Igor Sikorsky accompanied his father to Germany and through conversations with his father, became interested in natural sciences. After returning home, Sikorsky began to experiment with model flying machines, and by age 12, he had made a small rubber band-powered helicopter. Sikorsky began studying at the Saint Petersburg Maritime Cadet Corps, in 1903, at the age of 14. In 1906, he determined that his future lay in engineering, so he resigned from the academy, despite his satisfactory standing, and left the Russian Empire to study in Paris. He returned to the Russian Empire in 1907, enrolling at the Mechanical College of the
Sikorsky Memorial Airport Sikorsky Memorial Airport Igor I. Sikorsky Memorial Airport is a public airport in Fairfield County, Connecticut, owned by the city of Bridgeport. It is three miles (6 km) southeast of downtown, in the town of Stratford. It was formerly "Bridgeport Municipal Airport". It is included in the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) National Plan of Integrated Airport Systems for 2017–2021, in which it is categorized as a national general aviation facility. It has three Fixed-Base Operators (FBO's) and several private hangars. In 2016, Tailwind Air Service initiated seaplane service between Sikorsky and the New York Skyports Seaplane Base in central Manhattan.