Take Off

Welcome to my brand new blog. To say I'm an "Aviation Fanatic" is putting it mildly. When I was six, I was playing in my yard in Fort Carson, Colorado. The Blue Angels passed over my head at about 200 feet and I was hooked for life.

My Dad was a veteran of World War Two, and I was weaned on episodes of "Twelve O' Clock High". Yes I have copies (plural) of the movie but have never figured out why the T.V. show hasn't made it to DVD.

When I was sixteen I told my parents that I wanted to take gliding lessons. As it happened, the news reported a fatal glider crash at Salinas airport. Talk about bad timing! Mom was horrified. Flying lessons put on back burner.

At the ripe old age of seventeen I started my professional life in aviation by working as a High School intern in the Turbo-Propulsion Lab of the Naval Postgraduate School. I did such a good job, the hired me. Alas, a GSA audit noted that I did not possess a B.S. so I was canned.

Flying lesson were cut short when I joined the Air Force in 1977. I still wanted to fly and had dreams of being a gunner on a AC-130. "Twelve O' Clock High", remember? The recruiter gave me a sob story about only NCO's flying and being an Army brat I took it, hook, line and sinker.

Thus began my life as a crew chief. I crewed F-4's, T-38's, F-16's and the F-117. That's me getting my ride in the F-4E in 1979 and on in the F-16D
in 1989.






I crewed the F-117 during Desert Storm. She was called "Unexpected Guest".

After the Air Force I earned my Airframe and Powerplant license and worked on Navajos for a while. From there I had a stint at McCarren airport here in Las Vegas.

Old crew chiefs never die, they work transient alert somewhere. Which is what I'm happily doing now at Creech AFB.