robin olds interview

In with the AirVenture 2007 videos is a 30 minute interview with Robin Olds. It is a great piece of history, and it reminds me of talking to my grandfathers. A true hero, a man's man, and one bad ass fighter pilot.

Video here.

H/T Dennis Collins over at Hangarview

eye candy

No, sorry, not me in a bikini. But I do have some sweet video of the Raptor.

The Raptor is one bad jet, but I'm not gonna lie, I do not really want to fly something so new that I'm always worried about pushing the limits. And when you can shoot down any aircraft before you even show up on their radar screen, what's the fun in that?
H/T Jake Silver.

here's a toast

We lost a great man...

General Olds, rated a triple ace for having shot down a total of 16 enemy aircraft during World War II and the Vietnam War, served his country in assignments to England, Germany, Libya, Thailand and the United States, in positions of squadron, base, group and wing commander, and assignments to Headquarters U.S. Air Force and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
"Triple-ace Robin Olds' legendary leadership and heroic service to the cause of freedom have been an inspiration to our nation and our Air Force," said Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley. "He is one of our 'great captains' and a pioneer of air power.
***
Throughout his career, he was a staunch advocate for better fighters, better pilot training and new tactics, culminating in the war-winning air-to-air tactics and doctrine of surgical precision bombing we use today. Brigadier General Olds' courageous life stands as a timeless example of the power of faith and the strength of the human spirit.

Source

Second rounds on me. H/T Lex

And as we fly among them there we're sure to hear their plea,
"Take care my friend, watch your six, and do one more roll for me."

cool fighter chicks

I missed this post over at the American Thinker last August. It highlights the Chick Fighter Pilot Association, with a little hero worship to boot.

A confession: I am in awe of fighter pilots. I was never physically qualified to join the Army, much less posessed of the physical and mental abilities necessary to be a fighter pilot. But that has never stopped me from fantasies of dogfighting in a WW II Mustang or an F 16. Nor has it crippled me with envy for those who serve our country at the outer limits of the junction of technology and human capabilities.

But now I am in danger of becoming a complete groupie. A new organization of female American fighter pilots has been formed, the Chick Fighter Pilot Association (CFPA). They even have a website. And the website has pages of photos.

And The Thunder Run has an article on Maj. Kim "KC" Campbell. I got to meet KC (not just her initials, also stands for "Killer Chick") a few years ago when she honor the US Air Force Academy with her presence. She was calm and collected as she told us the story about how she lost part of her wing and tail over Baghdad, barely making it back to a friendly base. Let me just say I was in awe myself. She was recently decorated for her bravery:

On April 7, 2003, then-Capt. Campbell and her flight lead responded to a call for air support in downtown Baghdad, where an elite unit of the Iraqi Republican Guard had U.S. forces pinned against the Tigris River. Campbell and her wingman faced bad weather before they dove out of the sky and devastated the enemy with rockets and the Warthog’s feared 30mm Gatling gun. After successfully hitting their targets, the pilots turned back toward base – and that’s when Campbell’s jet was rocked by a large explosion, and immediately began pulling to the left and toward the ground. With numerous caution lights flashing, the one that worried Campbell the most was the hydraulic lights. A quick check confirmed her suspicions: Her hydraulic system had been fried. She would later discover that one of her engines was badly damaged and the fuselage was riddled with hundreds of bullet holes.

Campbell quickly switched to manual inversion, allowing her to fly her Warthog under mechanical control. She then had a decision: try to fly 300 miles back to base, or parachute into hostile territory. This was dicey terrain, so she decided she had to make the flight. Despite the heavily damaged aircraft and terrible weather – including massive dust storms – “Killer Chick” persevered. With the help of a seasoned pilot on her wing, Campbell landed safely back at base – fully prepared to take to the skies again and unleash the Warthog, as well as her moniker, on any opposing forces.

For her actions and bravery, Campbell was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for Heroism.

CENTCOM article here. Have you made it when there's a Wikipedia article on you? Congrats KC!

More links:
KC makes the "History of the Air Force"
KC tells her story
Article from Combat Edge
Smithsonian article, including photos of the damage to KC's jet
Speech by Gen Richard B. Meyers, then chairman of the Joint Chiefs, at USAFA, he mentions KC near the end (I was there!)

eulogy of a fighter pilot

I was reminded of the Great Santini when a guy in my squadron sent this out earlier this week. This my not have been my experience as the child of a fighter pilot, but I can relate to the the way his children idolized their father. This is Col Don Conroy's eulogy, given by his son, Pay Conroy. Full text here, or you can just google "Eulogy of a fighter pilot" for more. This is a great memory of a great man, enjoy.

