U.S. Army Captain Kyle Murray, a Cazenovia native currently stationed at Fort Drum, made a brief stop in the Cazenovia area recently — as commander of a Black Hawk helicopter squadron that touched down at the Hamilton airport as part of an air assault exercise.

Murray, a 2003 graduate of Cazenovia High School, is the commander of Bravo Company, Second Battalion, 10th Combat Aviation Brigade at Fort Drum. He was piloting one of the three helicopters as is set down in Hamilton on March 2 on its way to Binghamton for air assault operations training.

“It was just very exciting to see what my son has accomplished,” said Robin Bushneck’s, Murray’s mother, who was present at the Hamilton airport to watch the brief scene at her son’s invitation. “I’m just very proud of him. It was very exciting, and loud.”

Murray, 29, is a 2007 graduate of West Point with high honors, with a degree in civil engineering. He has been deployed to both Iraq and Afghanistan and is currently stationed at Fort Drum.

He has flown over Cazenovia many times for various exercises and always lets his mother know so she can “wave and take videos,” Bushneck said. “I get a huge kick of watching him fly over,” she said. “He did a flyover at the house last year and took beautiful pictures of Cazenovia Lake, the village and our house.”

Murray has recently embarked on a new path in life in that he and his wife, who is also a military pilot, recently had a baby, Bushneck said. Murray was also recently hired to teach environmental engineering at West Point. He will be attending either Stanford or UCLA in California to complete master’s degree before he begins his assignment, Bushneck said.

“It’s just a great honor, and he loves it; he loves the military,” she said. “He’s going to be a good teacher.”

Jason Emerson is editor of the Cazenovia Republican. He can be reached at [email protected].