The Kids Are Building an Airplane!

[Thomas Wilson]

Tango Flight (https://www.tangoflight.org/) partnered with Federal Express (which is headquartered in Tennessee) is providing a kit and education program for high school kids to build an FAA certified airplane. My wife’s and my high school will build their first plane next year. Janicewhokeepsmehumble’s family foundation is providing the capital for the kit. When the plane is finished and certified, Tango Flight will buy it back providing funds for next year’s plane for an ongoing, self-supporting program.

Educators commonly talk about visual learners who learn by reading or auditory learners who learn from lectures or one-on-one discussion. There are also tactile learners who learn by touching, holding, disassembling, and putting things together. This program targets those learners. In the words of Tango Flight, the educational goal is:



A strong mechanical, electrical and aerospace engineering foundation and
Fundamental technical and mechanical skills to build an FAA certified airplane.


Governor Lee was duly impressed.

For those who opine that high schools do not teach useful skills, you should stop by your local high school. This is one of about two dozen work/study programs to ready students to enter college or the workforce upon graduation. This is in a small town Tennessee high school. You have heard of shovel ready infrastructure programs. These are shovel ready kids.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

That is exciting and the kind of thing that will make a big impact on those young people. Let us know if they go public with documentation of the progress. I would like to see more.

[Tom M King]

That's fantastic. Glad to see kids learning how to produce something.

I had started building an airplane, Thorp T18, soon after I graduated from college, and bought a piece of cut over timberland with some agricultural buildings on it that was large enough for an airstrip, and near the lake where I had just started a trial business of building spec houses. Then I met the girl who became my Wife who had crashed the only time she'd been up in an airplane. I chose her over airplanes, so the airplane project ended at making the forms to fold the wing ribs with. She was/is animal crazy, so the airstrip land is now covered with horse trails.

[Thomas Wilson]

That is exciting and the kind of thing that will make a big impact on those young people. Let us know if they go public with documentation of the progress. I would like to see more.
Tango Flight has been doing this since 2016 in other high schools. Their website has lots of info. My wife’s brother is a private/hobbyist pilot. He is going to fly the plane (with a flight instructor) when it is certified. We will get some pictures.

The foundation has been supplying flight simulators to the high school for several years for their aviation program. Those things started out as video games. They have gotten good enough to provide genuine skills to kids.

[Thomas Wilson]

That's fantastic. Glad to see kids learning how to produce something.

I had started building an airplane, Thorp T18, soon after I graduated from college, and bought a piece of cut over timberland with some agricultural buildings on it that was large enough for an airstrip, and near the lake where I had just started a trial business of building spec houses. Then I met the girl who became my Wife who had crashed the only time she'd been up in an airplane. I chose her over airplanes, so the airplane project ended at making the forms to fold the wing ribs with. She was/is animal crazy, so the airstrip land is now covered with horse trails.
Probably a wise choice.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

Tango Flight, Inc. (https://www.tangoflight.org/) This will be fun to check out. Thanks

[Tom M King]

Is this a kit, or one built from scratch by plans? Either is worth doing. Just curious. I don't think there were any kits when I started that T18 in 1976. Soon after then, they did have aluminum panels with predrilled holes for rivets, but I didn't keep up with it after that.

[Jack Frederick]

The Van’s RV-12 has been the leader of the pack in schools. It falls under the “Light Sport” category with the FAA. Their selection of aluminum CNC’d components for their whole line is impressive. They have many thousands of “experimental” kit builds flying safely and successfully. Vansaircraft.com
Very cool that the kids get to do this.

[Thomas Wilson]

Is this a kit, or one built from scratch by plans? Either is worth doing. Just curious. I don't think there were any kits when I started that T18 in 1976. Soon after then, they did have aluminum panels with predrilled holes for rivets, but I didn't keep up with it after that.
It is a kit.

[Mel Fulks]

Sounds like you need a Pegasus ! And it would take the neighbors minds off messy birds !