Volare Helicopters Arizona

Volare Helicopters is owned and operated by Tyler and Tasha Sturges. It provides helicopter photo flights, flight training and aerial services in Southern Arizona from Ryan Airfield (KRYN), about 25 minutes south west of central Tucson. It is a separate company from Volare Aviation in the United Kingdom.

Photo flights and aerial services

Photo flights cover the Tucson Mountains, the Catalina Mountains, downtown Tucson and the aircraft boneyards at Davis-Monthan and Pinal Airpark, with doors off flights on request. Other aerial services include skydiving flights, golf ball drops and proposal flights. Gift certificates are sold, and the summer flight schedule runs from 7 am to noon.

Flight training

Courses run from private pilot through flight instructor: private pilot certificate with no prior experience required, commercial pilot certificate (150 hours total time needed to apply), certified flight instructor, instrument rating and CFI-Instrument. The school points to the Sonoran Desert setting and the high density altitude experience students gain. An enrollment application and an introductory lesson are the stated first steps.

Aerial LiDAR

Volare offers helicopter based LiDAR geospatial surveys and owns the whole process: helicopters, equipment and data processing. The system uses a RIEGL VUX-1LR laser with GPS/GNSS, an inertial measurement unit and a 61 megapixel Sony camera. Stated accuracy is 15 mm survey grade for the sensor and plus or minus 3 cm absolute using surveyed ground control. Outputs include classified point clouds, terrain and elevation models, contour maps and orthomosaics, for uses such as power line, railway and pipeline corridors, mining, floodplains and archaeology.

Maintenance

The maintenance shop at KRYN has an FAA licensed A&P with Inspection Authorization. It offers 100 hour, annual and pre-buy inspections, general repairs and mobile service, with a posted shop rate of 120 dollars an hour and flat rate inspections.