Arnprior Airport hosts fly-in breakfast hoping for community awareness to take off

The Arnprior Airport, run entirely by volunteers, hosted its fly-in breakfast, aiming to raise awareness of its place in the community. CTV’s Dylan Dyson report

Hundreds poured out onto the tarmac at the Arnprior Airport Saturday morning for the airstrip’s fly-in breakfast.

This is the third time the airport has hosted the event in recent years, aiming to grow its status within the Arnprior and Ottawa Valley community.

“There’s so many people that don’t even know where the airport is and let alone know that it exists,” said airport manager John Constantinesco.

“This is definitely an opportunity for us to allow the public to see what we’re all about.”

Hundreds drove out and flew into the airfield in Arnprior’s south end and enjoyed a breakfast in one of the airport’s hangars. The event serves as a key fundraiser for the airport which is ran entirely by volunteers.

“There’s a quite a large (aviation) community,” said Constantinesco.

“We have quite a lot of planes here at the airport. I think we have at least 50 planes that are based here and roughly about the same number of hangars.”

Local pilot Paul Groulx says expanding the awareness of the Arnprior Airport can lead to more dollars coming into the community.

“When we land here and it’s a quick two-minute walk over to the Antrim there, we go for go for lunch. The joke is to have the $200 hamburger, right? You fly from one airport to another, and then you stop here, and you spend money here in the local community.”

The airport also hopes exposure will grow its aviation community, with many kids in attendance getting to see planes and helicopters up close for the first time.

“Airplanes are tactile things,” said life-long pilot Rob Fleck, who now flies out of the Arnprior Airport.

“It’s very cool when you take somebody who’s young and you put them towards an airplane and they touch it and realize, it’s not that mystical beast.”

“The pilot that’s sitting at the front of that jet, that’s taking us on vacation to Mexico or Cuba,” adds Groulx.

“They start off in little airports like this and little events like this.”

Constantinesco says the airport has more planned in the future to generate interest in flying.

“Hopefully on the community side of things, we’re going to start offering people some flights on a specific day, one or two days a year where we can get people off and then let them enjoy aircraft as well.”

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