The third annual Michigan Musciano Fun Fly was held on Saturday, 16 August 2008 at the Air Zoo in Kalamazoo, Michigan.   The Kalamazoo Smoke Rings, the Broome Park Circle Burners, and the Lansing Area Flying Aces jointly sponsor this Michigan control line event.   This contest honors the legendary Walt Musciano, who has been designing and building model aircraft for over half a century and who for many of us, designed our first model airplane.   At 86 years young, Walt is still designing model aircraft!

The emphasis of this event is on fun and nostalgia and the aircraft are limited to the carved balsa fuselage, solid wing, semi-scale designs produced by the Scientific Model Company in the 1960s.   This formula starts everyone on an equal footing and lets us once again experience the fun of flying these little birds.   As in the past, this resulted in a large number of aircraft, a great day of competition, and some wonderful entertainment for participants and spectators alike!   In addition to the small 'hollow log' aircraft, the Musciano Unlimited event allows any Walt Musciano design scaled to any size.   This year saw large sized versions of the .049 Gulfhawk and the venerable Golden Hawk, both scaled up to .35 size!

The day was warm and sunny with a touch of wind and everyone had a great time!   Two circles provided a smooth running event with ample time for practice and competition. Walter Musciano graciously signed each of the winners' award certificates, which were presented at the end of the day as a special memento of a special day.

The Sportsmanship Award, new for 2008, was voted to Currel Pattie for supplying planes for several of the competetors.   His F-82 was the winner in Proto Speed while his Bullet was flown to a second place finish in the Slow Rat Race.

The day was marked by some tremendous flying and some wonderful craftsmanship.   Notable was Jacob Evans first place in the Proto Speed event that marked his ever win in competition.   Skip Gizowski returned from his Craftsmanship win in the first Musciano event to again capture this award with a spectacular Cessna 182.   All in all, it was a great day and we all look forward to the 2009 event!