by Darren Coomler
Welcome Chapter 1541 Members and Friends,

Welcome to Spring! Longer daylight and warmer weather makes you want to get out and enjoy it. This time of year has many of us planning our activities for the next few months. Your Chapter 1541 Board of Directors (BOD) has been doing the same. The online April BOD meeting had lots of discussion and planning for upcoming chapter events. This planning has been hampered greatly over the past few months due to the unknown of knowing when the local pandemic restrictions would lessen. As many of you have been tracking, with the overall improvement and the rising vaccination rates the guidance from the county and state allowing us meeting face to face (F2F) should be here within the next couple of months.

Looking forward, the BOD has tentatively set dates for a Young Eagles, Airport Fun Day, and something new to the chapter, Eagle Flights. Eagle Flight is similar to Young Eagles but for adults. We will be giving an introductory information session and rides to anyone over the age of 18 who has an interest in aviation and possibly pursuing flight training.

Along with these mainly outdoor activities we are looking a resuming our breakfast and member meetings at the hangar. Once Placer County moves to the Orange tier — which will permit gatherings of up to 50 persons at events — we will announce events at the hangar. For those who are not comfortable with meeting F2F at this time some of the meetings will be a hybrid type, meaning it will a combination of an online and F2F meeting.

The BOD has recognized the success of the online IMC Club meetings, which have been regularly attracting 30 to 50 or more participants from many areas of California, Nevada and other states. As a result we are planning to keep this meeting in that format and will be testing ways to have some participants join the meeting from the EAA hangar. We believe that these hybrid type of meetings should make the educational content more accessible to more pilots, and in the spirit of experimental aviation we are going to do the experiment!

Other great news is that the chapter has been awarded another Ray Scholarship position for 2021 from EAA national. This is a $10,000 grant to a young person to apply to flight training to obtain their PPL. Please share this news with anyone that you think may be interested. Questions on the Ray Scholarship can be sent to our email.

Lastly, when we do start meeting F2F again it will take many hands to help prepare food and set up events. Please step forward and be a part of this opportunity to serve your fellow aviation enthusiasts. We look forward to seeing you all in person soon!