Fueling the sky

Not many people think of including the airport in a list of public transportation infrastructure. Fewer still would think of changing their retirement plans to help revitalize that service, but that is exactly what pilots Roger Lincoln and Tony Dolphay did in Havre.

It's a typical Saturday morning at Havre City-County Airport and a crowd of pilots from around the area are trickling in to the fixed base operation - the airport equivalent of a gas station, called an FBO. Tony Dolphay is laying out a spread of doughnuts and pastries - and fielding a small barrage of jibes about the coffee.

Conversations roll and yaw through subjects ranging from one pilot's confounding engine problem to weather, the tarmac, recent travels and a few jokes that would never make the editing cuts to be included in this newspaper. Talk continually loops back to the engine.

Most of the pilots are based at the airport, so they drive there for the weekly informal gathering, a few others fly in.

One of the planes, an immaculate, bright yellow Piper Super Cub, taxies up to the FBO, and Roger Lincoln emerges. That's how he commutes to work every day, and from the look on his face, this is clearly not a bad way to lead a life.

Roger is a retired farmer from north of Hingham and a pilot since 1955 when he soloed for his license at 16 years old, and Tony, who retired earlier this month from his business, Havre Muffler & Brake, soloed in 2007.

They own the fixed base operation, MRKT Aviation Fuel LLC, along with their wives, Mable and Katherine. The business name, Roger and Tony point out, is from the initials of the four owners' names, but they also say it stands for "May Real Kindness Travel."

"And we'd like them to travel with a little bit of our fuel in their tank," Roger added.

Both men are avid flyers, members of the North Central Hangar of the Montana Pilots' Association, board members of Havre City-County Airport and, since February 2015, co-owners of the only FBO at the Havre airport.

Roger's retirement started to fail two summers ago, he said. He was at the Havre airport for a pilot's meeting when he saw that a plane had landed and three men were wandering around the airport. They were looking for fuel, but the FBO was closed, as it had been too often, and no one was answering the emergency on-call phone number.

"I thought, 'This is sad,' and I sent them down to Big Sandy, and I just hated to do that," Roger said. The plane had enough fuel to get to the airport in Big Sandy, which has a credit card-activated fuel pump, he added, but "that business needs to stay here. And that kind of got me thinking."

When the FBO came up for sale, Roger said, he talked to Tony and found that the two of them were thinking the same thing about the importance of fuel availability at the airport. A partnership was formed.

"We saw the need," Roger said.

"The word gets out very quickly to other pilots and other communities. If there's no fuel available, they will not stop," Tony said, stressing each word of the last phrase.

"It has a ripple affect through the local economy. They come here, they take our (courtesy) car, go downtown and eat," Roger said, adding that some transient pilots also spend the night, or several nights. Those travelers spend money on food, lodging, transportation, business pursuits and personal needs, as well as fuel to fill their tanks.

MRKT Aviation provides fuel for all types of aircraft from the single-seat aircraft to corporate jets and helicopters, including fueling the daily passenger flights for Cape Air and delivery flights for Richland Aviation, which hauls freight for UPS.

But one of the most important fuel services they provide, Tony said, is for medical transports.

A transport aircraft from Great Falls can make the round trip without refueling, but one flying in from Seattle or Salt Lake City would have to make an extra stop to refuel, he said.

"Minutes are lives saved," he said.

And, Tony, who is on call during off hours, is only 10 minutes from the airport. Because pilots know this, they can call ahead to have him there with the fuel truck ready, he said.

A medical transport pilot from Benefis called him one wintry night just to have him check the conditions of the runway, to help ensure a safe landing and takeoff, Tony said, adding that he was happy to do it.

That drive to provide service runs throughout their business philosophy.

"When you can greet that pilot and those passengers when they get off, it's that first welcome that you're giving them to Havre, and I think it kind of sets, in my opinion, the tone for the day for them sometimes," Tony said.

Their emphasis on personal service is why they are not thinking of installing an automated fuel pump.

"I think that is what has sold a lot of our fuel, that personal upfront, face-to-face service," he said.

"We are both fairly proficient in spreading BS, too," Roger added, and customers seem to like that as much as being catered to.

Their service orientation extends to the airport itself.

They said they try to be conscientious about everything from clearing debris that gets blown onto the runways and taxiways to shoring up the rafters and roof of the main public hangar to help maintain the building until renovations are completed on the building this summer.

The airport renovations, which include improvements to runways, taxiways and the tarmac, they said, are paid for in large part through the Federal Aviation Administration, with some money coming from Montana Aeronautics Division and local funds.

The study on economic impact of airports to communities, funded by Montana Aeronautics Division, is being updated right now, they said.

"They do a thorough investigation," Roger said. "... It's amazing when they assign a monetary benefit of an airport to a community. It's way more than I thought it was."

The state study was used in a public awareness campaign to gather local support for the levy, Tony said, and it was great to see that the community recognized the need and passed the levy on a 63 percent approval.

That 2 mil levy generated $80,000 to $90,000 dollars for general operations, which was used to meet the requirement for an in-kind match for federal and state grants.

One of the important aspects of maintaining the vitality of an airport is fuel availability, they said, adding that Havre's is one of the few privately owned FBOs in the country. Many are municipally owned with the county's opting to operate them to keep the air traffic coming in.

"An airport without fuel is just a landing strip," Tony said.

Another important aspect of airport vitality is something that is currently in short supply at the Havre airport: fresh faces.

"You don't see many 16-year-olds out there learning to fly," Roger said.

That shortage applies to both private pilots and commercial, but fixing that problem is one of the things they hope to do through their FBO.

Getting a certified flight instructor at the FBO, would be a real boon to both the FBO and the airport Roger and Tony said.

Roger said it might help him regain his retirement, as well.

"But Tony is 20 years younger than me, he can keep things going for a long time," he added with a laugh.

"It's a dedication," Roger said. "It's a commitment, but we feel good about seeing people leave here taken care of."

"Of course, I get to fly to work and fly home again," he added. "How can you beat that?"

(This story originally ran in the April edition of the Living Magazine.)