Iowa Helicopter Staff & Students

“Copter” John McLaughlin
Owner/DPE

John McLaughlin is the owner of  Iowa Helicopter. He is also the FAA Designated Pilot Examiner (DPE) for rotorcraft and fixed wing aircraft. John holds commercial, flight instructor and instrument flight instructor ratings in rotorcraft and single/multi engine fixed-wing aircraft. He has accumulated more than 5,800 flight hours in a variety of single and multi-engine aircraft. John has attended the Robinson Helicopter Flight Instructor Safety School and the Advanced Flight High Altitude R44 Training. He has more than 1800 hours in Robinson helicopters. He is also the Chief Meteorologist for KCCI-TV in Des Moines and specializes in Doppler radar systems. He is a frequent lecturer for the American Meteorological Society and the National Weather Association. When severe weather strikes central Iowa, John uses his helicopter skills to work with National Weather Service damage survey teams. John resides in the Des Moines area and can be contacted at copterjohn@gmail.com.

Jason Hohanshelt
Pilot

Jason Hohanshelt is a former Army National Guard aviator with more than 500 hours experience in the UH-1 Huey and Bell Jet Ranger, many of those hours under night vision goggles (NVG). He has attended the Robinson Helicopter Factory School and is certified as a commercial pilot in the R22 and R44. Jason and his family live in Ankeny, Iowa. Drop him a note at hohanshelt_av8r@yahoo.com

Brandon Kaufman
Student

Brandon grew up on a farm in Crawfordsville, IA. After graduation Brandon attended SCC and got an AAS in Drafting & joined the workforce. When the opportunity arose to take flying lesson's, he jumped on it. As of now he has his sights set on working for an EMS company in the midwest. Interests: Golfing, camping, church activities, & helping his wife feed the local homeless population.

 

Austen Clark
Student

Austen Clark came to Iowa Helicopter in April of 2010. Austen grew up in the small farming community of Elkader in northeast Iowa until he graduated from highschool in 2003. Then he moved to the Waterloo/Cedar Falls area where he attended Hawkeye Community College and recieved a AA in General Studies and an AAS in Police Science. After that Austen went on to attend college at the University of Northern Iowa where he recieved a Bachelors degree in Communications and a Minor in Criminology. Austen then went on to work in the "real world" for a little over one year and decided that he wanted to pursue his life long dream and love in the aviation field and the rest is history. Austen is working towards a CFII and ultimately would like to obtain a job with some type of agency ie. police, border patrol, CIA or FBI. Austen's ultimate goal as a helicopter pilot "I wanna be like Mike (Peterson)"

Neal Redington
Student

Neal grew up on a farm just outside Galena IL, & is the middle of three children. He started driving tractors when he was 5 years old, since then farming has always been a part of his life. Neal graduated high school in 2005, and went to work full time on the family farm. He farms a few thousand acres & also raises beef cattle. In his free time he likes to ride his Harley. This summer his family hired an ag sprayer to apply fungicide to their crops, but he was so busy that he kept putting them off and never showed up. His dad made the comment "well then I guess we'll just have to buy our own helicopter", & Neal jumped at the chance, bought an R44 and hopes to be crop dusting within the next few years after some specialized training.

Norman Robbins
Student

Norm was born and raised in Michigan where he worked for Chrysler for over 16 years as a designer and product engineer. In 2009 he decided to pursue a life-long aspiration of flying helicopters. He is currently in training at Iowa Helicopter working toward his CFII certification in Rotorcraft.