Have parachute, can fly: Prosser man’s aviation enterprise open for business

When a Prosser man wanted to start a business to teach people how to fly and build powered parachutes, his wife had one question for him: What’s the market for this kind of thing?

It’s true that powered parachutes and other light aircraft aren’t as ubiquitous to the skies as commercial jets or even smaller private planes, Bill Nelson said.

He’s one of a handful of people in the state, and the only one on the east side of the Cascades, certified to teach people how to fly powered parachutes.

But others involved in the sport have encouraged him and are glad to see someone being a much-needed public face for a hobby that allows people to fly with flocks of migrating geese or soar just above the waters of the Yakima River.

“There’s just not many people out there to train others,” said Jim Payne, a powered parachute enthusiast from Benton City.

Nelson, 65, a former minister who recently retired as a respiratory therapist, said he has been interested in aviation since his childhood in Fresno, Calif.

“When I was a little kid, I used to ride my bike out to the airport and watch the planes,” he said.

Nelson didn’t try to fly until the early 1970s, when he got involved with gliders. That led to him earning a standard pilot’s license, allowing him to fly Cessnas.

But after he married in the mid-1970s, his time and money went toward his family. In the early 2000s, when he tried to get back into aviation, he realized how expensive it had become. Even small planes can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, plus maintenance and fuel costs.

He tried powered paragliding, which involves wearing an engine on your back while being kept aloft with the help of a parachute. But it wasn’t quite what he was looking for.

“What I wanted to do was fly high and stay high,” Nelson said.

Then he discovered light sport aircraft, small craft that can include small single-engine two-seater fixed-wing planes, balloons and airships.

The category also includes powered parachutes, which use a parachute like a powered paraglider but it is attached to a chassis with a throttle and foot pedals. They can reach altitudes as high as 10,000 feet, but Nelson said he generally stays far below that level. Flying them requires a sport pilot license, and people can qualify to fly them solo in a weekend, Nelson said.

With retirement looming, and not willing to just sit around, he took a leap and formed Sky Striders LLC to help people get into the craft.

“It’s the easiest thing to fly. It’s the safest thing to fly,” Nelson said.

There are about 40 to 50 people throughout southeast Washington, northeast Oregon and western Idaho who are regular powered parachute flyers, occasionally gathering for fly-ins across the region. That’s how Payne fell into the sport, first attending a fly-in at Eltopia in Franklin County.

“What I really like to do is take a camera up with me,” he said. “Once you’re in the air, you’re about hands free.”

While powered parachutes are a more affordable option that avoids some of the expenses of more standard aircraft such as hangar fees, the sport isn’t cheap: a powered parachute will set someone back $7,000 to $40,000. And you can’t really use them to see the world: the 10-gallon tank on Nelson’s will only keep him aloft for three hours. Top speed? About 30 miles per hour.

But Nelson isn’t discouraged. He said he already has people signed up for rides in the coming weeks, and he’ll also be hawking his services at the Prosser Airport Fly-in July 17-8. One trip often convinces people how fun it can be to fly and that could lead to the sport thriving.

“It’s really cool to see someone flying one of these and be up there with them,” Nelson said.

Lessons cost $70 an hour for powered parachutes and $75 an hour for light sport airplanes.

For more information, go to www.skystriders.com, email bill@skystriders.com or call 509-781-1308.

This story was originally published July 12, 2015 at 9:00 PM with the headline "Have parachute, can fly: Prosser man’s aviation enterprise open for business."