A day in the life of a retired fighter pilot.....a must see....

[Lateral-G]

funny!

http://www.xtranormal.com/watch/1304...-fighter-pilot

[Toastmaker]

Oh, I don't know. . . sorta bizarre and a tad bit creepy, in a machine-like, AI-run-amok kind of way .

[stansdds]

That was great!

[stiz]

i still think the best ex pilot joke has been that cartoon where the stair lift in the RAF retirment home has a loop-de-loop half way up

[jmig]

Sounds normal to me.

[SSI01]

I'm tellin' ya, this sounds FOR REAL just like a lot of retired former 1811s I used to work with who just can't let go of it and keep thinking they're still who they were 15 or 20 years ago - or who they were when they retired from the agency; it's pretty tough for them to realize their handle now begins with "Mr." like everyone else's, not "Special Agent" or "Captain" or whatever . . . forgetting they're RETIRED and the agency will continue to function without them somehow. This cartoon was made in jest and has a lot of good laughs in it; the pathetic part of it is that there are some folks in my former profession, with an "I love me" wall, who are EXACTLY as the digital character portrayed in the cartoon.

[jmig]

I'm tellin' ya, this sounds FOR REAL just like a lot of retired former 1811s I used to work with who just can't let go of it and keep thinking they're still who they were 15 or 20 years ago - or who they were when they retired from the agency; it's pretty tough for them to realize their handle now begins with "Mr." like everyone else's, not "Special Agent" or "Captain" or whatever . . . forgetting they're RETIRED and the agency will continue to function without them somehow. This cartoon was made in jest and has a lot of good laughs in it; the pathetic part of it is that there are some folks in my former profession, with an "I love me" wall, who are EXACTLY as the digital character portrayed in the cartoon.

Please accept this post not as a rebuttal, but as a apologetic post, in the conotation of the word that means,'one who speaks in defence of'. While everything stated is accurate, it is a two deminional POV without empathy. I can speak from experience when I say, it is hard to go from "Captain", "Major", or "Special Agent" to "Mr.".

In the case of the former fighter pilot, he or she has given a lot to have earned the designation, "Fighter Pilot." A military pilot is not unlike a professional athlete. Both have God given talents and skills that enable them to perform at a high level of expertise. Both, however, achieve that level of expertise through hard work and practice. Both have to believe they are the "best" in order to achieve. This is where the comparison ends, however.

If the athlete drops the ball or strikes out, he will usually have another chance. If the fighter pilot makes a mistake, it can cost him his life. A fighter pilot lives on the edge when flying. This is especially true in combat where you are often on the very edge of the aircraft's flight envelope. Pull too hard and you can find the aircraft stalling and departing on you.

I have flown at over 500 mph at 100 feet off the top of the trees or waves. At that speed and low altitude, you can die in less time than it takes to blink. Landing and taking off in weather that would ground any other plane, is expected of the military pilot. It can lead to you becoming cocky or even arrogant.

He is told from the day he enters pilot training that he is the best and exceptional. He better believe it, His life may depend on believing that some day to survive. So, he is proud of what he does and what he is. He misses it when he leaves. He misses the camaraderie. He misses the trill of flying. He misses the sounds, the smells, even the Gs. After all these years, I am in the cockpit of a fighter demo at airshows. I know what he is doing, I can feel the Gs and see the ground rotating or falling away. I am transported back thirty years.

I have pictures on my wall of me flying, standing on or near the aircraft. I call them my "hero" pictures. They remind me that when my country called, I answered the call. I didn't run to Canada. I am proud of what I did. I can talk you to death, if you get me started on "what was it was like".

The video was funny. It was true in many ways for many former pilots, athletes, and others who were the best at what they did. It also was a stereotype caricature of a profession that in 50 years, I believe will be no more.

I will end this apology by thanking and praising all of the maintenance, ordnance, re-fueler, egress, and others who often spent all night getting the aircraft ready to fly the next morning. We may have been the tip of the spear, but without you the spear would have never flown. You too are the "Best".

[Bone]

When you remove the ultra-significance from an obsessive-compulsive anal-retentive high-strung mega-competitive over-achieving mission-oriented dynamic-aptitude individual, there are going to be some quirks.

[SSI01]

Bone - how true, how true!

Jmig - Absolutely nothing meant against any AF F-4 pilot/GIB, or any other service aircrew. As a former USAF maintainer of F-4s (with the hearing loss to prove it!) I think what you folks did on a daily basis was something of immense value to our service in particular, and our country in general. I was in the AF during the tail end of the VietNam war and had to deal with some of the public fallout against that conflict - our fellow USAF members who were in during the war had to deal with much more intense public feelings than we ever did. Your professionalism never slipped; those of us who were on the ground during that time frame, and couldn't go with you when you flew, were with you in spirit always. Steve Ritchie, Chuck DeBellevue, Karl Richter, Robert Lodge, Roger Locher and others are personal heroes. I never went over to SEA to support flight ops, however, we had our share of more senior NCOs in our squadron who did and we used to, during slack periods on the line, listen sometimes to them tell us about the hours, working conditions, and other nuances (like the "two-step krait" at Takhli) of being a ramp rat at Udorn, Takhli, Da Nang, and other places. I saw folks like you every day at Luke AFB (1974-1976) and worked closely with you. In spite of the heat, deadlines, and noisy and smoky working conditions, I still enjoyed it immensely and miss it. In fact, I miss it more (4 years AF service) than I do 23 years with my other govt agency. I have personal reasons for being browned off at the institution I used to work for, this involves a classified incident I can't discuss - but we who wore AF olive drab never set ourselves up as moral arbiters of anything, we just did our jobs to the best of our abilities and let history be the judge. I am immensely proud to have served as I did. If you were at Luke AFB during the above time period, we may have shared the ramp at one time or another. I know Capt Sullenberger was there when I was, in the 555TFS. I salute you, sir!:salute: