Air show pilot Patty Wagstaff won the U.S. National Aerobatic Championships three times and is a six-time member of the U.S. Aerobatic Team. She’s a flight instructor, and after three years of flying an OV-10 Bronco for Cal Fire as an Air Attack pilot during fire season, she is back to full time airshow flying, consulting, coaching, and instructing aerobatics. Patty also runs Patty Wagstaff Aerobatic School based at Southeast Aero, the U.S. dealer for the Extra Aircraft, in St. Augustine.
There are a lot of reasons why I love to fly, but the one that’s the foundation of them all is freedom. In airplanes, as in dreams, I rise above the mountains and the mundane. I can see over the trees. I’m in charge and in control of my destination, my destiny. The world becomes more »
Through life and career, we undoubtedly pick up mentors, heroes and role models. Everyday life is a challenge, leaving us wondering how to act, and we have to rely on others to show the way—overtly as you might expect from a coach or inadvertently when we like a character on TV or meet someone whose more »
Fear is a topic that comes up a lot when I talk to people at airshows. One of the most frequent questions I get is: Are you afraid? Don’t you get scared? I usually reply that I wouldn’t do it if I were afraid, a true, but simple answer. For me, flying airshows is about more »
In the winter of 1985, we decided to bring our Pitts to Alaska. Some might question the sanity of flying any airplane to Alaska in winter, much less one so small it weighs the same as a Harley Fat Boy, but then, some people are always up for an adventure. It seemed like a good more »
I spent the winter of ’84 giving tailwheel instruction, getting more aerobatic training and working on my helicopter rating. After I soloed the Bell 47G, I had a lot of fun flying it to the base of the Chugach Mountains that rise over Anchorage. I carved my initials in the snow with the skids and more »
In mid-October, I left Texas in the single-seat Pitts S-1S, N8078, and flew west to compete in my second and third contests, respectively. I knew where I was going, but didn’t really know what I was getting into yet. Other than that I loved to be around aviation and loved to fly aerobatics, all I more »
In 1984, I bought into a Pitts S-1S biplaneÑa single-seater with a 180 hp Lycoming engine and a fixed-pitch propeller.
How does one get to the World Aerobatic Championships (WAC)?
Small general aviation airports around the country, indeed around the world, are the safest, most hospitable places I know.
Sitting at home one recent weekend, I didn’t have an air show, but I sort of wished I were at one.
For years, people suggested I start an aerobatic school, but I hemmed and hawed about it. It seemed like a lot of work for little money.
Recently, the NTSB came out with its 2015 “Most Wanted” list of transportation safety improvements. At the top of the list was “Loss of Control.”
My happiest moments are spent in the sky surveying my kingdom.
For a pilot, South Florida is just a stepping stone and a 60-mile hop across the water to the Caribbean.
Over the past few years, I had become increasingly dependent on my annoying prescription glasses.
It’s kind of a joke that most pilots don’t know how to use their feet, especially jet jocks whose feet are flat on the floor most of the time they’re flying.
The prototype for one of the world’s coolest airplanes was built in a garage.
Excuse me while I toast myself, but it has been 30 years since I flew my first air show.