AOPA Turbine Pilot Magazine - January 2024 - 27

ABOVE: NIKI BRITTON; BELOW: MCCALL JONES/AMERICAN AVIATION NEWS
tanks, a Horton STOL kit, and three-blade
McCauley propellor. Over the years, Norton
has made upgrades to the avionics panel by
replacing the two Garmin GNS 430 GPS/
nav/coms with a GMX 200 multifunction
display and GNS 530 GPS/nav/com.
Norton says he loves the backcountry
recreational functionality of his Cessna
206, and it has become a perfect fit for
him and his family. Norton enjoys flying
his 206 around California, up to Canada,
and sometimes even coast to coast.
" Flying is a privilege, it's a really great
privilege, owning a plane is an incredible
privilege. And I think it's worth observing
that as someone who's been really lucky and
gotten to travel around the world and go to
a lot of countries and things, " Norton said.
" The United States has an extraordinary
asset in its civil aviation infrastructure and
in many ways you can take it for granted
until you go to other places and you realize
that this freedom, this permission, this
system that we're allowed to engage in,
where we go to a local airport-which
there are more of in the United States than
any country on the planet-and get in a
plane and fire it up, have shown that you
know what you're doing and be allowed
to be released to head off is something
that people do not enjoy in a lot of the
rest of world, in most of the rest of the
world. Twenty years of doing it I still kind
of can't believe I'm allowed to do it.... "
niki.britton@aopa.org
View the video
aopa.org/pilot/
jan24
Celebrating a landmark mission
On Angel Flight West's 100,000th mission, actor Edward
Norton along with his friend and co-pilot Michael Langston,
both newly minted Angel Flight West volunteer pilots, flew
Norton's Cessna 206 from Santa Monica Airport (SMO) to
Montgomery-Gibbs Airport (MYF) in San Diego with Angel
Flight patient passenger, cancer survivor, and liver transplant
recipient, 12-year-old Luis Peña and his mother Maria Pérez.
Angel Flight West's network of volunteer pilots provide free
medical transportation to people in need.
Luis required Angel Flight's services when he was diagnosed
with cancer at the age of 4. He eventually received a liver
transplant at UCLA Healthcare and now Angel Flight West
continues to fly him and his mother for post-transplant
appointments. Luis, who refers to the team at Angel Flight
West as his family, loves aircraft and hopes to one day
become a pilot himself.
The 206 made quick work of the flight from Santa Monica to
San Diego as we traveled at 130 knots over the ocean along
the California coast. Norton and Langston, who flies Norton's
206 about as much as Norton does, were fantastic pilots and
tour guides, pointing out a spectacular superpod of dolphins
and other landmarks seen along the way.
Luis Peña and his mother Maria Pérez.
" It's really cool listening to what everyone here is saying about
this organization and it makes me only regret that I didn't
know more about it sooner, and I think that the mission of
amplifying what you guys are doing and getting more people
involved is a really worthy one and I'm really happy to lean
into that with you, " Norton said at the Angel Flight West press
conference prior to the flight. -NB
angelflightwest.org
AOPA PILOT / January 2024
27
http://www.aopa.org/pilot/jan24 http://www.aopa.org/pilot/jan24 http://www.angelflightwest.org
AOPA Turbine Pilot Magazine - January 2024

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of AOPA Turbine Pilot Magazine - January 2024
