Shad’s love of all things flying began at an early age. He started flying airplanes when he was 12 and has spent the past 30 years exploring every facet of aviation and wind sports, including airplanes, gliders, aerobatics, skydiving, paragliding, snowkiting, and kiteboarding. Compared to the other flyers attending this year, he is relatively new to flying large single-line display kites.
Shad was part of the original team of kite flyers that Steve Boote brought together to showcase these beautiful works of art over the water during the Fourth of July celebration in 2019. Since then, he has participated in several iterations of #BojiKites, during both summer and winter shows. His favorite part of flying big kites is seeing the smiles, hearing the laughter, and watching the memories being made for the children in attendance—as well as the childhood memories rekindled for the adults in the audience.