The Inspiration II

In this picture: Barrington Irving, the youngest and first African-American pilot to fly solo around the world.

Summer camps are probably one of the places you wouldn't want to spend your summer vacation if you lived in Miami, Florida. However, if you signed up for 'Build and Soar', a 10-week camp offered by Barrington Irving, you will not be disappointed with your summer. In this program, inner city highschoolers learn how a plane is put together piece by piece, how the sky is not the limit, and how to work together to acheive a finale: Building a plane by themselves. The highschoolers who participated in 'Build and Soar', also engaged in learning opportunities where they constructed rockets, wind tunnel aerodynamic flight testing, and participated in both real and computer simulations. On October 15, Irving boarded a Zenith XL aircraft that was constructed by the high school students, and took it for a test ride. "I feel excited because it's very inspirational to know I built a plane," said Denzel Brown. Irving justified his thoughts to the crowd that had gathered to watch and cheer him on. "I'm not nervous about flying this aircraft because I believe in our students," he said, just shortly before taking off. The highschoolers named their aircraft the 'Inspiration II', in honor of the plane Barrington used on his trip around the world. Usually, it takes a year to build even an experimental plane, however, these students spent ten weeks on this project, and was still able to make have it take flight and fly a thousand feet above the ground. I believe that this was a major accomplishment to the highschool students, knowing that they've created an aircraft that is stable and can, in fact, take flight. This also creates a spark of inspiration for children and teenagers to know that they too can create a stable model, and the sky is not the limit.

Original Article

picture credit to: google images.