Meet Maverick Foletta: The 8-Year-Old Aspiring Pilot from Salina, California Pursuing His Aviation Dreams

SALINAS, Calif. — Maverick Foletta is well on his way to achieving his dream of becoming a pilot, despite being just 8 years old.

The young aviation enthusiast from Salinas has already accumulated more than 10 hours of flying lessons, a notable achievement for someone so young.

Despite his impressive progress, Maverick shared with KSBW that piloting a plane involves juggling multiple tasks.

“You have all your instruments, and you have to look outside mostly,” he explained.

Maverick’s passion for aviation took flight two years ago when his father introduced him to flying lessons, and he has been enthralled ever since.

“He gave me some lessons. I really enjoyed it,” Maverick said. “Recently, he gave me some more lessons, and I’m enjoying it right now.”

“It’s always my dream to fly with Maverick, and that was like, a dream come true,” said Michael Foletta, Maverick’s father.

Enoch Weichers, Maverick’s instructor, praised him for his work ethic.

“Kids really tend to learn really quickly because they don’t have any preconceived notions of how to do things,” Weichers said. “He’s very humble and a very quick learner.”

Most students are ready to fly solo after 40-60 hours of flight time, but Weichers believes he’ll be ready much sooner.

“If Maverick could, he’d probably be ready to solo pretty soon, maybe in the next couple of flight lessons,” Weichers said.

Maverick has a reason behind his motivation to fly.

“It’s because I want to be like Top Gun Maverick,” he said.