Brantford’s local chapter of the Canadian Owners and Pilots Association (COPA), Flight 148, and the Ninety-Nines’ Maple Leaf chapter, hosted the first “Let’s Discover Aviation Now” event at the Brantford Municipal Airport on Saturday, September 20, 2025.
While the two entities have put on their own separate, but similar, events in the past (the Ninety-Nines’ “Let’s Fly Now” and COPA’s Discover Aviation Day), this year, they decided to join forces.
“We each had our own event in 2024 but because we were drawing from the same pool of pilots, we thought it might be good to just combine our events,” said Gord Cormick, a pilot with COPA Flight 148 and co-organizer of the event. “It’s nice because by having just this one event, we have more volunteers that are available so it makes it easier to run.”
During the event, around 100 people between the ages of 14 and 50 got the opportunity to take a free 20-minute sightseeing flight over the region, check out the Brant Flyers RC club and tour various planes and an airplane hanger.
Upon arrival, participants were brought in small groups to the Brantford Flight Centre’s ground school room for an overview of what to expect during their flights.
After completing an essential safety briefing, attendees made their way outside to wait for their turn to explore the skies.
Ashley and Lauren Pierce, two Brantford residents who participated in the event, said that the overall experience was amazing.
“I would definitely do it again, it was a way better experience than I was ever expecting. To be able to see the area you live in from up above is the coolest thing ever,” said Ashley. “You really don’t realize how big and how long the Grand River is until you see it from the sky like that, it was just breathtaking. I was actually saying to Lauren that it would be amazing to do it again in a couple of weeks when the leaves are all changing too.”
When asked what her favourite part of the flight was, Ashley said that it was getting to see all the ponds while flying over Waterford.
“It was neat to see how small those bodies of water look from above, but also, how much space they take up too,” she said. “I also really liked getting to see the airport from above while we were coming around and getting ready to land because that’s a sight you would never see while driving on the road. It’s funny because I thought I would get butterflies while we were landing but that wasn’t the case at all.”
Cormick said that while the event was originally designed with the intent of introducing children to the world of aviation, it was later revised to include adults as well.
“In the last couple of years we’ve decided to expand the age group because originally, the idea was that we’d take kids flying and then they could go on to school and learn how to become a pilot,” he said. “But we started to realize that, in many cases, people wait until later in life to pursue something like flying; often, it’s after the kids have moved out or the mortgage is paid off, and they finally have a bit of extra money to spend on flight lessons. So we thought, why not offer introductory flights to people around 50 or so who have always wanted to fly but never knew how to get started?”
Cormick said that for him, one of the most satisfying things about being part of an event like “Let’s Discover Aviation Now” is getting to hear when it’s made a difference in someone’s life.
“A couple years ago, we actually had a woman come up to our registration desk during our Discover Aviation Day and say, ‘You probably don’t remember me, but I went on my very first introductory flight five years ago at this event, and now I’m a right seat pilot with Air Canada.’ That was really nice for us to hear for two reasons,” he said. “One, because we were successful in encouraging someone to pursue aviation, and two, because we rarely get to ever hear those stories. We’ll take people flying but we don’t know what happens later, oftentimes we don’t even know if they’ve enjoyed it. Sometimes we see their smiling faces when they come back down and exit the airplane, but to hear that we had a profound effect on someone’s life is really rewarding. That’s why we do this.”
Rita Richter, a pilot with the Ninety-Nines’ Maple Leaf chapter and another co-organizer of the event, shared similar sentiments.
“The biggest reward as a pilot is getting to share your passion for aviation. There’s a freedom that comes with flying, it’s just so liberating and I love getting to share that with people,” she said. “We have ten volunteer pilots who are helping out today and they’re all just as passionate about flying as the next one. So not only donating their time and planes today, but the cost of flying too; depending on the aircraft, this event will cost these pilots anywhere between $1,300 to $3,000 of their own money and they’re doing it because they want to share that passion. …That’s pretty special.”
Richter added that depending on how successful the event is, it may just shape how similar events are done moving forward.
“This is a bit of an unprecedented event that a lot of people are looking to see how successful we are,” she said. “It may just reshape how we do some of these aviation events and we introduce flight to the many.”
Before heading back home for the day, all participants received a bag of souvenirs, a first flight certificate, information on how to become a pilot, different scholarship opportunities and information about COPA, the Ninety-Nines and the Brantford Flying Club.
Kimberly De Jong’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.The funding allows her to report rural and agricultural stories from Blandford-Blenheim and Brant County. Reach her at kimberly.dejong@brantbeacon.ca.
