17-year-old Skylar Petrik in the cockpit of the Cessna he's now licensed to fly.While battling through his senior year of high school, earning a 4.0 GPA and also dedicating his school nights and weekends to hockey, Skylar Petrik still managed to complete a rare accomplishment for a 17-year-old student-athlete— earn his private pilot’s license.
“Hockey, I’ve always said, is the most fun thing I’ve ever done — until I started flying airplanes,” Petrik said. “That’s the one thing I like doing better than hockey.”
Mike and Sarah Petrik, Skylar’s parents, own and operate Richland Aviation.
“[Richland Aviation] has been in the family for 40+ years now, and it’s always something that’s been kind of implied that I would get my pilot’s license,” Skylar said. “Last summer, my dad finally got his hands on an airplane that was appropriate to get my pilot’s license. One of our pilots that worked for Richland Aviation was a flight instructor, and he said, ‘yeah, I’ll teach him how to fly.’”
Mike Malcher was that pilot, and started working with Petrik last summer. But, after only a few hours of instruction time, they stopped the run from Billings to Sidney that Malcher piloted. Another instructor, one of Richland Aviation’s former pilots, filled the position several months later. Petrik and the instructor worked on ground instruction, and after only 10 hours of ground work, in January of this year, the instructor soloed him, allowing him to fly alone. Once again, the flight instructor left the Sidney area and left Petrik waiting for another instructor to finish his training.
After a few months of inactivity, Malcher stepped back into the picture, now piloting a run from Sidney to Sheridan, Wyo.
“I started flying the UPS plane with him back and forth to Sheridan,” Petrik said. “Every day when we were sitting in Sheridan, we would fly the airplane, and that was brutal. It was really hot and bumpy, but at the same time was a lot of fun. He and I built a lot of time. We must have flown the airplane for 25 hours over the two weeks.”
While in Sheridan, he also completed his written test, another requirement for receiving his license.
“So I passed that thing, another milestone, and at night I would read my books, make sure I was all read up on everything,” Petrik said.
By this time, his senior year was upon him. He took some time adjusting back into the school schedule, but quickly returned focus on his goal of becoming a licensed pilot.
“At the end of the two weeks, I came home, I was pretty close, still needed more ground instruction because I wasn’t ready for the ground examination,” Petrik explained. “The ground examination is your big check ride. It includes an oral examination and practical tests.”
Kevin Keegan, another local flight instructor, worked with Petrik during his school-to-work internship during his eighth hour, which starts at 2:30 p.m. every school day, until around 5 p.m.
“He and I started doing a lot of ground stuff together,” Petrik said. “He asked me questions to make sure I knew all the airplane systems, navigation. He flew with me to make sure I knew everything I needed to know for the practical test.”
At the tail-end of November, Skylar passed the checkride and now holds a private pilot’s license.
“Now I’m a licensed pilot,”Petrik said. “Finally.”
This license gives him the ability to fly himself and passengers to any location the little Cessna 172 will take him.
“With a private pilot’s license, you are allowed to go with wherever you want, with whoever you want, with as many people as you want,” Petrik explained.
As a high school senior planning on attending Concordia University Wisconsin in Mequon, Wis., his journey does not stop here.
“For me, this is the segue to more stuff, because I plan on getting multi-engine rating and instrument rating, my commercial pilot’s license. The commercial pilot’s license allows you to fly for compensation,” Petrik said.
He plans on earning a degree in a subject completely unrelated to aviation, due to the simple fact he has all he needs to earn his commercial license at home. He does not plan to leave his next goal untouched for too long.
“I’m going to try to get as much done as I can during the summer,” Petrik said. “I want to get as far as I can before that next step into college, because college is going to be hard enough, so I don’t need to throw something else into it.”
For now, he continues to log hours while also sharing his accomplishment with his friends in the air, and still finds time for school and hockey.
“Senior year’s gotten really crazy. I had no idea the workload, so I’ve had to adopt a really delicate balance between school and hockey and flying the airplane,” Petrik said. “I don’t get to do all of them as much as I would like to, but I get to do them a lot and I get to do them every day.”
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