Posted on 12/04/2018 4:59:39 PM PST by C19fan
The Navy will honor former naval aviator and 41st president George H.W. Bush on Thursday with a largest-ever 21-aircraft missing man formation as part of his funeral services in Texas. Thirty F/A-18 Hornets and Super Hornets departed Naval Air Station Oceana, Va. today ahead of the Dec. 6 internment ceremony at the George Bush Presidential Library and Museum in College Station, Texas. A naval aviation official told USNI News that a missing man formation of this size is unprecedented and reflects Bush’s legacy as a naval aviator and ongoing relationship with the Navy’s carrier strike group community.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.usni.org ...
That’s a good movie.
Come to think about it, I do find it interesting that he became president without ever winning an election. He WAS CIA director when JFK was killed. Hmmm
The blue angels flew over DC for Reagan’s funeral which WAS awesome because since 9/11 no planes are allowed in the airspace over DC.
Churchill lost the election for PM in Britain literally months after leading the effort to beat Hitler and establishing himself as arguably the greatest leader of the 20th Century. Voters don’t care about history. They care about getting stuff.
+2
“What a great design with a gunner pod in the rear. Genius!”
Saburo Sakai nearly got killed by that rear turret near Guadalcanal. He eased up behind some Grummans he though were Wildcats and was not familiar with the new TBM.
That rear turret nailed him before he saw it, he got a .30 caliber bullet to the head, lost an eye, windscreen shattered.
By incredible skill he made an epic 500+ mile flight back to Rabaul and lived to fly again.
Very interesting plane that TBM. We all think of it as a lumbering torpedo plane.The 1944 movie “Wing and a prayer” has some good flying shots of it maneuvering, diving, etc. In that film it was very interesting to see how fast and graceful it could be compared to the common way we see it.
Pilots fly numerous tail numbers in their career. There are probably a few aircraft out there he logged time in besides the one he was shot down in. Happens for all kinds of reasons. Maintenance, transferring between squadrons, squadron equipment changes, etc.
So it’s probably true that some museum somewhere has a tail number he logged time in at some point.
After seeing a program about “Midway”, something really caught my attention.
Those battles were more than furious. Of all the airmen who flew during the battle, most of them, Japanese, Americans and I think there were some Australians, most of them lost their lives.
The Japanese never recovered.
What?
George HW Bush beat Dukakis in 1988. He was elected to the House of Representatives in 1966 and 1968. He was Director of Central Intelligence from January 1976 until January 1977.
John A. McCone was DCI when JFK was killed.
“For Dorkbama, there will be a 21 fly flyover.”
LOL. Good one.
Huge numbers did. And huge numbers died in training too. Towards the end of the war a Japanese pilot becoming a kamikaze was basically simply facing reality...he had almost no chance to survive the war anyway and they all knew it.
.
If the US military does nothing else, it keeps records.
The people who restore these “floating museums” do spend considerable time looking things up.
The Grumman Avenger was replacing the outdated Douglas Devastator at Midway(Dawn Like Thunder) is a good book about it among other things about the battle. Torpedo 8 from Yorktown was nearly all destroyed. Some of those pilots were sent to Guadalcanal and flew as part of the Cactus Air Force from there. According to what I’ve read the only thing the Devastator devastated was the people flying them. The Avenger was faster more maneuverable and a much better plane. GHWB lost his two flight crew off Chi Chi Jima before he was picked up. They were trying to destroy a Japanese military installation relaying info on our bombers going to the Japanese islands. (Fly Boys). GHWB was game pilot back then.
And we Torpedo 8 (Hornet) losing all their planes is well known. But very few know that in the same attack, Torpedo 6 (Enterprise) lost 10 of 14 planes, and Torpedo 3 (Yorktown) lost 11 of 13 planes.
A total of 6 out of 41 aircraft came back from the USN Midway torpedo runs.
The spirit shown by the torpedo squadrons hitting the battle with very little fighter cover was amazing. They may have not done a lot of damage but they cleared the way for the dive bombers. Terrible loss for the TBFs though. An amazing story. If you lean forward that type of history, try “last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors” about the battle for Leyte Gulf. Take Care.
they sent 30 to fly 21? Sounds like they are short a few to account for attrition due to worn out airplanes after barky effed things up.
“All in the middle is kinda shrugged off”
Kind of a blind statement. Most combat
vets I know, carry the burden of war and
all its brutality, and recognise fellow
vets carrying the same burden. There is
no shrugging it off. It’s the measure of
the soldier who is able to carry on with
this burden that lives his life to the
fullest.
Definitely will! And also not all the Torpedo planes at Midway were Avengers. Torpedo 8 was in TBD devastators.
Another cool thing not widely known about the TBD was that during level bombing the man sitting behind the pilot left his seat during the bombing run, slid down into a prone station beneath the pilot and operated a Norden bombsight.
That was a very big plane.
The Missing Man Formation and Taps will tear your heart out.
As a grown man I cannot see or hear one of those two without shedding tears.
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