A graduate of Columbia High School recently had the opportunity to fly the planes he watched as a child as he participated in the Spirit of St. Louis Air Show in Chesterfield, Mo., over the weekend.

Seth McClanahan grew up in Columbia, graduating from CHS before attending Greenville College and participating in Division III soccer.

He graduated in December 2013 and mainly worked for a time as a substitute teacher in the area, particularly in his hometown as well as Valmeyer.

He later found himself drawn to the military, joining U.S. Navy Officer Candidate School in September 2015 and receiving his commission in December of that year.

In the years since, McClanahan has done a great deal of traveling as part of his training and service.

Though he lived in Columbia for a time, he attended flight school in Pensacola, Fla. He selected multi-engine as his specialty and received his wings at Corpus Christi, Texas, in 2017.

From there, he went to Jacksonville, Fla., where he currently resides, learning how to fly the Boeing P-8 Poseidon.

He then joined Patron Squadron VP-5 for his Sea Duty, serving a little over three years with a deployable squadron. A lot of this time was spent in Okinawa, Japan.

He then became an instructor at VP-5 and has since been selected to attend the Maritime Patrol and Reconnaissance Weapon School, where he has been receiving training for nearly three years.

Amid his service and training, the stars aligned quite recently to allow him to participate in a local air show.

As he recalled, his squadron’s “sister squadron” VP-30 was sending an airplane to the Spirit of St. Louis event, and one of the pilots asked if anyone might be interested in joining.

McClanahan said he originally just expected to tag along with the plane, joining a static display to answer questions as folks got a close-up look of the aircraft.

He ultimately, of course, wound up participating in the actual display.

“This was my first time actually performing at an air show, which was a very neat opportunity for me, and I’m incredibly grateful and blessed for that opportunity,” McClanahan said.

He emphasized how interesting it was to be on the other side of the event, having seen other such shows when he was younger.

“It was an incredible opportunity for me to go from being the little kid at the air shows at Scott Air Force base growing up to now being able to be the performer and be on the other end,” McClanahan said. “To go from being the observer to now being in it and getting to share my passion and joy of aviation with the younger generation.”

He noted that he’s not exactly planning on pursuing the air show circuit going forward, and he is still attending the Maritime Patrol and Reconnaissance Weapon School

Nevertheless, he said he would love to fly in a show again should the opportunity arise.

“Will I ever get a chance to fly in another air show?” McClanahan said. “That’s a good question. We’re not the Blue Angels or some of the demo teams that get to do this on a regular basis. It was really kind of a neat experience and an honor to be able to do that.”