Estherville, IA (KICD)–As we previously reported KICD news was given an opportunity to tour the Estherville airport earlier this week to look at its impacts on the local community and a lot of that comes from operations fulfilled through Iowa lakes Community College.

Director of the aviation program and chief flight instructor Tim Busch has been running the program since his arrival in 2019. In that time the airport’s been on a real growth trajectory everything from number of aircraft to the number of flight instructors on staff.

With all this growth that has led to a special opportunity with the United States Air Force.

The ILCC program is not solely military based but also fill openings in the commercial sector.

Right now, the program is focused mostly on planes but that could soon expand into other types of aircraft.

Busch is expecting 90 students in the aviation program come fall along with up to two dozen those being part of the Air Force ROTC program.