Summer Training Program
A number of students come for flight training during the summer. They work with flight instructors, all certificated CFIs. Some work towards a rating and some come to build time in the real-world environment that they can find at Kingdom Air Corps.
Students include college students who come for a few months between college semesters, as well as those who are preparing to join a mission organization or are veteran missionaries who want to add aviation to their ministry. The training season usually runs from May through September, depending on the students’ schedules and training needs.
Technical training at KAC focuses on mountain flying, bush operations in uncertain weather and windy conditions, and exercising good judgment in decision-making for safe flight. In addition, training emphasizes the capabilities and limitations of pilots and aircraft, and the importance of consistent and timely aircraft maintenance and inspections.
Flight Training
Each summer, a group of student pilots, certificated pilots, flight instructors, and mechanics spend the summer in Alaska, learning to apply their training in the mission field. They come to study and to train at King Ranch. While flying, they work on certificates, ratings, and endorsements, and at the same time gain experience in mountain and bush flying. They also spend time in the hangar and in the field working on our fleet, applying the mechanical knowledge that they’ve learned in the classroom to maintaining, fixing, and rebuilding airplanes.
Many of the instructors for both the flight program and the mechanics spent time on the mission field themselves, and so are able to speak into the students’ lives about ministry and calling, as well as the technical training they are giving.
Mechanic’s Experience
Gaining experience in the hangar at KAC consists of both rebuilding and maintaining aircraft. Although, KAC does not offer an official A&P program, students who are working toward or have received their A&P certificate build experience through both large projects and everyday maintenance to keep the aircraft flying.
KAC also partners with LeTourneau University in their mechanics program. Two Inspections classes visit the Ranch every summer, and spend time working on our airplanes.
TRAINING PILOTS TO REACH THE ISOLATED PEOPLES OF THE WORLD WITH THE GOSPEL
Kingdom Air Corps was founded in 1999 by Reverend Dwayne King for the purpose of training missionary pilots to fly in the most rugged places on earth in order to bring the gospel to the people there. In Alaska, though more than 85% of the villages are not accessible by road, airplanes are able to fly in. In Far East Russia, especially in Siberia, nearly 96% of the villages are off the road system. Airplanes can fly to these places and the pilot missionary can minister to these isolated people. Missionaries who feel called of God to minister in these remote locations can train and obtain their pilot certificates at the Kingdom Air Corps flight training base in Alaska. Applicants are hand-picked and undergo a rigorous interview process. Only students who are wholly committed to serving the Lord in full time mission work are considered for flight training at Kingdom Air Corps. As a result of training pilots for mission work, Kingdom Air Corps has outreaches across the United States and in Russia and Thailand.
We thank God for the work He has given us and invite you to participate as the Lord leads you. Volunteers and church groups visit Alaska each summer to help with the ministry.
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