Rotorfest takes off at Penn College | News, Sports, Jobs - Williamsport Sun-Gazette

A Pa State Police helicopter takes off during the Wildcat Rotorfest on the campus of Penn College of Technology April 11, 2023. The event featured several helicopters including a Coast Guard Dolphin Helicopter, National Guard HH-60 Blackhawk Air Ambulance, a PA State Police helicopter and other displays.
DAVE KENNEDY/Sun-Gazette

An array of people, including students in grades K-12 from area schools, college students and even the pre-schoolers from the college’s Child Development Center, attended the first ever “Rotorfest” at the Pennsylvania College of Technology.

The sky was blue, the sun was shining and there was a gentle breeze blowing the huge flag at the entrance to college as the event got underway Tuesday morning.

In anticipation of the students arrival, helicopters from the National Guard, U.S. Coast Guard and the Pennsylvania State Police had flown in for the event. There were first responders, recruiters from the Army National guard, representatives from the college’s emergency management and homeland security department and a Stryker armored vehicle. A drone unit from NCPA Unmanned Emergency Services, Tioga County, was also on hand to demonstrate its capabilities.

But, for the little ones from the college’s Child Development Center’s Bears Group, it was the helicopter that flew in while they were there that was the most exciting. They are studying wind this week and could feel firsthand the power of the Coast Guard’s helicopter blades as they watched it land in the field.

For older students attending the event, it was the opportunity to hear from those in the various careers what it was like and what they need to do to pursue them.

Visitors check out a Black Hawk helicopter during the Wildcat Rotorfest on the campus of Penn College of Technology April 11, 2023. The event featured several helicopters including a Coast Guard Dolphin Helicopter, National Guard HH-60 Blackhawk Air Ambulance, a PA State Police helicopter and other displays. DAVE KENNEDY/Sun-Gazette

It was an event like this that sparked Devin Smerlick’s interest, which led him to become a sergeant with the Army National Guard serving as a crew chief and hoist operator in the back of an HH 60 Mike Blackhawk.

“I had a bunch of pilots that lived in the same town that I grew up in,” Smerlick said. “And they did a display like this for our borough day, which is what we call it. There’s a picture of me in the newspaper. I was like 12 years old. I could answer every question that the pilots or the interviewer was asking, and that’s what got my picture in the paper.”

“Ever since then, I fell in love with this,” he added. “I was driven. I was very driven.”

Smerlick, who has been with the National Guard for about 10 years, said that he was motivated to join by his desire to serve.

The helicopter he works on is used for domestic medevac operations such as flooding and to search for or rescue lost hikers and is stationed out of Fort Indiantown Gap.

Holden McKeever of Athens sits in a Black Hawk helicopter during the Wildcat Rotorfest on the campus of Penn College of Technology April 11, 2023. The event featured several helicopters including a Coast Guard Dolphin Helicopter, National Guard HH-60 Blackhawk Air Ambulance, a PA State Police helicopter and other displays. DAVE KENNEDY/Sun-Gazette

The event allowed the students, whatever age, to climb in the helicopters, look at the engines of the combat vehicles or to see a drone in flight. For Capt. Josh Bell, team commander of the Williamsport Police Department’s Special Response Team, he saw it as an opportunity to promote goodwill.

“These types of events allow us and allow the public, even for children, some unfiltered access to me, the officers on more of a human level, instead of seeing them drive by in a police car when we’re at work, responding to a call. We don’t have a lot of time for interaction,” Bell said.

“These events allow us to just have some conversation with people, and just spend some time together and let people get to know the officers on a human level, on a personal level,” he continued. “And they let us interact with people, just one on one, as people. A lot of people’s interactions with police are obviously on some days of the worst days of their lives.

“So (it’s nice) coming to events like this, where we can get out with the public and interact with other professionals and other agencies that we might work with,” Bell said. “But more so to just sit down and be able to talk to people, when we have just time to do that dedicated to just that.”

The little ones who stopped by to see Bell and his team got to try on a helmet, part of their tactical gear. Some of the older students were asking about careers in law enforcement, while others were working with polymers, which are used in the team’s ballistic equipment, like their shields.

“It’s neat to be able to talk to people that are going to go into a career field where they may end up building these,” Bell said. “So it’s neat for them. And it’s neat for us to see some of the young folks that are going to go into jobs, and they get to see what the fruits of their labor might be. You might be building a shield or ballistic panels for a police officer on a SWAT team or SRT team like us.”

“And they get to see their future, maybe something that they will do down the road, and how it affects the community and everybody else’s career,” he added.

In total, about 1,000 people were expected to attend this inaugural event, said William Schlosser, a member of Penn College’s faculty who headed up Rotorfest.

“Penn College has a huge hands-on program,” Schlosser said, “and I’m an instructor in emergency management and homeland security. What we do dovetails with everything that is emergency response. So from our mechanics, to our aircraft maintenance people, it just seemed like a really good fit.”

“I’m involved with the Civil Air Patrol, so I had a bunch of contacts in the aviation and emergency response community,” Schlosser said. “So I reached out. They said, ‘Yeah, it’d be great to have your college students come and take a look at us and then have the high school students look at what the jobs are and how to get those jobs.’”