PORT ANGELES — A Port Angeles-based timberlands management firm is the owner of the first airplane hangar to be built at William R. Fairchild International Airport in at least five years.
John David Crow, chairman of the Green Crow board of directors, said the new, entirely privately funded hangar is about 6,000 square feet and will house a company plane Green Crow uses to ferry clients to and from Port Angeles.
Crow said air travel is often the easiest way to bring clients to the North Olympic Peninsula so they don’t have to worry about driving long distances or dealing with ferry traffic.
“A business out here really needs an airplane,” Crow said Saturday while standing outside Green Crow’s new tan hangar with green trim.
Construction on the hangar, the second-largest at the airport, started last summer and wrapped up last month, Crow said.
“It wasn’t cheap,” Crow said when asked how much it cost to build after declining to say the specific figure.
Doug Sandau, airport manager for the Port of Port Angeles, said the last time a new, relatively large hangar was built at the airport was at least five or six years ago.
“It’s a nice addition to the airport,” Sandau said. “I’m excited to see it there.”
Crow said his company is leasing the space upon which the hangar is built from the Port of Port Angeles.
In addition to the Green Crow company plane, the hangar will house Crow’s two private planes, one of which is an aerobatics plane he flew professionally for five years up until about 20 years ago.
“I’m an aerobatics nut,” Crow said.
The lounge and office attached to the hangar were also a testament to Crow’s love of planes and flying, with commemorative photographs and artwork depicting some of Crow’s favorite aircraft lining the lounge’s forest-green walls.
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Reporter Jeremy Schwartz can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5074, or at jschwartz@peninsuladailynews.com.
