two major airlines, and together with Shetterly’s grandfather, the trio comprise “The Shetterly Squadron,” an active airshow team.
According to Shetterly, Wren and Kress, a fair number of commercial pilots, as well as other professional airmen and women, participate in air shows in their free time.
Liam Shetterly knew he wanted to follow the Shetterly family flight path. After learning about the MSU Denver aerobatics team, he personally called Kress to express his excitement and interest in joining.
Kress was thrilled to welcome a multi-generational talent to the team, and on that sunny, Saturday afternoon, she rode with Shetterly on a practice flight sequence, working through his maneuvers and advising him on ways to impress judges.
