BHUBANESWAR: Flying has always been a loved verb for the human race. Everyone is fascinated to watch an airplane tearing the skies, speeding along performing dangerous loops or turns or even flying inverted. Infact, many must have watched tiny models automatically flying displaying amazing aerobatics on TV and wished if it were possible here.
Unfortunately, most of us are not aware that this wonderful hobby called aeromodelling is very much taught here, in the capital city. ‘‘Our team of two, trained by me, won the gold medal at the Republic Day Camp in the radio control model of aeromodelling this January. We always perform great at this national level competition for NCC in New Delhi but not many in our State even know what it is,’’ says Suresh Chandra Pattnayak, the only aeromodelling and flight principle trainer of the State.
Earlier a cadet himself, Pattnayak was in the air wing of NCC and started training since 1997 at the NCC base located beside the Bhubaneswar aerodrome, which was once his class. ‘‘It was a costly affair earlier but today the air industry is in a boom and that is not going to go down. Currently, this training is provided to around 20 students of NCC air wings every year for few selected candidates of the college level,’’ says Pattnayak who teaches the concepts of making or building an air-plane and principles of aero dynamics. ‘‘Aeromodelling is the art of making miniature aircraft models that look and fly like real aircrafts. It needs little engineering expertise with lots of craft-making, and creativity is a must. This basic course covers almost 70 percent of the knowledge that a maintenance engineer has,’’ he adds.
Pattnayak is an adventure buff and says that there is lot of potential for adventure sports in the State. ‘‘Many of us adventure lovers go sailing in Chilika or Mahanadi, love parasailing, flying and gliding or even horse riding. It’s all here and the youth will definitely be interested. Just that the awareness is missing. If schools had summer camps of say aeromodelling and adventure sport camps for college students, or say creative classes of these kinds, this much loved hobby around the world would grow even here,’’ Pattnayak says.
He has trained at various institutes across the country at adventure camps and aeromodelling camps and wishes aeromodelling finds more enthusiaists as a hobby in the State.