The LaGrange Callaway Airport and airport manager Chad Traylor are set to shoot the local airport into the stratosphere.
The very first Southern Wings Fly-in and Car Show is set for 9 a.m. on Sept. 20. The show will include a bevy of different aircraft, from war birds and experimental planes to military classics and everything in between.
The best part may be the price tag. Admission to the show is free of charge for anyone and everyone.
“We’re really looking to pack out our runways,” Traylor said. “We want this to be the best fly-in in west Georgia and east Alabama.”
A fly-in is a gathering of aircraft in a designated place. Traylor, an air show fan and connoisseur, is looking to bring the biggest and the best to make the first Southern Wings and event to remember.
Unlike other air-locked airports, LaGrange Callaway Airport has the advantage of West Point Lake, meaning the only unavailable airspace around the airport sits over West Georgia Health.
“Those planes can fly circles around West Point Lake if they want to. We are completely unrestricted,” he said.
Traylor would be more than happy to see between 300 and 500 people crowding the runways of the local airport, but he’s aiming as far above the clouds as he can.
To start things off, Experimental Aircraft Association Chapter 1350, the Air Grangers, will be preparing a pancake breakfast from 9 to 10:30 a.m. Traylor himself will be preparing smoked barbecue for the crowd, available between 11:30 a.m. and 3 p.m.
Expect food trucks, bounce houses, homemade ice cream, mile-long tee offs on the runways, tall tales with experienced pilots, static displays, aircraft close-ups — if you can name it, it’ll be at the airport on Sept. 20.
“We want this to be an event to remember, something the community keeps coming back to year after year,” Traylor said. “The sky’s the limit, after all.”
For more information on how you can be a part of Southern Wings, contact Traylor at ctraylor@troupco.org.