Aviation student Andrew Jeon ’21 earns solo flight endorsement
Please join the Aviation Department in congratulating Andrew Jeon on earning his student pilot solo endorsement. Andrew flew solo for the first time at Manatee Airport in a Piper Archer PA-28 aircraft tail number N82746 on January 8, 2020.
“Aviation has been a dream of mine since I was six,” Andrew, a 7-day boarding junior from South Korea, said, citing the time his parents took him to an airshow. “I just love the feeling of being responsible for the aircraft and for everyone on board. It’s really fascinating to me.”
Andrew started at Farragut last year. He came here for the aviation program. “There’s no other school that gives you this chance,” he said. “Even the fancy New England boarding schools I came from. There’s nothing like it.”
Andrew had just gotten his medical three days before his flight. He’d been waiting for it for a year, and he didn’t think he’d be flying solo for another few weeks. “We went to Manatee for a normal day,” Andrew said. “My instructor told me to pull off to the side of the taxiway, and told me to do three stop-and-gos and not to go anywhere else. ‘Don’t go pick up your girlfriend or anything,’” he added with a laugh. “So I got to the end of the taxiway and I was about to turn onto the runway and my legs were shaking, I was so nervous. But when I took off, it was amazing. You couldn’t replace that feeling with anything else.”
“This accomplishment represents a long journey for Andrew,” said Rob Ewing, director of the aviation program at Farragut. “To his credit, he never became discouraged during the process and always stayed focused on achieving his goal. He is proof that hard work and determination are pathways to success.”
Andrew is planning to apply to Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University for college. He wants to get his private pilot’s certificate and possibly his instrument rating before he leaves Farragut, and then he wants to get his commercial license and either go into the U.S. Air Force or go into commercial airlines. “I think everybody should at least try out aviation before closing their mind off and saying they can’t do it,” Andrew said.
