Evan Flys

Greg Poe

Unfortunately we lost a wonderful air show performer and really great guy in July 2011. Greg Poe is regarded as one of the very best. Here is my interview with him back in 2008

One of the most amazing airshow performers is Greg Poe and I was very fortunate to be able to interview him at the Watsonville airshow.

Greg was 16 when he first flew and it was his interest in the astronauts and the space program that grabbed him. His parents were very supportive of his flying.

When he went to the Reno air races and saw Art Scholl and Bob Hoover perform, that’s when he knew he wanted to be in air shows.

“The first time I did aerobatics was when he was a teenager and he didn’t know you could do such things with airplanes and I fell in love with it. What I learned is that aerobatics is like a three dimensional aerial ballet. It’s very exhilarating! And also aerobatics is very challenging. I’ve been flying aerobatics for 35 years and I still learn new things. You’ll never perfect it or ever master it but that’s the challenge, to get as good as you can. That’s what I like about it.”

He flies an MX2 which is an incredible stunt plane. His sponsor is a company called Fagen and they design and build plants that produce ethanol. Greg’s plane runs on ethanol and it makes almost 400 horsepower!

Greg Poe's MX2

Because he’s a top level airshow performer who has performed all over, he gets to know all the other performers. This has given him the opportunity to fly in F-15’s, F-16, and he’s even flown in the slot position with the Blue Angles!

His favorite flying story was when he and his daughter flew in a float plane to a reservoir at the Idaho/Oregon border and landed in the middle of it. They swam and played in the warm water for hours and hours before going home. That sure beats driving to the local pool!

Watching Greg fly was amazing. His plane is designed to go up to +/- 12g’s! So he can do things with it that other planes can’t do. He could make it tumble end over end and even look like a maple leaf falling from the sky!