Swisher man wins FAA award

Adam Magee of Swisher, who operates a hot-air balloon academy, has been named the 2024 National Flight Instructor of the Year by the FAA’s General Aviation Awards Committee.

Michael Whitaker, of the Federal Aviation Administration, will present the award to Magee on Thursday at AirVentures, a weeklong air show in Oshkosh, Wis.

Magee is the first Iowan to win the award in its nearly 60-year history.

Magee previously won the 2021 National FAA Safety Team Representative of the Year award and the 2019 General Aviation Awards Certified Flight Instructor of the Year Award, locally and regionally.

“This award is very special to me because only a handful of instructors around the country have won two of the three national awards available since my career is outside of aviation,” said Magee, finance director at Collins Community Credit Union.

Outside of his job, Magee specializes in hot-air balloon flight training, certification and safety for pilots from teenagers to people in their 60s.

“We fly balloons two hours after sunrise and two hours before dusk, before or after work, and on weekends when weather permits,” he said.

Magee said he was hooked on the sport after he took his first balloon flight at age 5 in Columbia, Mo.

He and his wife, Kim, who works in biostatistics, met at the hot-air balloon festival in Indianola. She has won six world and nine national records in distance and altitude in small balloons.

They started a nonprofit, The Balloon Training Academy, nearly 10 years ago in Swisher. He says 80 percent of balloon pilots have used the academy’s resources.

The program includes prep courses, a quarterly webinar series with a global following, continuing education, certification and the Elite Balloon Instructor program.

The academy has certified more than 500 new balloon pilots since it began, and Magee trains more than 100 students per year through the academy’s online program. The training is in partnership with the National Association of Flight Instructors, where Magee is a board member, trustee and chair of the finance committee.

The fee for the academy’s ground school is $105. Flight training is the cost of propane, and certification is $350 with both ground and air flight exams.

Magee said he works closely with the FAA to improve standards and safety and resource materials.

“For me, it’s about the passion of wanting to grow the sport, to make it safer and more sustainable for years to come,” he said. “We have filled a huge void that the FAA didn’t have. … We were the first to do an online program, and now we are only one of two such programs nationally.”

Private balloon certification starts at age 16 and commercial certification at age 18.

“It’s fun to see people of all ages accomplish their goal of becoming a balloon pilot and be successful in the future,” he said.

But he shares a caution that his mother first told him: “Your first flight becomes your most expensive because you always end up buying a balloon!”