LightHawk has carried on through the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic with socially distant flights monitoring conservation efforts across the US and abroad. It announced its annual awards for the year to recognize pilots who have contributed most to its mission to connect conservation groups with the GA platforms and pilots that can provide them with lift.
Mike Schroeder, winner of the association’s Rockwell Award, exemplifies the spirit of the pilot for whom the award was named, Bill Rockwell—who always flew the extra mile for the organization. Schroeder flew with 23 passengers (pre-pandemic) and 7 wolf pups. According to LightHawk, “These missions ranged from flying program staff for land trusts in Arizona over the fragmented Upper Santa Cruz River to flying journalists and key decision-makers over the Salton Sea to better understand the scale of environmental and public health challenges there. A set of flights to cross-foster Mexican wolf pups from a captive facility to a wild den within 20 hours of leaving their birth mother was the most complicated, requiring intensive preparations and multiple last-minute changes. Mike endured all of this with flexibility and a ‘can-do attitude’. And then he signed up to do this all again, flying a total of 7 pups from the birth mothers to their new wild packs in Arizona.”
The Carpenter Award, for the pilot flying the most hours during the year, went to Will Worthington, who donated 62 hours of his own time plus aircraft time, culminating 16 years of flying for the organization and serving on its board of directors. Worthington’s missions “ranged from finding missing CA condors in the wild to flying scientists, elected officials and journalists on educational tours over the Salton Sea,” according to LightHawk. “He successfully completed missions in Arizona, California, Utah, and Texas. Will also remains a dedicated pilot flying to support our work in Mexico and mentor to volunteer pilots who are new to flying with LightHawk in Mexico.”
The Rookie of the Year award celebrates the first year with LightHawk for pilot Jim Schmidt. After joining the organization’s pilot roster in March 2019, Schmidt signed on for 23 missions, conducting 13 of them. As the organization notes, “Jim Schmidt and his hardworking Cessna 206 soared above the Belgrade Lakes region of Maine for the 7Lakes Alliance, helped the Nature Conservancy survey its conservation easements off the rugged coast of Maine, captured stunning 4K video of the mid-coast region for the Maine Coast Heritage Trust, and kept close watch over thousands of acres of the northern forests in Maine and New Hampshire for The Nature Conservancy.”
