Kansas State University Flight Team

Yesterday our team travelled back to Salina and were able to make it without delay!
The route traveled was KMLI (Quad Cities, IL) to KIRK (Kirksville, MO) to KIXD (Olathe, KS) to KSLN (Salina, KS).

We are ready to start practice for Regionals in October, which will be hosted in Salina!

We officially completed Safecon Nationals 2026 in Quad Cities, IL! Our team finished 22nd overall for the Judges' Trophy and we had some members place in their events.

Special thank you to the Quad Cities Airport for hosting and to all the NIFA judges who helped make this competition possible!

Here are some of our achievements!
Mary Barbour placed 1st in the AMT test
Logan Dobransky placed 2nd in the AMT test
Roei Biton placed 19th in IFR
Claire Trapp and Roei Biton placed 19th in Crew Resource Management
Claire Trapp received the Outstanding Team Member Award

All that remains of SAFECON 2026 is this evening's Awards Banquet, brought to you by FlightSafety International

Tonight's event is preceded by 106 years of intercollegiate flying competitions, and marks the conclusion of the 77th National SAFECON under the National Intercollegiate Flying Association.

A few items to follow along tonight, and learn more about our history:

Doors at the Rhythm City Casino open at 5pm CDT. Dinner is expected to begin around 5:35pm, with remarks and presentation of awards beginning at approximately 6:45pm (subject to slight change based on dinner flow).

The Awards Banquet live stream will be available on our YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/NIFA_aero

The Awards Banquet Program can be used to follow along with the presentations: https://nifa.aflip.in/21765ff2b6.html

The SAFECON 2026 Program is available online as well & provides a rich history of NIFA, competing teams, events & awards, as well as a list of previous hosts & winners: https://nifa.aflip.in/9b601e9aa0.html

After the conclusion of the Awards Banquet, a full list of Official Results can be found on the Resources section our website: https://resonant-jumper-7c1.notion.site/SAFECON-Official-Results-8a087b3f36b74834be51a65cac127a19

Thank you for your interest and enjoy this evening's event! To learn more about how you can support NIFA, please visit https://www.nifa.aero/support

We are proud to announce that one of our team members, Edison Santos, has been elected to be a student representative on the NIFA council. For the two years he will be in this position, he will act as a voice for all NIFA collegiate competitors during council meetings and at competition. Please join us in congratulating Edison! 💜

Throughout the competition week more events were conducted, including pre-flight, CRM, ground trainer, simulated IFR, and the AVM test.

Our competitors in pre-flight were Mac and Mary. The event is timed and a confined scenario where the pilot must check the aircraft to determine everything is safe and working properly before it flies. There are many different considerations and possibilities to determine if the aircraft is safe or unsafe for flight.

Our competitors for the Crew Resource Management or CRM event were Claire as PIC and Roei as SIC. The event is in a full flight simulator and replicates the final stage of airline training. The pilots must work together to fly to their destination airport while encountering different scenarios the judges may throw at them.

Our competitors for ground trainer were Logan, Nikolay, and Nathan. The event is conducted in full flight simulator in instrument conditions, the pilot is given a pre-determined route with changes in headings, altitudes, airspeeds, and all within a time constraint.

Our competitor for the Simulated IFR event was Roei. The event is preformed in a full flight simulator under instrument conditions. Contestants must fly several different approaches with precision.

Our competitors for the AVM/Mechanic Test were Isabella, Logan, and Mary. The Mechanic/AMT Test includes maintenance fundamentals and covers knowledge areas of the Aviation Mechanic ACS.

Day five of the competition was short field landings! For this landing, the pilots must use energy management and cannot add in power that is already removed. The pilot must land on a specific point on the runway in a full stall attitude.

Our competitors in this event are:
Roei, Claire, Nathan, and Isabella

Today we completed power off landings!
This event tests the pilots on their ability to glide and land accurately without the use of engine power.

Our competitors for this event were:
Nathan W., Isabella B., Claire T., and Roei B.

Yesterday was the Navigation event!
The unlimited navigation event involves XC planning in a short time, with the resources of an electronic flight bag and GPS. The pilots calculate times, fuel burn, and other components. Then they fly with their safety pilots and try to find the checkpoints and secret points. This event is judged based on the accuracy of the calculations and the route flown.

Our competitors for Unlimited Navigation:
Roei B. as pilot and Logan D. as safety pilot.
Claire T. as pilot and Timothy M. as safety pilot.
Alex M. as pilot and Nathan W. as safety pilot.

Day 2 of the competition was supposed to be the navigation event, but we ended up doing Message Drop! Unfortunately, low cloud ceilings in the morning caused the event to start later, so we were only able to send out 4 teams.
This event challenges pilots and drop masters to drop a wooden message brick from 200 feet AGL and hit a target on the ground, and the closest to the target wins!
The teams that competed were:
• Claire T. as pilot and Mac D. as drop master
• Isabella B. as pilot and Timothy M. as drop master
• Nathan W. as pilot and Nikolay G. as drop master
• Isabella B. as pilot and Edison S. as drop master
The team that was unable to compete due to time was:
• Claire T. as pilot and Mary B. as drop master

Day 1 of Nationals is underway, and we had a strong start with our ground events!

First up was E6B, an accuracy-based math competition featuring a variety of flight calculations completed using a manual E6B flight computer. Representing us in this event were Claire, Alex, Mary, Isabella, and Edison.

Next was Aircraft Recognition, where competitors identified different aircraft by make, model, and nickname. Competing in this event were Timothy, Nathan, Mac, Nikolay, and Logan.

The final event of the day was SCAN (Simulated Comprehensive Aircraft Navigation), a scenario-based cross-country event involving climb, cruise, and descent performance calculations, along with regulations, weather, and sectional chart questions. Competing in SCAN were Logan, Isabella, Claire, Roei, and Timothy.