CAPE GIRARDEAU AIRPORT FINAL STOP FOR POKER RUN EVENT

Cape Girardeau Municipal Airport is the final regional stop and trophy-award site for Saturday's Federal Aviation Administration Flight Safety Aviation Poker Run competition.

The event is one of a series of regional flight safety poker runs that will be held in Missouri, Illinois, North Carolina, Alabama, Florida, Tennessee and Hawaii.

The poker run in this area is sponsored by the FAA's St. Louis Flight Standards District Office, participating airport fixed-base operators, and aircraft accident-prevention counselors. It will be sponsored in Cape Girardeau by Airport Manager Randy Holdman and his staff.

Other regional airports designated as stops are Poplar Bluff, Mountain View, Ark., Farmington, and Rolla.

There is no preregistration. Pilots may begin their poker runs from any of the designated participating airports. The final stop is Cape Girardeau.

Holdman said, "The FAA told us we could expect anywhere from 40 to 50 planes arriving at the airport late Saturday afternoon for the trophy award and drawings."

Holdman said the rules are simple: Pilots will depart from any airport and stop once at five of the designated airports participating in the poker run. At each stop the pilot and passengers participate in an aviation flight safety program, and draw a playing card from the site sponsor. Pilots must be at the final show-down destination airport at 4 p.m. The best natural poker hand wins a trophy and local prize.

Holdman said the Cape Girardeau Convention and Tourism Bureau will provide additional prizes for the drawings at the airport and provide Visit Cape packets to participating pilots and passengers.

Holdman said weather minimums are an existing and continuing sky of at least 2,500 feet broken and four miles visibility to start the poker run. In case of marginal weather, pilots should contact the nearest FAA automated flight service station (1-800-992-7433) to determine the status of the run, and, if necessary, a rain date for the poker run.

Saturday's poker run is one of a series of aviation-related activities that will be held at the airport in May, June, and July. It is also the first major airport activity since the dedication of the airport terminal building following its extensive renovation last year.

Other planned aviation activities at the airport this summer include a daylong FAA "Wings" flight training seminar for pilots in the airport restaurant on June 9; a static display of two Confederate air force aircraft -- a B-17 and a German Luftwaffe Heinkel bomber - on dates to be announced; and a hot-air-balloon festival July 22-24.

"We're also working on an Aviation Day at the airport that would be held on July 22 in conjunction with the balloon festival," Holdman said.

"All of these activities are designed to get people to come to our airport and see what we have to offer," he said. "We're trying to get folks -- pilots and non-pilots alike -- to discover the Cape airport again, and show them what an excellent facility we have down here.

"It's hard to find an airport in this region with the kind of weather minimums that we can provide with our excellent navigation and instrument landing system facilities.

"Who knows? Any one of the pilots or passengers that will be stopping at the airport on Saturday could also be a top corporate executive of a company that's considering a new home near an airport or relocating their business near an airport.

"We're very proud of what has been achieved at the airport. We want people to know what a pristine facility we have down here, as one pilot told me recently. It's the only all-weather airport between St. Louis and Memphis."