Someone told me I oughtta post an article I wrote for the base paper on AW. Since I always try to do what I ought, Ive copied the text below. Printed in the latest Flying K at NASK. I'm sure a lot of you Intruder or Hornet types know the names or callsigns referred to in the article.
In The Break
I hope you all had a fantastic Memorial Day Weekend. As another Memorial Day passed, I was flooded with memories of those brothers-in-arms that gave their all in the service of our nation. I wasn’t primarily focused on those heroes from ages past and from the great wars, but on those I have actually known and flown with.
Since entering flight training over 20 years ago, 32 of my friends have paid the ultimate price of service. It was averaging two a year for the first ten or so years, but I guess as we get older and wiser our odds improve. Also, safety programs and equipment have all been steadily improving during that time, so I hope when you reach this stage of your careers your list of lost friends will be much shorter than mine.
Trying to remember the names of all 32 has gotten more difficult with age, and even the causes of their accidents are becoming blurry, but I do remember most of them. The first was a student who got too slow behind the ship in a T-2 and lost control. Soon after leaving Kingsville, a Marine friend flew an AV-8 into the water off North Carolina. Paul and Kenny tried to get an Intruder down on a low level route in West Virginia in really bad weather. A flight control problem in an FA-18 got Glenn after a night cat shot.
Two more friends in an A-6 didn’t turn hard enough at a checkpoint in a valley in Japan. Plumbr flew into the Med, along with Craig and a couple of other aviators who failed to return overhead the ship on different occasions. Rhino was lost after a mid-air. A whole cluster of friends was lost during Strike–Fighter Weapons Training as a result of one mid-air off thecoast of San Diego.
Of all the friends lost, only one was in combat operations and even that wasn’t a result of enemy fire. What we do is inherently dangerous, and the reason we don’t routinely hear of accidents, why each one is such a significant event, is that we focus so much on attention to detail and professional excellence. You may wonder why some Instructor is harping on you to be perfect in every single aspect of a training hop, but it is because we have all seen the consequences of inattention to detail, and complacency.
Almost every one of the aviators involved in the accidents I remember was a fantastic pilot. In truth, you can’t become a Naval Aviator without being a fantastic pilot. Not one of them knew they were going to have their last flight on the day they died. Yet in almost every case, it was a slight miscalculation, a very small error in judgment or a very short lapse in concentration that caused them to perish. In almost every one, I could put myself in their cockpit and figure out how the accident could have been prevented.
I miss the company of those friends. They would be great to sit around the ready room or K-Bar and talk with. Were they heroes? Who knows? I think they were. They may or may not have ever flown into combat or slain our nation’s enemies, but they willingly put themselves into harm’s way every time they manned-up. I honor their memory, but I also remember the lessons of their short lives. Each one was too tragic to be wasted. Naval Aviation is an avocation for dedicated professionals who confidently man-up, knowing that they have prepared in every possible way – physically and mentally – to meet the challenges of that day. It isn’t for the weak-bodied or weak-minded. Timid souls need not apply.
Study hard. Stay sharp.
God bless you.
Cowboy
In The Break
I hope you all had a fantastic Memorial Day Weekend. As another Memorial Day passed, I was flooded with memories of those brothers-in-arms that gave their all in the service of our nation. I wasn’t primarily focused on those heroes from ages past and from the great wars, but on those I have actually known and flown with.
Since entering flight training over 20 years ago, 32 of my friends have paid the ultimate price of service. It was averaging two a year for the first ten or so years, but I guess as we get older and wiser our odds improve. Also, safety programs and equipment have all been steadily improving during that time, so I hope when you reach this stage of your careers your list of lost friends will be much shorter than mine.
Trying to remember the names of all 32 has gotten more difficult with age, and even the causes of their accidents are becoming blurry, but I do remember most of them. The first was a student who got too slow behind the ship in a T-2 and lost control. Soon after leaving Kingsville, a Marine friend flew an AV-8 into the water off North Carolina. Paul and Kenny tried to get an Intruder down on a low level route in West Virginia in really bad weather. A flight control problem in an FA-18 got Glenn after a night cat shot.
Two more friends in an A-6 didn’t turn hard enough at a checkpoint in a valley in Japan. Plumbr flew into the Med, along with Craig and a couple of other aviators who failed to return overhead the ship on different occasions. Rhino was lost after a mid-air. A whole cluster of friends was lost during Strike–Fighter Weapons Training as a result of one mid-air off thecoast of San Diego.
Of all the friends lost, only one was in combat operations and even that wasn’t a result of enemy fire. What we do is inherently dangerous, and the reason we don’t routinely hear of accidents, why each one is such a significant event, is that we focus so much on attention to detail and professional excellence. You may wonder why some Instructor is harping on you to be perfect in every single aspect of a training hop, but it is because we have all seen the consequences of inattention to detail, and complacency.
Almost every one of the aviators involved in the accidents I remember was a fantastic pilot. In truth, you can’t become a Naval Aviator without being a fantastic pilot. Not one of them knew they were going to have their last flight on the day they died. Yet in almost every case, it was a slight miscalculation, a very small error in judgment or a very short lapse in concentration that caused them to perish. In almost every one, I could put myself in their cockpit and figure out how the accident could have been prevented.
I miss the company of those friends. They would be great to sit around the ready room or K-Bar and talk with. Were they heroes? Who knows? I think they were. They may or may not have ever flown into combat or slain our nation’s enemies, but they willingly put themselves into harm’s way every time they manned-up. I honor their memory, but I also remember the lessons of their short lives. Each one was too tragic to be wasted. Naval Aviation is an avocation for dedicated professionals who confidently man-up, knowing that they have prepared in every possible way – physically and mentally – to meet the challenges of that day. It isn’t for the weak-bodied or weak-minded. Timid souls need not apply.
Study hard. Stay sharp.
God bless you.
Cowboy
