May 27, 2021
Gabriel Klinger ’21 Taps Austin Meyer ’88 For Year-End Aviation Club Event
“How can a heavy metal capsule fly 30,000 feet in the air?” This question has perplexed and fascinated flight enthusiast Gabriel Klinger ’21 from a young age, fueling a lifelong passion for aviation. A native of Sao Paulo, Brazil, Klinger is a self-dubbed “AvGeek” (aviation geek), taking pride in his collection of books and magazines on the subject and his obsession with the science behind flight.
“During the summer, I would read through airplane manuals and handbooks,” Klinger says. “In lunch breaks at school, my friends and I would sketch innovative airplane concepts that we were certain would revolutionize the industry. Airplanes were all I could think of and I knew they were my future.”
Klinger brought his passion with him to St. Paul’s School, and founded the Aviation Club last year with fellow plane lover David Huang ’23. The club’s mission is “to encourage and teach people about the joys of flight,” and activities have included flying airplane simulators, engaging in experiments, and delving into the physics behind air travel. Within the first few meetings of the club, members had already learned how to perform a simulated takeoff in a Cessna 172, a small single-engine airplane.
In the winter term, the club hosted a schoolwide paper airplane competition in the Upper Dining Room, allowing students to design their own vessels and attempt to fly them through a series of mounted hula hoops. This spring, the club started meeting in the school’s engineering lab, where Huang had constructed a wind tunnel to help students develop their own remote-control planes.
The final piece Klinger wanted to offer club members was the opportunity to interface with professionals in the field, and he was thrilled when renowned aviation expert Austin Meyer ’88 accepted an invitation to speak to the group. As a young boy in Brazil, Klinger taught himself how to fly using Meyer’s X-Plane flight simulator, one of the most advanced and widely used simulators in the world. “He is a massive figure in the field of aviation and an idol of mine,” says Klinger of Meyer. “I was certain that his talk would inspire members of our community, and his story is a great example of how we can use our passions and skills for the good of the world.”
Meyer met virtually with students on May 7, delivering a talk entitled “From SPS to X-Plane,” in which he discussed his experience at SPS, his current work, and the future of aviation. “When I went to St. Paul’s, there were times that alumni came back to talk about what they were doing in the professional world, and it was great,” recalls Meyer. “It brings in so much real-world information that you might not get academically.”
The hour-long event left plenty of topics untouched, and Meyer is excited to continue these sessions in the future, digging deeper into the technical side of his projects and the math behind his flight simulators. As for Klinger, he is setting his sights on a career in aerospace engineering, hoping to dedicate his life to the science of flight and its unique ability to connect people, cultures, and resources from all over the world.