Kathy Samuelson, Owner and CFII May 1979 - Earned her Private Pilot Certificate April 1982 - Earned her Instrument Rating March 1983 - Earned her Commercial License April 1983 - Became a Certified Flight Instructor (CFI) April 1983 - Started training Private Pilot students April 1984 - Became a Certified Flight Instructor Instrument (CFII) March 1985 - Purchased Columbus Flight Instruction, and has been teaching flying continuously for more than 20 years.

Destined to become a pilot... Kathy Samuelson has been fascinated with airplanes since she was a child living in suburban Philadelphia, Pa. The summer before her 9th birthday, she and her family moved from Ohio to a house under the flight path into the Philadelphia airport. Airplanes flew over all day, so the sound of airplanes has represented the joy of summertime since 1955.

Flying was in her blood... Maybe that love of flying had come from her Dad, who served in the Air Corps in WWII. She is lucky to still be able to share flying stories with him, while her Mother listens to the two of them talk aviation.

An Introductory Flight sealed the deal... Kathy received a ride in a four-seat airplane for her birthday in October 1977 and was bitten by the aviation bug, never to recover! She started taking flight lessons in the summer of 1978. From that first lesson on, the sound of an airplane was the realization of a personal dream. She received her Private license in 1979.

Every cloud has a silver lining... Visual flight was great fun, but Kathy wanted to be able to fly on those cloudy, rainy days too, so she trained for her Instrument rating, and received it in 1982.

Getting paid for something she loves... Wanting to fly more often than the budget allowed, she decided to go on to get a Commercial license and Certified Flight Instructor rating, both in 1983. That was followed by the Certified Flight Instructor Instrument in 1984, so that now she could share her love of flying with both visual and instrument students.

Well educated, well connected... Kathy's background includes a B.S. in Psychology from Ohio State University, which really fits in with teaching. She also benefits from longtime memberships in the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, in the Ninety-Nines, Inc. (International Organization of Women Pilots), and in the National Association of Flight Instructors.

Much more than a job... Besides her passion for flying with her students, Kathy loves taking flying trips with friends. She has flown in all of the states east of the Mississippi, and to a few of them west of that great river, and still has many flying destination goals to explore. She enjoys sharing her flying experiences with her son, (who is also a licensed pilot, thanks to her teaching) and daughter, their spouses, and other family members living in the Columbus area. Kathy has taken all three of her grandchildren up in the airplane for rides, and they all love flying too.

Here to Stay... Kathy has been a resident of Columbus for over thirty years, and plans to keep right on teaching here. She considers flight instruction as a professional goal of its own, and not as a stair step to flying for the airlines. She worked with a local flight school when she first started teaching in 1983, and bought the business when the owner retired in 1985. She has owned and operated Columbus Flight Instruction at Port Columbus since March of 1985.