Staff Writer
Captain Jerry Drake of Caribou, received the Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award last week from the Federal Aviation Administration, for his 50 years of flying service.
Contributed photo
Captain Jerry Drake, of Caribou, was awarded the Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award from the Federal Aviation Administration, May 6, for his 50 years of flying service.
The Wright Brothers Master Pilot Award recognizes the efforts of pilots who have followed and continue to follow the precaution and awareness of safe operations. Most of all, FAA recognizes pilots who have contributed and maintained safe flight operations for 50 or more consecutive years of piloting aircraft. Drake’s first solo was Oct.19, 1947, for 4 hours and 5 minutes in an Aeronca 7ac Champ. (Drake still owns a plane of this model.)
In Dec. 1970, Drake became the Fixed Base Operator at the Caribou Municipal Airport and in 1971 he was appointed Airport Manager by the Caribou City Council. As the FBO he provided student pilot training, air ambulance and an aircraft maintenance shop.
Drake joined the Civil Air Patrol in 1961 and served as squadron commander from 1969 to 1971. He was awarded the Flight Safety Award for assisting with an instrument flight rules aircraft with maintenance problems in 1983. The Caribou pilot rejoined the Civil Air Patrol in 2001 and now serves as a mission pilot active in many search and rescue missions.
His total flying time to date is 17,900 hours and Drake may often be seen in the skies over Caribou in his 1947 red and white Aeronca 7ac Champ.
The members of the 33rd Squadron want to wish Jerry congratulations on this well deserved award.
Civil Air Patrol, the official auxiliary of the U.S. Air Force, is a nonprofit organization with more than 56,000 members nationwide. CAP performs 90 percent of continental U.S. inland search and rescue missions as tasked by the Air Force Rescue Coordination Center and was credited by the AFRCC with saving 103 lives in fiscal year 2007. Its volunteers also perform homeland security, disaster relief and counter-drug missions at the request of federal, state and local agencies.
