PlaneSkate started in 2012 while managing a corporate fleet of 4 Chieftans.
Designed by a pilot that had seen it all from both sides of Airport operations.
Engineered, assembled, and shipped from Buffalo, Minnesota — by a small team that still answers the phone.
The first PlaneSkate was designed in a Buffalo, MN hangar in 2012 after Mike Wiskus was managing a corporate fleet with 4 Piper Chieftans.
After several flat tire experiences and having to divert aircraft to alternate airports, Mike decided to create a new tool that could safely and quickly recover the aircraft to their homebase in minutes instead of hours.
The math was simple: every minute that runway was closed cost more than a properly-engineered aircraft recovery dolly would cost outright.
Every airfield needed one. Hardly any of them had one.
After word got out on how well it worked, people started to call and ask to buy one for themselves.
The first PlaneSkate sold was delivered two years later in 2014 and there are now over 350+ skates in use worldwide.
Eleven years on, that's still the bet: static, mechanical, no external power, no software.
Lifts a wheel.
Rolls.
Priced at less than a single hour of closure costs at most fields.
Manufactured and assembled one at a time, in Minnesota, by people who answer their own phones.
Engineered, assembled, and shipped from Buffalo, Minnesota by a small operator-heavy crew. When you call PlaneSkate, you talk to one of these people — not a call center.
Mike is the inventor of the original Aircraft Recovery System — the product the aviation world now knows as PlaneSkate.
But the road to building it started about as far from a boardroom as you can get: a ten-year-old kid at his first air show in Mason City, Iowa, deciding right then that airplanes were going to be his whole life. At fourteen, Mike rode his bike to the local airport every day for two weeks until the owner finally gave him a job washing planes and sweeping hangars, just to be around them.
He traded that work for flying lessons and earned his Pilot’s License on his 17th birthday. More than forty years later, Mike has logged over 31,000 flight hours, qualified in more than 40 aircraft, and built one of the most recognized careers in American air show aviation — a 2002 U.S. National Aerobatic Champion and a member of the 2004 U.S. Aerobatic Team, flying the Lucas Oil Pitts at more than 20 shows a year across the U.S. and Canada for two decades.
Alongside his flying career, Mike leads and operates West Metro Aviation in Buffalo, Minnesota — a full-service maintenance, restoration, and sales facility that’s become a cornerstone of the Minnesota general aviation community. It was on that shop floor, solving a problem he’d seen too many times on too many runways, that the idea for PlaneSkate was born.
Today, Mike leads PlaneSkate with the same philosophy that got a kid from Iowa into the cockpit in the first place: if you can imagine it, you can build it — and if it keeps a runway open and gets an aircraft home safely, it’s worth building right.
Patrick builds sales and marketing functions from scratch — the messy, interesting work of turning a company with a great product into a company customers actually hear about. He’s done it at Fortune 500 brands and at pre-revenue startups, across Medical Devices, CPG, Software, and now aviation ground support equipment, and the pattern is consistent: understanding what the customer is trying to accomplish, what’s getting in their way, and how to make sure the relationship pays off for them long before it pays off for anyone else. That’s the approach he brings to every PlaneSkate conversation.
At PlaneSkate, that means making sure airports, FBOs, and military operators don’t just buy a product — they get real value from it. Faster runway recovery. Fewer hours of disruption. A partner who picks up the phone. Patrick’s job is to make sure the experience of working with PlaneSkate is as good as the product itself, and that every customer walks away knowing they made the right call.
Be sure to ask Patrick the story about how he once designed a pair of shoes worn by LeBron James. (Hint: it involves lip balm, a signature promotion, and the distinction of being the only non-Nike employee to have designed shoes worn by LeBron.)
Patrick holds a B.A. from Ave Maria University where he studied American Economic History and Alexander Hamilton before he was Broadway show cool. Outside of work, he’s a devoted family man and an avid traveler and golfer — two pursuits that have him in and out of airports constantly, and that gives him a genuine appreciation for what PlaneSkate customers are trying to protect: the open runway, the on-time departure, the trip that goes the way it’s supposed to.
Joanne grew up in Maple Lake, Minnesota, and attended Saint Timothy's Catholic School through sixth grade — an early foundation, she'll tell you, that shaped both the academic discipline and the steady sense of purpose she's carried into every role since.
She went on to earn her B.A. from the University of Minnesota, Morris, taught and coached for several years, and then returned to school for her MBA at the University of St. Thomas, where she is currently a doctoral candidate in Leadership.For the past several years, Joanne served as Director of Operations at Nativity of Mary in Bloomington, where she oversaw a $4.2 million budget, managed payroll and HR for more than 70 employees, and handled the kind of behind-the-scenes work that keeps a complex organization running smoothly — finance, compliance, facilities, contracts, audits, and the dozens of details no one notices until they're missing.
She brings that same operational steadiness to PlaneSkate as Office Manager, making sure the day-to-day runs the way it should so the rest of the team can focus on customers.
Ask Joanne what she's most committed to and she'll give you a clear, three-part answer: her faith, the strength of family and friends, and the power of education. She has four adult children — two in the Twin Cities, one in New York City, and one in Florida — and spends most of her free time with family and friends, much of it outdoors or around a sport of some kind.
Jordan originally comes to us from Buffalo, Minnesota. He served in the United States Air Force for 6 years as a maintainer on the Lockheed HC-130J’s. This aircraft serves as a dedicated fixed-wing personnel recovery platform for the Air Force and Jordan’s extensive background with these operations brings a wealth of knowledge and experience to PlaneSkate. While serving in the Air Force, Jordan deployed twice and traveled to 14 foreign countries. Jordan met his wife while serving in the Air Force and in his spare time, he enjoys spending time with family, hunting, and fishing.
Seth builds PlaneSkates. He assembles each unit, manages inventory and parts sourcing, preps equipment for shipment, and coordinates delivery to customers — from the Buffalo, MN shop floor to the airport receiving dock. As PlaneSkate scales, Seth will also support on-site customer training, walking airport teams through deployment and maintenance.
Before joining PlaneSkate, Seth spent five years across sales and hospitality roles in the Twin Cities, including positions at the Four Seasons Hotel Minneapolis and as a sales representative negotiating commercial contracts in excess of $1 million. He brings the same standard of care to every PlaneSkate that leaves the shop.
Outside of work, Seth is training for an Ironman, boxes, lifts, and coaches track. He and his family run For the Girls, a nonprofit raising money for girls' sports in Minnesota. Above all, he values time with the people he loves.
No power, no hydraulics, no software. If it can fail in -20°F at 0300, it doesn't ship.
Steel from US mills. Machined and welded in Maple Grove, MN. Constructed by people we'd hire again.
15K covers GA. 70K covers Regional. 100K covers Commercial & Military. We don't fragment the lineup to game the spec sheet.
We offer a no questions asked 60-day money-back guarantee on every unit.
Real numbers, real lead times. No “contact for pricing” games. Most kits ship in under 30 days.
1-763-271-9393 rings to a person. That's not a feature. It's the bare minimum.