When Ray Briers returned from a trip to the Bahamas with his family earlier this year, his team at The Pipe Yard, Inc.—the pipe purchasing and cleaning company he owns near Houston, Texas—fell in love with a photo Ray showed them.
It wasn’t one of the images showing the family having fun among the beautiful turquoise waters and white sand beaches that Staniel Cay is known for—though, those photos were stunning—but rather a photo of 2½-year-old Geddy Lee Briers strapped in his car seat in the cabin of his dad’s 1978 Beechcraft King Air B100.
“During the flight to Exumas in the Bahamas, Geddy decided to relax and look through King Air magazine,” Paulina Biscamp, who works in accounting at The Pipe Yard, wrote in an email that included two photos of Geddy Lee looking captivated by the magazine. “These pictures are priceless and we wanted to share them with the staff of King Air magazine!”
Geddy Lee is named after the lead singer of the rock band Rush, one of his dad’s favorite bands. Ray says his son loves opening our magazine, not just any magazine, and looking at all the pictures.
“Even in my car, Geddy is super intrigued when he spots my King Air magazine on the seat near him. I’m guessing it’s because he loves to fly,” Ray said.
Fortunately for Ray, all his children have loved to fly with him. He has daughters Carolinn (23) and Skylar (17) from his first marriage, stepson Colton (13) and Geddy Lee with wife Jessica.
Now 53, Ray started flying when he was 26 years old and has accumulated about 1,500 hours over the years, flying a mix of business and recreational trips from his homebase at Houston Southwest Airport (KAXH).
Encouraged to Fly
Ray earned his private pilot certificate in 1997, becoming the first student of a friend who had recently become a flight instructor. He was encouraged by his family, too.
“My uncle was a pilot, and I remember that my dad had an airplane at some point when I was growing up but he was never a pilot,” he said. “My dad regretted never learning to fly and told me I should do it while I had the chance. So, I did. I completed my complex and high performance training right after getting my private, and then jumped right into getting my multi-engine rating. I flew multi for probably 10 years without my IFR certification, and then I went back and got my IFR.”
He received a tailwheel endorsement and tried some aerobatics early on, but said, “I knew my goal was always to go farther, faster and with more weight so a twin engine airplane was the direction I went in.”
In 1999, he bought his first airplane, a twin-piston Piper PA-23 Aztec, which he replaced in 2006 with a Cessna 421.
“I loved the 421, but it has those geared engines and it was a complex airplane to fly with one pilot,” Ray said. “I’d heard a lot of good things about the turbines and how stable they are, so I bought the B100 in 2018 as my intro King Air. I’ve loved it, and I’ll buy another one.”
‘A Great Introduction’
Looking back on the past six years of flying the B100, Ray admitted he’s not sure why he bought the airplane.
“It’s been such a great airplane for us, though, that I’m glad we did,” he said. “The B100 really has been a great introduction to being in a turbine aircraft.”
He was in the market for a King Air B200 when he came across N519RR in east Texas and couldn’t pass up the good buy.
“The initial cost of the B100 was so much less than the B200, so we went and looked at it,” Ray said. “The cabin was the same as the B200 and
this airplane had the -10 engines. We get 250-260 knots regularly with those -10s, up to 280-320 with a tailwind.”
If you’re wondering, as we were, if the large R on the tail matching the signature Beechcraft B font is Ray’s doing, it’s not. Like the tail number, it came with the aircraft when he bought it in 2018. He’s not planning any unnecessary modifications since he’s already decided to upgrade, likely a newer B200 model.
Instead, he’s enjoying accumulating hours in the King Air, ranging from personal flights to business travel, flying single pilot and occasional flights with Chris Prause, who is a minority owner at The Pipe Yard and a pilot and certified flight instructor.
Work missions include industry conferences and customer meetings related to The Pipe Yard, which sells new, used and surplus steel pipe and offers remediation services to customers in the oil and gas, petrochemical and energy industries. They also fly for projects involving their ancillary business, Credo Services LLC, a pipeline integrity service company offering a variety of inspection services. This work regularly takes the King Air across Texas and in and out of Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma and New Mexico.
Most personal flights in the King Air take family and friends back and forth from Houston’s KAXH to KECU, Edwards County Airport on the western edge of Texas Hill Country. The Briers own a ranch in Rocksprings, which would be about a six-hour drive instead of a 75-minute flight in the B100.
“I have also been to many places from California to Florida on pleasure trips with my family,” Ray said. That includes flying to Tempe, Arizona, while his daughter was attending Arizona State University (she now works for The Pipe Yard). And, of course, his first time flying the B100 to the Bahamas earlier this year, with Chris as co-pilot.
“Being able to fly ourselves in and out of those small islands makes owning a King Air worth it,” Ray said. “We were thoroughly pleased with the B100’s performance down there. The King Air did wonderful with seven of us onboard with luggage and going into a 3,000-foot runway with a cliff on one side. The weather was great during our trip but it was raining that last day so we went IFR leaving, and the B100 was a great airplane to be in.”