Instructors
Acro Dynamics is a family company that was established in July09 between two brothers that only had dreams of keeping the tail dragging spirit and persona alive.
Michael (Mikey) Matthews is the owner of Acro Dynamics llc and is the experience in the equation. After a life practically immersed in aviation, Matthews knew early that flight was not just a choice in life but his destiny. The majority of his childhood aviation was the byproduct of a military flying family. His father Rick is a retired Army Helicopter pilot having logged thousands of hours stateside and abroad in aircraft like the UH-1 Huey and Cobra. The first family aircraft was a 1952 Cessna 170B purchased when he was a boy and whether Matthews could reach the pedals or not was of no concern. The yoke was still accessible with a couple of pillows. Flying the network of grass strips in the NC area has given him some pretty concise views of do’s and don’ts when it comes to grass strip hopping.
He says his aviation career really started as a Piedmont Hawthorne Lineman at a local airport in Winston Salem NC KINT . After earning a CFI Certified Flight Instructor ticket in 2004 at NAIA in South Carolina he was united with some friends in Las Vegas and began instructing for West Air Aviation in the High Sierra Desert of Nevada. Mountain Flying and high altitude operations quickly educated him on the performance aspects of small aircraft. He also had a chance to instruct some of the USAF United States Air Force’s finest in the IFS and IFT Initial Flight Training programs while in Sin City. After gaining some professional aerobatic instruction he began to teach the art himself and has since logged time in a plethora of aerobatic aircraft such as the Pitts, Swick T, Super Decathlon, Hiperbipe,Rans S 9 & 10,At-6 Texan and Stearman.
Matthews returned to his home state of North Carolina in 2006 and began working for a very fast group of individual that you may have heard of. Nascar Aviation is a corporate spiderweb of high end airplanes and near sonic travel. Dale Earnhardt Jr of JRM Motorsports employed Mikey to fly the EMB 120 Brasilia Turboprop in 2006 and his corporate career had begun. Going on for several years now he has been ingrained into several social networks of aviation nationwide and is motivated by the wealth of knowledge that these flying communities have to offer. He is currently employed by the King of Speed, Mr Richard Petty and his son Kyle Petty to pilot the personal fleet. Type rated in the Israel Aircraft Westwind Jet and certified as a factory instructor in the Columbia 400, Matthews absolutely loves his schedule and work life.
Having now earned his ATP Airline Transport Ticket and his MEII Multi Engine Instructor he has logged over 3000 hours total time in 70 different airplanes and has given 1200 hours of dual instruction over a very prosperous career in aviation. Matthews says, “He is blessed to experience such a magical place as the sky and the chance to learn something new from every hour in the clouds and from each different aircraft, you know flight time is not deducted from ones lifespan” he proclaims. Maybe he is right but that knowledge and experience is what he arms himself with every time he straps into his 1978 Bellanca Decathlon CS. He expects your experience at Acro Dynamics to be a personal one and a friendship to be established throughout your training here at Acro. After all, one of the most important tools in life is learning the power of humble. Once you have been humbled then it tends to become a motivating factor. Matthews says, “He is constantly on the lookout for the next humbling experience on the inverted horizon”. Come experience what quality training is like at Acro Dynamics and let your adventurous side take flight !!! Whether it is the thrill of aerobatics or learning to fly a tailwheel airplane, Acro has just what you need to become a safer pilot. Drop by and take a flight, you may discover what you have been missing!! Blue skies.
