LEXINGTON, Ky. (WKYT) – A Lexington teenager is taking to the skies this summer as a licensed pilot.

Bryan Station High School rising senior, Griffin Humfleet, is one of the youngest licensed pilots in the state.

He says he never even thought about being a pilot until boredom struck during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I just kind of picked it up and I started loving it,” said Humfleet. “I started buying models and flying in simulators.”

Humfleet spent about a year doubling down on studying, studying for high school classes and flying.

“It can take a few weeks to a few years,” he said.

Humfleet spent about 10 months in flight school at Kentucky Airmotive in Mount Sterling.

“You get something called the flying bug.”

Humfleet says that bug is here to stay now, but believe it or not, he was once scared of flying.

“I’ve been like ‘pilots, I don’t know how they do that. They’re so high up in the air,” said Humfleet.

By facing his fear and hitting 40 hours of flight time, Humfleet passed his private pilot flight test in May.

“There’s definitely points where you feel like giving up, and there’s definitely points where you feel like you’re on top of the world. It was just kind of like ‘I can’t believe I’ve done this. I’m a pilot.’”

Humfleet says he flies a Cessna 172 single-engine airplane that actually weighs less than his car.

“You’ll just get random people coming up to you in the hall saying, ‘When are you taking me up for a flight?’ Or ‘hey, when can we go fly?’”

His focus for the summer and senior year, he said, is to build up flight hours with the goal of one day becoming a commercial pilot.

“I’ll need to fly to my college visits instead of driving to them. It just feels like so free, very free.”

Griffin says his next planned trip is on Sunday. He and his father are going to go out to London to get an aerial view of the tornado damage.

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