Minot Aero Center Flying High - KXNet - Bismarck/Minot/Williston/Dickinson

Minot Aero Center Flying High

Commercial airline travel is at an all time high throughout the region spurred by the economic boom.

That is also true for the private and commuter air traffic moving through the Minot Airport.

As Shaun Sipma reports, the influx of aircraft has Minot's Aero Center hitting on all cylinders.

In three short years Minot's Aero Center, which handles all non-commercial flight traffic in and out of the Magic City, has gone from staying busy to a bustling epicenter of air travel that never sleeps.

(Warren Pietsch, Minot Aero Center/Pietsch Aircraft) "We've had about a 650 percent increase in the past three year."

Three years ago, it was Pietsch aircraft took over as the Fixed Base Operator at the Aero Center.

(Warren Pietsch, Minot Aero Center/Pietsch Aircraft) "We service all of the aircraft that require fuel out here and that includes the airlines. We do all the airline fueling, we do all the general aviation and corporate fueling. We maintain corporate aircraft and general aviation aircraft and we're on call in the event that one of the airlines breaks, we have contracts with each of the aircrafts, the mechanics will go out and work on those airlines."

With air travel increasing so too has the staff.

(Warren Pietsch, Minot Aero Center/Pietsch Aircraft) "Just five years ago there were six of us working at Pietsch Aircraft and there's 35 of us working together at Minot Aero Center now.

Much of the new traffic through the General Aviation building is centered around energy.

(Warren Pietsch, Minot Aero Center/Pietsch Aircraft) " obviously because of the increase in oil boom and things.

But before the oil, Minot already had a bulls eye on it for air travel. Maybe not the destination but the halfway stop.

(Warren Pietsch, Minot Aero Center/Pietsch Aircraft) "We're on what's called the great circle route. That allows us to have airplanes that are going worldwide stop here for fuel and customs and those types of things."

(Warren Pietsch, Minot Aero Center/Pietsch Aircraft) "We have some pretty neat trips that come through in the middle of the night. There was one two days ago on its way from Los Angeles to London with a celebrity on board. They come in about 5 in the morning got some catering, got some fuel and were on their way.

More demand on the center has prompted Pietsch to expand, adding a 36-thousand square foot facility that will include corporate day rooms, heating garages, a new lobby with larger restroom facilities in addition to a much larger hanger bay that will hold the largest of corporate jets.

(Warren Pietsch, Minot Aero Center/Pietsch Aircraft) We'll have lounges for the pilots, lounges for the customers so they don't have to be mingling all the time."

Pietsch says with the economy in the region continuing it's climb the demand on the Minot Aero Center will only increase making for a very busy, but well equipped general aviation airport.

In Minot, Shaun Sipma KX News.

The Minot Aero Center runs upwards of 50 planes a day through the General Aviation Airport.