Fly like Kylie

And Kylie Murray was a pilot.

“She was in so many orbits,” her father, Geoff Murray, says. “She was very athletic, and she liked being part of groups and organizing things. She really felt a lot of love being with all these different kinds of people.”

Kylie got the aviation bug from her father, a management consultant turned airline pilot. She began flying while she was still in high school and earned her private pilot certificate before graduation.

“She was one of those people who was doing all of this stuff, and just made it look easy,” Murray says. “Like a swan—graceful above the water’s surface but working so hard below it.”

And she was humble, her mother, Lisa Murray, adds. “We would talk to some of her student-athlete friends who had no clue she was a pilot, and her pilot friends didn’t know she was captain of the soccer team.”

“She’d say, ‘Oh, Mom, who cares?’”

Kylie worked her way through advanced ratings to become a CFI and also earned a seaplane certificate while on a trip to Alaska with her father. Her love of taildraggers led her to Cub Air Flight in Hartford, Wisconsin, where she taught in the iconic Piper Cub.
As the school’s youngest instructor, she earned the
nickname “Baby Quack.”

On July 31, 2021, Kylie Murray died in a stall/spin accident while doing what she loved: teaching a high school student how to fly. She was 21 years old.

“When the accident happened, so many people wanted to help,” Geoff Murray says. More than 600 people came to pay their respects. “Kylie was active in EAA and Women in Aviation International at Auburn University, and I think almost by instinct, we just said, if you want to do something, please support EAA or WAI.”

Those organizations were then overwhelmed with donations. It quickly became clear to the Murray family that they could keep Kylie’s legacy alive by creating opportunities to help young women like their daughter achieve their aviation goals.

“Kylie never understood why more women weren’t flying,” Lisa Murray said. “So, we wanted to support other young women who exhibit characteristics similar to Kylie, and who could use a financial leg up.” The family created several scholarships for aspiring aviators that now carry her name.

The Kylie Murray Memorial Flight Training Scholarship is administered through EAA’s Ray Aviation Scholarship Foundation. It provides a minimum of $10,000 towards primary flight training at any flight school in the country. A second scholarship is offered through WAI and ATP Flight School and supports a woman who wishes to pursue a commercial multiengine land or multiengine instructor certification. The third scholarship is offered through Wisconsin Aviation Hall of Fame and Cub Air Flight, where Kylie taught, and pays for a tailwheel endorsement.

So far, six young pilots have benefited from the scholarships, which are given annually and have been fully endowed. The Murrays hope to find candidates who embody the ambition, the spirit, the compassion, and the kindness of their daughter Kylie.

“Kylie loved being a part of the grassroots general aviation community, getting back to the basics, hanging out at the field on a Friday afternoon, or just tooling around in a Cub at dusk,” Geoff Murray said. “She just loved the art of flying.”

[email protected]

flylikekylie.org
wai.org/scholarships
eaa.org/scholarships
wahf.org/scholarships