One of the activities of the Civil Air Patrol Cadet Program is the Cadet Orientation Flight (COF) program. It is designed to introduce our youth, under 18 years old, to general aviation through hands-on orientation flights in single engine aircraft and gliders. On January 12th the first three of the Honor Squadron’s cadets enjoyed their first orientation flight. Robie Brehm, Patrick Grazawski, and Kyle Chmielewski flew the CAP C-172 with Captain (CAP Lt Col ) Petrucci. Each cadet flew about one hour in the right seat and performed basic orientation maneuvers in accordance with the prescribed Orientation Flight Syllabus. Each cadet will fly five “O” flights which are funded by the Air Force. Robie was the first in the right seat and flew from Sarasota-Bradenton Airport, performed basic maneuvers and landed at the Venice Airport. After a short time on the ground, the cadets changed seats – Patrick was the second to fly. His leg was from Venice to Charlotte County Airport at Punta Gorda. He also performed the prescribed maneuvers before landing. Kyle took the last leg from Punta Gorda back home to Sarasota. Kyle is a student pilot who has logged about 30 hours of flight instruction before this “O” flight. Check out the smiling faces. By the way there was a fourth student who, well shall we say "still needs some work". Click here to see him.
