Fly in for fun at annual Spaceport Days

It's time for the Greater Green River Intergalactic Spaceport to welcome visitors - extraterrestrial or otherwise - once again.

The annual Spaceport Days event will take place this weekend with a movie night on Friday, August 25 and a fly-in and pancake breakfast Saturday morning, August 26.

"It's just great to get people an opportunity to come together and enjoy aviation in Wyoming," Mark Westenskow, the City of Green River Public Works Director, said of the event.

The event is hosted by the City of Green River every year with the help of a grant from the Wyoming Aeronautics Commission designed to promote aviation locally.

This year's family-friendly movie night will feature a space-themed pirate movie and include a fire pit for s'mores. Families are encouraged to bring their own chairs or tailgates. The movie will start at dark, probably around 9 p.m.

Saturday morning's fly-in could see pilots starting to come in as early as 7 a.m. so they can come in while it's still cool, according to Westenskow. Typically at least a half dozen pilots fly in, and the public is welcomed to chat with them and check out their planes. This year the AirMed team is hoping to bring their helicopter by again as long as they don't have any emergencies.

All pilots who fly in will get a free goodie bag and a free breakfast.

"This year we're proud to welcome back the Boy Scouts," Westenskow said. "They're going to be serving the pancake breakfast up there in the morning."

The pancake breakfast from Troop 312 will be served around 8 a.m. and will also be available to everyone who attends, with the troop happy to accept any donations.

Spaceport Days will also include activities for kids, like painting balsam wood airplanes, and giveaways of goodies including t-shirts and more.

Last year's Spaceport Days saw about 75 people come out for the movie night and around 100 people for the fly-in. Westenskow noted that sometimes things like sporting events are scheduled at the same time, but the event still usually draws a good crowd, and they would always like to see even more people come. Westenskow is thankful for the people who come back every year, and always hopes to have people come for the first time as well.

"We love seeing new folks come in," he said.

Spaceport Days is not only an opportunity for family-friendly fun, but a chance for the community and Wyoming pilots to check out Green River's airstrip.

"We just like having people come out and see that we do have an airport and that it is safe and it's viable," Westenskow said. "It's on the books, it's on the records, it does exist, and it needs to be safe. And if we're going to do that, we want to be able to show it off once a year."

The city is always looking for opportunities to make improvements to the airstrip as well, Westenskow said. The next big project they want to do is improve the fence and put it in a better location. Westenskow is also hoping to work with the Wyoming Department of Transportation to get leftover material from nearby paving jobs in the future to be able to make improvements to surfacing.

"We're able to do little things at our strip, and little things mean a lot for the pilots who do land here," Westenskow said.

The airstrip has been used for everything from emergency landings to military flights, and Westenskow hopes to see it continue to be of use and to grow. Part of that is continuing to "show it off" to the public and have some fun with it every year at Spaceport Days.

"We know what we are," Westenskow said. "We're kind of a lonely dirt strip and we have a funny name, and we try to play with it."