August Gathering - Recap

Turnout for the August EAA Chapter 430 membership gathering was enthusiastic. As usual, President Ray Ballantyne walked us through the business portion of the meeting with his purposeful flair and with the aid of a wearable wireless microphone, that worked like a charm. We then had the hand-held mic available to pass around for reports from our board members and introductions of guests and new members.

Hilda Maurera, of the Seattle FAA Safety Team (FAAST), shared tips on “How to survive a ramp check.” This topic couldn’t help but generate some interesting discussions and viewpoints. We thank her for the insights that will no doubt be helpful for some of us, in the future.

The big news of the day was, of course, the culmination of our annual Poker Run, aviation scholarship fundraiser. This has proven to be a fun way for us to raise money to directly aid our young students with some of the expenses for their aviation-related studies.

Chapter pilots are tasked with flying to at least five airports that are listed on the entry form. Washington State has a program that provides “passport” stamps at every airport. Each entry form gets stamped, to record an arrival. Five recorded arrivals gets you into the poker games, held at our August gathering.

For the second year in a row, Aiden Lara and Emily Westcott registered their arrivals at all of the listed airports.

Erik Petersen treated newly minted private pilot, Jazmin Stamper to share in the flying of Erik’s Cessna 172 so that they could log arrivals at a qualifying number of listed airports.

Tracy Halsted has, once again, distinguished herself as our magnificent “dealer” for these fun games. Generous prize donations were awarded to the winners of each round of play.

The event was organized by Barry Halsted. Lisa Ballantyne cheerfully assisted Tracy with the management of the games.

Thanks to everyone who donated prizes and congratulations to the winners. The event raised $400 for our chapter’s scholarship fund.

Prize winners were Richard Howell (hand played by proxy - Norm Nelson) and Dave Miller, for game one and John Meyers (hand played by proxy - Nathan Nelson) and Pat Barrett (chapter 406), for the second game.

Top prizes included a fabulous self-care gift basket, a message package, and a hat with gift card for Peninsula Tap Room.

We can hardly wait for next year!