Too many trolls
Too many trolls
Last edited by Jim Heffelfinger; 08-29-2016 at 07:33 PM. Reason: Too many Trolls
Jim, it must be true. Last Thursday at Osh on a very windy, overcast day, Harrison Ford flew the 2 millionth YE in his DH2 Beaver. Jeff Skiles flew the 1,999,999 in his C-185 and the person that has flown the most YE's got to take up the 2,000,001 in a Glastar.
All symbolic and ceremonial of course. What ticked me off was that the flights started and finished 500 yards away from members eyes so you couldn't really see anyone. Only the media got close for interviews and pictures. If you didn't know it was Harrison Ford you would not have recognized him. He must be shooting the next Santa Clause movie(or Bin Ladin) because he had a huge, long white beard that enveloped his face.
I too would like to know if we actually hit 2M. But so far... Silence from HQ.
1996 Quad City Challenger CWS w/503 - Sold
1974 7ECA Citabria - Sold
1986 Pitts S1S
I'm not sure I see the value. On the other side, this was a major PR hit for EAA and general aviation. I have non aviation friends who heard about Harrison Ford and the 2 million kids he has flown. Well, they got it close. But the point is it's much, much bigger than the individual EAA members, like me, who fly the kids. Who cares if I flew number 1,998,996. If I flew 2,000,000, it wouldn't make the chapter newsletter. Harrison Ford got the message out to MILLIONS of the general public.
Bryan
Houston
:-(
Last edited by Jim Heffelfinger; 08-29-2016 at 07:30 PM.
I wouldn't hold your breath. EAA has made it clear that this is a done deal. It was a timing stunt done at Oshkosh to take advantage of all the publicity and attention that the accumulated world's aviation and other media could give it.
As well, as I pointed out earlier in this thread this event was designed to provide maximum exposure because of the pilots that participated and it was clearly a symbolic and ceremonial event. HQ has a good idea of when the 2M will happen in the next few months but that REAL milestone celebration could not hold a candle to doing it as an Oshkosh celebration.
In fairness to EAA, it has never bee said that Jodie Gawthrop was the actual 2 millionth Young Eagle. The words used were that she "represented" the 2 millionth YE, and sometimes the "official." I prefer "represents" which was in the earlier statements. Technically, she would not have been the 2 millionth YE, anyway, but represented the 2 millionth YE flight, as each youth can fly many times and each seat filled on each YE sortie counts towards the total. So the real 2M may happen on September of October -- but the time to celebrate that is during AV. (Note: All of my previous statements about the YE YPT program still stand.)