Local resident gets surprise Easter delivery

Saturday was a clear day full of Easter egg hunts for many around Marion County, but for Sunflower Rd. resident Dawn Hett, the day came with the surprising sound of hail and a low-flying plane.

Hett said when she stepped outside the house she found that family friend Matt Orth had unloaded a plane-full of plastic eggs in the yard.

“The biggest surprise wasn’t the eggs, it was him flying over the house,” Dawn Hett said. “He flew in low, and when he dropped the eggs it was a bunch of eggs pelting the house. It sounded a little like a hailstorm. I didn’t know what was going on until I looked outside and saw the plastic eggs.”

The exact number of eggs Orth dropped is unknown, but there are still some unaccounted for, Hett said.

“My husband made a joke about picking up a five-gallon bucket of eggs, and said there should have been a lot more,” she said.

“I thought it was a very clever idea,” she said. “It was a very nice surprise, and definitely a good Easter gag.”

Orth, owner of Central Ag Air spray plane business in Marion, was asked to drop 2,000 Easter eggs at Walter’s Pumpkin Patch in Burns by owners, but the children were still hunting when he flew over again.

“The kids get excited to see it,” he said. “I had never done it before, but I told them I’d try.”

Instead of flying back home, Orth decided on the surprise drop for his friends on Sunflower Rd.

“I just thought it would funny,” he said.

The deliveries took him about 30 minutes each, but Orth said he would have been less enthusiastic if he had to stuff the eggs.

“I wouldn’t have wanted to do it then,” he said. “It was just a quick flight there. They wanted one in the morning and one around 2 p.m.”

While he enjoyed it, the drop isn’t a consistently viable option from a financial standpoint, Orth said.

“I just donate the time and gas,” he said. “It’s not a great way to make money, though.”