Learning to Soar: Local glider pilots aim to make the sport more accessible to youth

On a temperate day, with bellies full of burgers from the summer cookout, members of the Refugio Soaring Circle watched a Schweizer SGS 2-33 glider plane land gracefully, and silently, on the grass airstrip at Rooke Field Airport in Refugio.

The aircraft carried student pilot Colson Haubelt, 14, and Mike Cavanaugh, FAA-certified flight instructor for gliders.

Colson, who has been training with Cavanaugh for about a year, comes from a family of pilots. His grandfather, Ray Haubelt, longtime club member who also serves as secretary and treasurer, took Colson flying at the Refugio airport three years ago and he was hooked.

“I was amazed by it,” Colson said about his first flying experience.

Colson taking an interest in flying at his age is exactly what Cavanaugh wants to see more of in the group. The Refugio Soaring Circle was formed in 1967 by a small group of active-duty service members who wanted to fly gliders for fun and didn’t have much of an interest in training others, Cavanaugh said. But over 50 years later, Cavanaugh, who serves as the club’s president, hopes to reach more youth interested in aviation.

“I don’t know of any place that’s cheaper to learn to fly,” he said.

Members pay a one-time initiation fee, monthly dues, an hourly rental fee for the 2-33 training glider, a fee for how high the tow plane takes them each time and annual dues for the Soaring Society of America — which partly go toward insurance costs.

“Soaring is much less expensive to get involved in,” said Haubelt, who has been a member of the club since the late ’70s. “You can probably get a private glider rating for anywhere from $2,000 to $5,000, whereas a power rating might cost $10,000 over the period of time (when you’re training).”

Cavanaugh said they also have a small scholarship fund available for students like Colson.

For those just starting out in aviation, learning to fly gliders teaches them the fundamentals of flight before moving on to power planes.

“It’s the pure stick and rudder skills,” Cavanaugh said. “You have no engine to save you except the energy that mother nature provides. So, you can’t be coasting, you’re always paying attention and alert to everything that’s around you.”

Cavanaugh served in the U.S. Army for 26 years and spent his GI Bill — the educational assistance provided to servicemembers — on learning how to fly.

“I actually have been flying for 51 years,” he said. “I did my first solo flight at Butts Army Airfield in Fort Carson, Colorado, on the second of September in 1970. I got my glider rating and my glider instructor rating in 1983.”

After retiring from the military, Cavanaugh taught eighth and ninth grade science for seven years before becoming the principal at Cuero High School, which he did for 13 years. Now that he’s retired from education, he’s returned to a life full of flying.

“I learned a lot in my years as a teacher and principal in high school, so I think about those things when I teach,” he said.

Cavanaugh says he sees two different kinds of people join the club wanting to earn their glider pilot license — those who have no experience at all and those who already have their pilot license and want to add a glider rating.

Although joining the club is a relatively affordable way to earn a license to fly gliders, a commitment of time and dedication is key, Cavanaugh said.

He also asserts that learning to fly teaches many great lessons for teenagers coming of age, both in the aviation world and life.

“It’s decision-making, it’s focusing on a task, it’s studying,” Cavanaugh said. “Airplanes are all about math. So that helps them focus on those kinds of things as they go along.”

The pandemic put the club’s flying on hold for a while and disrupted Colson’s training, but they resumed flying on the weekends this past summer.

Colson has had to balance schoolwork, being the starting quarterback on the freshman football team and life as a teenager with flight training and studying aviation materials. But Cavanaugh and Haubelt hope to have him solo a flight before the end of the year. Colson would then be able to get his private glider license when he turns 16.

“It’s just great to see young people accomplish a goal like that,” Cavanaugh said.

Colson said that he might like to fly for the Air Force someday, and Cavanaugh said having experience at a young age will not only give him a head start, but also make him a more competent and skilled pilot.

“Why not try it because it’s something new and something that not a lot of people get to do,” Colson said about other young people wanting to get involved.