Aviation View | Volume 2, Issue 1

89 AVIATION VIEW VOLUME 2, ISSUE 1 to Major General in 1985. Today, his namesake airport is becoming recognized as an important asset to economic development in the local region. “For the last few years, I have been trying to raise interest in aviation, while at the same time improving the Indiana County Jimmy Stewart Airport,” says Rick Fuellner, Airport Manager. “This is a quiet area, but we still have some coal mining and three power plants in the county. Those, and the Indiana Regional Medical Centre account for most of our corporate traffic.” This is not to say that the airfield is not busy. They have been working on a program with the school board, trade schools, and community college to develop a curriculum that will be run out of the airport and will teach aeronautics as a trade. This also means bringing the flight school, Innovative Aviation, on board. Fuellner reports, “We have reached out for some FAA grant money and we are going to be using that for INDI ANA COUNTY J IMMY STEWART A I RPORT infrastructure, but more specifically we are going to be bringing in a full-motion flight simulator that the school will have access to. I think it will be an amazing addition to the flight school in their operation.” One significant infrastructure project has to do with creating a taxiway to bring the airport into compliance with new FAA regulations. Previously, access went directly from the hangars to the runway, and this would potentially cause encroachment issues. Last year saw the creation of a self-service fuel farm which opened on the 31st of December, 2020. This has certainly boosted fuel sales as well as stopovers after hours. A pilot lounge on-site with a key card entry system makes it very easy for transient pilots to stop. Last year, the airport also got a new aviation maintenance facility up and running. Advanced AeroWorks and Avionics, owned and operated by the same person that owns the flight school, has brought the services available at Indiana County Jimmy Stewart