ELLY GRIMM
• Leader & Times
Among the high-flying entertainment at this year’s AirFair will be Bill Culberson from Fighter Jets Inc. As Culberson tells it, aviation has been the family business for as long as he can remember.
“I've been a pilot since 1999. I'm the son of a fighter pilot and the grandson of a WWII fighter pilot, so aviation definitely runs in my blood. When I was really young, my dad would take me up flying in smaller planes, and there wasn't really any point where I wasn't thinking about or interested in flying,” Culberson said. “By the time I finished my engineering degree at the University of Alabama, I'd gotten into the job market, and as soon as I had some disposable income, I started working on my pilot's license. I got my private pilot license in 1999, and then I also got my commercial rating and other ratings not too long after that and flew mostly civilian single-engine or twin-engine airplanes for work and pleasure. It was in the early 2000s when I started thinking about ... I missed the idea of flying in the Air Force, that just didn't work out for me, but I wanted to fly for fun and fly something cool. I thought about buying a T-34 aircraft or something similar, but a good Navy pilot friend of mine told me I had to buy an L-29, which is a Russian-designed single-engine jet trainer, and I was hooked. That also went with my passion for Russian airplanes because my dad told me 'It's great being in a U.S. airplane, but you should really know our adversaries' planes too.' It was just such an interesting and exotic plane, and I was really excited for the chance to own one. I flew L-29s for about four or five years and realized the early-generation Russian fighters, the MIG-series fighters, were really almost the same as my L-29, so I started becoming more and more interested in those. Then, I met the patriarch of the Fighter Jets Inc. organization, Randy Ball, and he said 'If you like this kind of stuff, you should really get a MIG-17,' so in 2013, I did find one for sale, started flying it, and now I've been with Fighter Jets Inc for 11 years now.”
The interest in flying in air shows has been almost side by side with his interest in aviation, Culberson said.
“I know many military pilots, when they were little, sat and looked at the sky at air shows and saw the planes flying around and said 'I want to do that one day.' That's as true for me as any of them, because my dad took me to multiple air shows when I was young, and I was just blown away,” Culberson said. “The idea of being a military pilot is great, but being an air show pilot is much more interesting in some ways because a military pilot flies around and does their job, and they're not really that visible to the public. Whereas being an air show pilot, you're able to show off your capabilities more so the crowd can appreciate what you're doing.”
And when the AirFair coordinators got in touch with Fighter Jets Inc. about participating in this year’s AirFair, Culberson said it was easy to say yes.
“Those conversations started at the big International Council of Air Shows (ICAS) convention in December 2024 when they found us, and that's where air show coordinators all come together to hire acts for their events. Our organization has actually flown through Liberal many times, but this will be the first time performing at the AirFair,” Culberson said. “They contracted us pretty earlier and knew we would put on a good show. We were really excited to be asked because Liberal's a good spot – I actually have a place in Colorado and being a private pilot for many years, Liberal is where I would stop for refueling or to spend the night or whatever. Flying the AirFair will allow me to give back a little bit and let the community see something really cool. We fly air shows all throughout the U.S., so getting to go to a different show and meeting new people is always great. And I know the AirFair lineup is also pretty solid, so it'll be great seeing those guys do their thing, because the air show industry is almost like a big family, and it's fun catching up with everyone. It's also great talking to people about planes and telling them the history of the aircraft and letting them have a more up close and personal look at everything.”
Overall, Culberson said, the AirFair should be very entertaining for everyone.
“They'll get to see a very interesting airplane, my plane is a 1947 MIG-17 design that inspired later models. At the end of WWII, the Allies divided up the captured German engineering teams, and we got a lot of those aerospace/aviation engineering guys. That plane came as a rather rude awakening to the Allied forces because it was way better than anything we were working with, and we didn't think that was possible,” Culberson said. “The MIG-17 is so maneuverable and so capable that only the advent of the F-16 made people realize it could be outfought, and that was a big lesson for the U.S., and it's great being able to show off the plane's capabilities at an event like this. It's a great time of the year, and it'll be a great time for people to get out and about and see something different. These types of acts aren't something seen every day, so take that day, come out and see all of us.”
