On Sunday, December 10, 2017 at 8:22:54 PM UTC-5, 2G wrote:
On Saturday, December 9, 2017 at 4:34:21 AM UTC-8, wrote:
For one, I am sick and tired of this character assassination of Rich Owen. I have been a part of Seminole Flying and Soaring as a part-time instructor/tow pilot starting at the Flying Seminole Ranch NE of Orlando. With the threat of Orlando's rapid growth Knut and Ingrid Kjenslie wisely purchased land in rural Lake County where they built from scratch the Seminole Lake Gliderport. The Kjenslie's sold several residential lots on the gliderport just to financially survive! Many Orlando glider pilots found SLG a place where soaring is great and the business atmosphere is more like a gliding club. The Seniors' competition has cemented SLG's reputation as a world-class soaring destination.
Yes we all had misgivings including Knut when Mihai purchased the gliderport. And yes we knew how to Google! We have been assured by reliable sources that SLG is safe from seizure.
Now this is where Rich comes in. I find him to be an honorable man who is passionate about soaring. He is a retired Navy and airline pilot and DOES NOT get paid other than expenses for being vice-president of SLG. His biggest vice, he's addicted to Jimmy Buffet concerts! His only goal ( as well as Knut's and a huge majority of the soaring community) is to keep SLG as a healthy, viable soaring destination.

Sigh. NO ONE is impugning Rich's character; it is his business partner, Mihai Tanjala, whose character has already been assassinated by a jury in Romania and confirmed by a US judge. I believe (or at least I hope this is the case) that Rich has been duped by Tanjala (an expert at these sort of things), although Rich continues to defend the felon in the face of extremely damning facts.

Tom

Sigh all you want. Rick became vice-president of Seminole-Lake (without pay ) to make sure we would have a place to fly.
Rich does this to promote soaring not because he was duped by Mihai. The pilots that fly here and like to fly at Seminole-Lake Gliderport are not going to stop flying here because a few don't like the owner. IMO keep politics and religion topics from RAS and glider-ports.