ABOVE: Chris Deuel, left, owner of Badland Aircraft in Truman, shows students in Jerry Brooks’ Principles of Flight class at Fairmont High School one of the ultralight airplanes he has built for a customer on Thursday morning.

TRUMAN– Students in Fairmont High School’s Principles of Flight class toured Badland Aircraft on Thursday morning. Badland Aircraft, located just outside of Truman, is owned by Chris Deuel, who manufactures airplanes.

Jerry Brooks, the instructor of the class, said that last week Deuel was invited into the classroom to talk about how he got into the industry, what’s involved in his business, what type of skills are needed and what kind of employment opportunities it could lead to and that the trip out to his business was set up so that students could see everything for themselves.

“The Principles of Flight class really deals with all of the different career paths that you could go into in aviation. It’s not just about flying an airplane. You could go into air traffic control, become a mechanic, pilot, stewardess or TSA worker,” Brooks explained.

He said the fact that there’s a business like Badland Aircraft so close– which many people in Martin County don’t even know about– led him to want to expose the students to it.

“He’s a nationally known producer of aircraft, but a secret here in Martin County,” Brooks said.

Originally from Marshall, Deuel moved to Las Vegas after graduating high school as he intended to join the Marines. However, he ended up working at a body shop doing collision repairs and then became a police officer for a school district in Las Vegas, which he did for about a decade.

Then, one day Deuel said he developed the urge to fly. He began doing flight training but realized it would be better overall to buy an airplane to train in, rather than rent one, and sell it when he was done training.

“I started looking for an airplane to buy, but I found a bunch of tools and jigs on eBay,” Deuel explained.

Rather than buy himself an airplane, he decided to build one, which he ended up selling.

“Then I built another one and sold it to that guy’s cousin,” Deuel said with a laugh.

He started taking flight classes in 2014 and obtained his pilot certificate. In 2016, he built the first plane and in the seven years since then, he has built 31 planes.

“When the second guy wanted a plane, I thought I could start building and selling, but I was back-ordered by two or three planes within the first year. That’s when I created Badland Aircraft,” Deuel said.

While Badland Aircraft does manufacture ready to fly airplanes, it also offers a variety of kits filled with the required aircraft grade parts for people to assemble their own planes.

“It takes 200 to 400 hours. It doesn’t take a ton of talent. If you have a 500 piece toolkit, you can put it together,” Deuel said.

As for putting together the planes himself, Deuel does the design work, which he greatly enjoys, the welding, which he’s certified in, and the fabrication work. He works alone with the occasional help from his wife and children, who help out how they can.

Deuel explained that there’s three different models of planes: ultralight, experimental and light sport. While the vast majority are single seat, he recently received an order for a two-seater that he will work on for the first time.

Currently, Deuel has orders for 17 different planes. His customers are from all over and he’s made planes or sent kits to people in Texas, Alabama, Florida, Alaska, Pennsylvania and Georgia to name a few.

Deuel believes a lot of people hear about him though social media platforms Instagram and Facebook, which he posts on under the name of his business, as well as through his website, badlandaircraft.com, along with the big EAA (Experimental Aircraft Association) Airventure, which takes place every July in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.

“It’s the largest airshow in the world. There was 670,000 people there this year,” Deuel said.

He’s had a booth there the last six years and more than social media, he believes that that’s where the majority of his customers come from. While most of the visitors fly in for fun for the 10 day event, there are a good number of other vendors there such as himself.

Badland Aircraft started while Deuel and his family were living out in Las Vegas. In 2021, the family moved out to where they currently are after Deuel’s sister sent him a video of the property. The property provides ample space for Deuel to work on and store the plans and all of the required equipment and parts.

“The timing was right. Everything was right to do this,” Deuel said.

He doesn’t knows of any other local aircraft manufactures, except for in Duluth. While he doesn’t own any planes that he’s built, he does own a 1947 Luscombe 8a, which he flies on a regular basis. The plane at the Fairmont Municipal Airport, though Deule does have a landing strip on his property.

As he’s 100 percent self-taught, Deuel enjoys the opportunity to share his journey with students and let them know of all of the different opportunities out there.

“It’s crazy when you sit down and think of all of the jobs out there and how many we don’t have a clue about that we would probably love,” Deuel said.

Exposing students to the opportunities out there is a goal of the Fairmont Area School District’s as well as something Brooks strives to provide to his students.

“Anytime we can get our kids in our classes to have an authentic experience and see the possibilities and how advanced something can be… it’s not something you can just sit in school and hope to do. To see the motivation that someone has to start a company like this is a pretty neat experience for our kids,” Brooks said.