With goggles strapped on and a cream-colored pilot scarf around its neck, Amelia Bearhart looked every bit the parachutist. That proved appropriate when the teddy bear was dropped from a plane flying about 200 feet in the air at roughly 85 knots.

Against a clear sky, the bear tumbled to the ground. With just 20 feet to go, a plastic parachute opened. Then Bearhart drifted down safely and landed within 18 feet of her intended target.

“It really came down perfectly,” said Luke Wadsworth, a sophomore Aeronautical Science student and member of the Embry‑Riddle Aeronautical University Eagles Flight Team, who gave the bear its name and released it into the sky.

Twenty-eight young men and women stand in a row, some holding teddy bears

The Eagles Flight Team at the Daytona Beach Campus does not usually drop teddy bears from its aircraft. Members train to release message containers onto a target for an event at a national collegiate aviation competition.

“We try and hit a barrel at the competition, and we usually get within 30 feet of the target, which is remarkable,” said Carson Ruhnke, a sophomore Aerospace Engineering student who is the team’s assistant chief pilot. “It’s an event we train especially hard for and not a lot of other schools do it.” 

But the team set aside time from their intense practice to collect teddy bears for , a Florida non-profit that delivers the toys to children in foster care, hospitals and shelters.

James Hanover, the flight team’s head coach, worked with Jennifer Capri and her 12-year-old daughter Gianna, ambassadors for the organization, on the project for April’s National Child Abuse Prevention Month.

“The Eagles flight team is some of the best and brightest students at Embry‑Riddle,” said Capri, who works as quality assurance manager in the Flight Training Department. “I hope this will inspire them to continue community service no matter where they land in life.” 

On April 4, nearly 30 members of the flight team gathered with the Capris at Massey Ranch Airpark in Edgewater, Florida, to parachute several bears as part of an effort to raise awareness about Kada’s Promise.

“This is a great way for us to engage with each other and still do everything we love using airplanes while also helping the local community,” said Jak Kalvin, the team’s chief pilot.

A bear floats down with a plastic parachute

Team members dropped the bears, including a giant pink one, from two aircraft. They captured photos and videos of their descent to Earth.

“I designed the parachutes, and I’m impressed,” said Kalvin, who earned his bachelor’s degree in Aeronautical Science and is now pursuing his MBA. “I was not expecting it to work as well as it did.”

The students also signed certificates with their bears’ names. The Capris plan to deliver some 50 teddy bears to  in DeLand, where they will be given to foster children. They will also provide them with photos and the certificates, so the children will know how the bears reached them.

“I love stuffed animals. It was exciting to see,” said Gianna. “I’m glad they came out to support us.”