Womens Soaring Pilots Association

Promoting all aspects of soaring for women glider pilots.

Sarah Kelly Arnold – United States Soaring Hall of Fame

Sarah Arnold has been selected for the U. S. Soaring Hall of Fame for 2020. Her induction and banquet will be held here at the National Soaring Museum on Wednesday evening, November 3, 2021. She has selected this date so as to not conflict with her business and competition responsibilities. She has requested that Roy McMaster, 2019 HoF inductee, also be recognized on this occasion.

Sarah has firmly established herself as an excellent competition sailplane pilot. In 2011, she was the first woman selected to represent the U.S. in a world soaring competition and brought home a bronze medal. In that same year, Sarah also won the U.S. Open Class Nationals and in 2020, she became the first American to win a Women’s World Championship. When she is not flying in contests, Sarah and her husband, Jason, operate their soaring operation in Benton, Tennessee. She has spent thousands of hours instructing and towing. Sarah has worked tirelessly through her adult life to promote the sport of soaring.

Sarah grew up in Lumby, British Columbia, Canada, a small town surrounded by the Monashee Mountains. This “pretty area” turned out to be a good place to develop her skills as a pilot. She first began flying at the age of 13, beginning with an ultralight aircraft. Throughout her teen years, she continued to perfect her skills, learning to fly additional kinds of aircraft. On her 17th birthday – the earliest possible date – she tested for and received her pilot’s license.

Sarah, who is a dual citizen of the U.S. and Canada, later moved to Oregon, where she enrolled in aircraft mechanic school. Her original dream was to become a missionary pilot and help with humanitarian efforts in other parts of the world. However, after she graduated, she found there was little demand for missionary pilots.

She moved to Tennessee after accepting a job at Advent Home Youth Services in Calhoun, which was a group home for youth. While working at the home, she also began working part-time at Benton’s Chilhowee Gliderport as a tow pilot. She then began “trading hours” to gain time learning how to fly a glider. “It wasn’t that hard for me to learn because I was already a power pilot,” Arnold said. “The sport of the whole thing is different though. There’s an intuition that you have to have to find your angles, hit the thermals and gain energy to fly.”

After going through the process of getting her glider pilot license, she continued to perfect her skills and began thinking of competing. In 2006, she took part in her first major competition.

She has since participated in more than 30 competitions in the U.S., not including pre-world and world championship races.

WSPA is a division of the SSA