Video Game to Left Seat

My name is Haden Bourland and I am a senior at Presbyterian Christian School in Hattiesburg, MS. My interest in flying started when I was about four years old. There was a video game, Aces of WW2, at the pizza place in town that I loved to play when we would go there. I was so little that sitting in the “cockpit”, my feet didn’t even touch the floor and I had to sit up on the edge of the seat to reach the controls. My mom said people would stand around behind me and watch me fly. It wasn’t even a game that you could win tickets for, you just got to fly, which was fine with me. It was that same year that I got to go to my first airshow, at Keesler AFB in Biloxi, MS. That was the first time I got to see the Thunderbirds fly. We have been to airshows just about every year since then.

When I was in Kindergarten I got to meet three of the original Tuskegee Airmen from WW2. They were Lt. Col. Leo Gray, Lt. Col. Herbert Carter, and Col. Charles McGee. They came to the African American Military Museum which is in downtown Hattiesburg. There was a local artist there also that had painted a picture of their three planes and was selling prints of it. My parents bought a print and each pilot autographed their plane and I got my picture made with each of them. I actually met three great aviators that flew “Redtails” and were a part of the “Greatest Generation”! At the time I thought that was pretty cool, but I now realize how special that really was. Colonel Charles McGee, now Brigadier General Charles McGee, was promoted to Brigadier General in December 2019 shortly after his 100th birthday. From what I have read about him, he has flown more combat missions in WW2, Korea, and Vietnam than any other Air Force pilot. And he is also an Eagle Scout. How cool is that!

When I was in first grade, I joined Cub Scouts. Each year we got to spend the night on the U.S.S. Alabama, which at the time was the greatest thing ever. But when I crossed over to Boy Scouts, we got to go camping and go to the Blue Angels Homecoming airshow every year. That was awesome! While visiting the National Naval Aviation Museum at NAS Pensacola, I heard about the National Flight Academy. It is a camp you can go to for a week in the summer.

One of my fellow Eagle Scouts, Chad Filbey, who already had his private pilot’s license at the time, and had already attended the camp, encouraged me to go. I went and I’m glad I did. It was like living on an aircraft carrier for a week, complete with all the sounds of planes landing on deck day and night. You’re assigned to a squadron and even given a call sign. 

Mine was “Talon” because I’m an Eagle Scout. We flew simulators on mock missions, which included night traps on the aircraft carrier. That part was the most fun but also the most challenging. We also got to see the Blue Angels practice. I had a blast and made friends with people from as close as Florida to as far as Alaska.

Since my friend Chad already had his pilot’s license watch me fly. It wasn’t even a game that you could and knew I was interested in flying, he invited my mom and I to go fly with him. I think the first time we flew with him we flew all over Hattiesburg. We flew over my school, over my house, over our friend’s houses, everywhere. It was so cool! When you fly in a big jet like you do when you’re going on vacation, you fly so high that you don’t really get to see all the cool stuff that you do from a much lower altitude. The second time he took us flying, we flew from Hattiesburg – Laurel to Stennis (Bay St. Louis, MS).

That was a longer flight and he showed me the basics of what a “cross country flight” is all about. We went flying with him one more time and after that I decided I wanted to become a pilot. He gave me the name of his instructor, Mr. Ronnie Bishop, and I started lessons shortly thereafter.

I now have almost 30 hours and was about to solo when Covid-19 started. I was able to fly three cross country trips before we had to stop. The first was to Meridian, MS. It was a nighttime flight which was neat because we landed at night at an airport I had never been to before. The second was to Natchez, MS. It was a daytime flight.

We flew over the Mississippi River and also the Emerald Mound which I had been to before on a field trip for school. It was cool to see it from the air. On the third cross country, we flew from Hattiesburg-Laurel to Ocean Spring, MS, then turned and flew the coastline all the way to Bay St. Louis, landed at Stennis, then back to Hattiesburg-Laurel. That was probably the longest flight so far. When we were flying over Bay St. Louis we were able to see the faint outline of the tall buildings in New Orleans. That was a suprise. I wasn't expecting to be able to see New Orleans from there.

I hope to start back flying again soon and hopefully get my private pilot's license before I graduate in May. I plan to attend Delta State University in the Fall of 2021 and major in Flight Operations.