FREIGHT PILOT HAS BARNSTORMING SOUL

CAPE GIRARDEAU -- Inside pilot Pete Malone exists some of his late grandfather: a 1920s barnstorming aviator. So much does it have a hold on him that, at just 26, acrobatics is the only rush Malone gets out of flying an airplane anymore.

"Acrobatics is the biggest charge you'll ever get," he said. "You'll either love it or get sick one of the two."

Malone, a Sikeston native, works as one of two Airborne Express freight pilots at Cape Girardeau Municipal Airport. He's had the job the past two years.

The job entails flying next-day air freight and mail to St. Louis from Cape Girardeau and Marion, Ill., Monday through Friday nights. Once there, the freight and mail are put on another airplane and relayed to Airborne Express' main hub in Wilmington, Ohio. From there it is sent out on other airplanes all over the world.

With the job each night comes an eight-hour layover in St. Louis, Malone said. For that reason Malone maintains an apartment in St. Louis, paid for through a job allowance.

Sitting in the Cape Girardeau Municipal Airport's restaurant one morning after work, Malone said he has flown airplanes off and on since he was 17. To look at Malone a young man with brown, short-cropped hair and a brown, leather jacket one thinks he should look older.

Malone's job has allowed him to keep in step with a tradition started by his grandfather, James Lacey Malone, and continued by his father, James ("Pete") Malone of Matthews. Most of his primary training came from his father, a retired crop duster, he said.

His grandfather eventually went on to become a test pilot for North American Airlines. He died in 1956, several years before Malone was born. But Malone is said to resemble the man, not only characteristically, but the way he flies an airplane.

"My dad says I'm more like my grandfather than him. I don't know whether that's good or not," said Malone.

Malone's ambition also parallels his grandfather's in that he too wants to become a pilot with a major air carrier. He said he wants to do that to make more money and to fly more sophisticated airplanes.

The plane he flies now on the job is a 1957 Beechcraft Model 18 owned by Cape Central Airways, he said. Although older, Malone said, the plane is well-kept and reliable.

Said Malone: "Every night you fly you have different weather, so each night isn't the same. I've had a thousand experiences, but never the same experience twice."

Malone said it's impressive how Airborne Express can deliver packages all over the world a day after they're sent. He said he's not seen the sorting process required, but he would like to one day.

Malone said seldom does he know what's inside the packages he hauls.

"I'm always curious about them. You'll get a box the size of that jukebox that doesn't weigh a pound and a half," he said, pointing to a jukebox in the corner. Freight marked fragile, he said, usually has computers or glass inside. He said he hauls a lot of automobile parts.

Malone said he hears a lot of comments about his age when he pilots charter flights, although that isn't very often.

One time he believes it was in Kansas City Malone said he walked up to the airplane without initially introducing himself as the pilot. When he climbed in, he said, the passengers asked where the pilot was.

"I said, `I'm it.' They didn't say anything; they just looked at me at first like they didn't believe me."