The children of fighter pilots tell different stories than other kids do. None of our fathers can write a will or sell a life insurance policy or fill out a prescription or administer a flue shot or explain what a poet meant. We tell of fathers who land on aircraft carriers at pitch-black night with the wind howling out of the China Sea. Our fathers wiped out aircraft batteries in the Philippines and set Japanese soldiers on fire when they made the mistake of trying to overwhelm our troops on the ground..

Your Dads ran the barber shops and worked at the post office and delivered the packages on time and sold the cars, while our Dads were blowing up fuel depots near Seoul, were providing extraordinarily courageous close air support to the beleaguered Marines at the Chosin Reservoir, and who once turned the Naktong River red with blood of a retreating North Korean battalion. We tell of men who made widows of the wives of our nations' enemies and who made orphans out of all their children.

You don't like war or violence? Or napalm? Or rockets? Or cannons or death rained down from the sky? Then let's talk about your fathers, not ours. When we talk about the aviators who raised us and the Marines who loved us, we can look you in the eye and say "you would not like to have been American's enemies when our fathers passed overhead". We were raised by the men who made the United States of America the safest country on earth in the bloodiest century in all recorded history. Our fathers made sacred those strange, singing names of battlefields across the Pacific: Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, the Chosin Reservoir, Khe Sanh and a thousand more. We grew up attending the funerals of Marines slain in these battles. Your fathers made communities like Beaufort decent and prosperous and functional; our fathers made the world safe for democracy.
***
Here is how my father appeared to me as a boy. He came from a race of giants and demi-gods from a mythical land known as Chicago. He married the most beautiful girl ever to come crawling out of the poor and lowborn south, and there were times when I thought we were being raised by Zeus and Athena. After Happy Hour my father would drive his car home at a hundred miles an hour to see his wife and seven children. He would get out of his car, a strapping flight jacketed matinee idol, and walk toward his house, his knuckles dragging along the ground, his shoes stepping on and killing small animals in his slouching amble toward the home place.

My sister, Carol, stationed at the door, would call out, "Godzilla's home!" and we seven children would scamper toward the door to watch his entry. The door would be flung open and the strongest Marine aviator on earth would shout, "Stand by for a fighter pilot!" He would then line his seven kids up against the wall and say,

"Who's the greatest of them all?" "You are, O Great Santini, you are." "Who knows all, sees all, and hears all?" "You do, O Great Santini, you do."

We were not in the middle of a normal childhood, yet none of us were sure since it was the only childhood we would ever have. For all we knew other men were coming home and shouting to their families, "Stand by for a pharmacist," or "Stand by for a chiropractor".
***
When he flew back toward the carrier that day, he received a call from an Army Colonel on the ground who had witnessed the route of the North Koreans across the river. "Could you go pass over the troops fifty miles south of here? They've been catching hell for a week or more. It'd do them good to know you flyboys are around." He flew those fifty miles and came over a mountain and saw a thousand troops lumbered down in foxholes. He and Bill Lundin went in low so these troops could read the insignias and know the American aviators had entered the fray. My father said, "Thousands of guys came screaming out of their foxholes, son. It sounded like a world series game. I got goose pimples in the cockpit. Get goose pimples telling it forty-eight years later. I dipped my wings, waved to the guys. The roar they let out. I hear it now. I hear it now."

During the Cuban Missile Crisis, my mother took me out to the air station where we watched Dad's squadron scramble on the runway on their bases at Roosevelt Road and Guantanamo. In the car as we watched the A-4's take off, my mother began to say the rosary. "You praying for Dad and his men, Mom?" I asked her. "No, son. I'm praying for the repose of the souls of the Cuban pilots they're going to kill."

Later I would ask my father what his squadron's mission was during the Missile Crisis. "To clear the air of MIGS over Cuba," he said. "You think you could've done it?" The Great Santini answered, "There wouldn't have been a bluebird flying over that island, son."

centrifuge

It was about time I got around to posting my first 'fuge video. No sound unfortunately, but I think its pretty funny. For those of you that do not know, every Air Force fighter pilot goes to the centrifuge to test their ability to pull G's. What aircraft you will fly determines the amount of G's you are tested with. Before I flew the T-38, my classmates and I were tested. You can see the amount of G's in the upper left corner.