It’s another successful conference for the books!
From September 29th-30th, King Air Gathering II (KAG) took place at Stevens Aviation in Dayton, Ohio. Organized by King Air Academy, over 60 attendees were present and nearly 30 King Air aircraft graced the flight line.
The attendees were treated to two heavily informative days of King Air knowledge and talks featuring in-depth discussions and hands-on seminars with the best experts in the industry. Additionally, top caliber speakers in the aviation industry were brought in; including Dr. David Strahle, the father of Datalink NEXRAD (a thunderstorm avoidance system).
“In all the aviation events I’ve attended, I’ve never seen a guy (Dr. Strahle) talk for two hours on weather and have a crowd hanging on every word.” said Kevin Carson, KAG organizer.
Another speaker who had the audience in suspense was Captain Robert “Hoot” Gibson. Gibson, a NASA pilot and Mission Commander, had the audience amazed with his stories of atmosphere re-entry at Mach 20+. “Where do you go from there?” Gibson said to big laughs.
Carson noted that despite Hurricane Irma preventing several people from attending that turn-out was strong.
Also impressive was that despite the conference being fairly new, Carson ended up having to put some sponsors on a waiting list.
Major names and titans of the King Air industry were on hand to talk with attendees at booths ringing the hangar. Platinum sponsors included Beechcraft/Cessna/Hawker, Textron Aviation, and Rockwell Collins. Gold sponsors were Raisbeck Engineering, AvFab, Davis Aviation, Blackhawk Modifications, Sandel Avionics, PWI, Stevens Aviation, Garmin, ForeFlight, Covington Aircraft, Advent Aircraft Systems, BLR, More Company Inc., CenTex, Luma Technologies, LoPresti Aviation, Trace Aviation, Rapco Fleet Support, Vector Aerospace, Hampton Aviation and Standard Aero.
Popular features of the conference were hands-on hangar sessions and the ease of visiting with sponsors and speakers during down time. Carson says the conference will be expanded over time but will strive to keep the small and friendly feel. He went on to note that people were once more asking when the next one would be.
Once again, KAG turned out to be an excellent conference and attendees are eagerly looking forward to KAG III. Until then, we have these photos of the conference (courtesy of Kevin Carson and others):
