NEPA Quad Racers Host Pennsylvania Whoop Championship in Pittston

The first day of spring brought more than warmer air to northeastern Pennsylvania. It brought whoop drones screaming through an indoor obstacle course at Pilot Mind Drone Academy in Pittston, where NEPA Quad Racers staged the Pennsylvania Whoop Championship on Saturday.

Around a dozen pilots from states across the Northeast converged on the Pittston venue for the event, which was also billed as the NEPA Quad Racers Eastern Championships. Among those competing was Phil Croteau of Johnson City, NY, one of the out-of-state pilots who made the trip to race under the MultiGP Drone Racing League banner.

The competition format centered on whoop drones, the compact, propeller-caged aircraft favored for indoor circuits. Drone-mounted cameras fed live video to ground-side monitoring systems, giving race officials a close-up view of every pass through the course while pilots navigated the obstacle layout in organized heats from a marked start line.

NEPA Quad Racers is a regional MultiGP chapter established roughly two years ago by Kevin Bowery, an assistant instructor at Pilot Mind, and his wife. Bowery was direct about what drove the effort to build the club and stage events like Saturday's championship.

"We wanted to bring drone racing back to Pennsylvania," Bowery said.

One attendee identified only as Butler said he values what has grown up around the competition itself, pointing to the connections and camaraderie that have emerged among pilots at drone racing events.

Race results and final standings were not immediately available, and it remains to be confirmed whether Saturday's event carried official MultiGP regional qualifying points. What is clear is that NEPA Quad Racers has established northeastern Pennsylvania as a legitimate stop on the Northeast whoop racing circuit, two years after Bowery and his wife decided Pennsylvania needed a reason to look up.