Who we are!!

The MAA originally formed in 1992 as a member of the Sport Flyer Association.

Our flying site was the West Richland soccer field.

We were able to stay there one year (In those day's The soccer field was a 20 to 30 acre grass field). But as the sport of soccer grew and more and more goal post and concession building were installed we had to move to another site in West Richland.

The city has a 13-acre piece of land that's listed as a future park. But was used as a privet dump for West Richland. We put down used dryer belting from Boise Cascade paper mill for a runway and flew out of there until 1997.

By now we had grown in membership and the local housing area was growing with leaps and bounds. 

Several members had been working with the Benton County Park Board. And a long-term lease was set up in 1997. We are now firmly established with 8 years at our current site.

A lot of work has been accomplished. We've installed under ground sprinkles. Moved from a dryer belt run way in 2002 to paved a 40 by 400-foot runway. Also in 2002 with a unanimous vote by all members present at the meeting we renamed the field to Higgins Field.

Our well has been pumping water to our ever improving grass areas for 7 year's. Our grass areas saved us from losing everything when the big Hanford fire burned all the way around, up to the grass (and did scorch the edge of the grass) and we lost our well house. But that was repaired in short order.

And in 2003 the Benton County Park board voted to and installed electricity to it's Horn Rapids Park. So we will no longer be running a diesel generator to water the grass.

 We hold several fun fly's and big bird events each year with our Indian Summer Jamboree as our last event of the year. It's always a 3 day fly.

In 2004 we retired Chucks Chuck wagon and rebuilt our gazebo and turned it into the Big Dog House. And we will be using it as our cook shack, so food and drink will still be available at the field during events.

We do have a large graveled parking lot and over night camping is permitted. And 1 mile north of use is a full service RV park with power and clean out facility.

When the Sports Flyer's Association ceased. The club joined The Academy Of Model Aeronautics. Our membership is open to all. We require that you belong to the AMA and be a member of the MAA.

 Our flying style is sport flying. Our planes run from the very simplest electric to big bird to scale with a growing interest in the 3D and an occasional helicopter shows up.

Our standard is if you can fly it safely then fly it.