See Kerry is a bonafide pilot!
Posted on 05/04/2004 11:07:15 PM PDT by JohnHuang2
ELECTION 2004 Did Kerry make up jet-pilot story? Seasoned flyers doubt yarn about taking controls over Israel
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted: May 5, 2004 1:00 a.m. Eastern
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com
It's been a tough week for John Kerry's credibility.
He's been called unfit to be commander in chief by many of his Vietnam comrades and commanders.
He's been criticized for accepting a Purple Heart for what amounts to a scratch on his arm treated with a Band-Aid.
Now, seasoned jet pilots are calling into question his latest claim – taking the controls of a fighter and flying it over Israel in 1991.
Kerry told the story Monday in a speech to the Anti-Defamation League. He claimed it gave him a different perspective on Israel. He said probably no one else in the room has seen the country upside down from an Israeli Air Force jet.
He asserted that authorities in Israel kept denying his request to fly one of their planes, but that the colonel who was showing him around Israel during a 1991 visit not only got him into a trainer, but let him take the controls.
"I take it off, we go up into the sky, climb up, head down toward Aqaba," the senator said. "And I wanted to look at Aqaba, so I'm coming down over Aqaba, and I suddenly hear this voice on the intercom, and he says, 'Senator, you'd better turn faster, you're going over Egypt.'"
Kerry said the colonel then gave him permission to do "a little aerobatics" and that he made a loop at about 12,000 feet.
"To be able to come out upside down and look down and catch the horizon in back of me and see all the way down into the Sinai to the old base that had been given up, all the way across into Jordan, all the way out into the Gulf of Aqaba, and to see Israel beneath me, and the lines contained, and to see it all upside down was the perfect way to see the Middle East and Israel," he said.
But Internet boards were abuzz with skeptics – some of them seasoned jet pilots themselves.
"I'm sorry but I don't believe for a second much of what John Kerry says," wrote Ron Pera, himself a veteran Navy combat fighter pilot."
I believe even less that he makes the comment he took off the jet trainer that he reportedly flew over Israel."
FreeRepublic.com and other bulletin board sites were inundated with similar posts.
"First of all jets are more difficult to take off than propeller planes because they accelerate much faster and the speed they need to get airborne is much higher," Pera wrote in an email to WND. "This requires more precise control and you will not have that the first time you are in the plane. It takes practice to get those skills, a lot of it. Second of all no rational military trained pilot would take the chance of hurdling off the runway at 160 mph just to let some bigwig handle the controls. Takeoffs and landing are two of the most dangerous times during an aircraft flight. Once you are tens of thousands of feet in the air then it is much, much safer to let some inexperienced person take the controls since you have time and altitude to regain control. This is not a blessing on the ground."
Pera added that unless Kerry many hours flying military aircraft "it is next to impossible he took the plane off."
"I speak from experience as a former Navy fighter pilot and I have no problems releasing ALL of my records," he wrote. "Will Kerry flip-flop on this statement also or just yell at whoever asks the question?"
Isn't the entire SF area controlled airspace? This picture of the rented T-34 "skimming over the swells" just doesn't sound like something that would be permitted in an area rife with sailboats, ferries, and tour boats. Pure fantasy. Teenage fantasy which raises questions of kerry's maturity.
Looking at the leading edge of that wing, can you picture a seagull penetrating the aluminum skin leaving his feet sticking out? Can you picture a seagull even penetrating? It might SPLAT but I doubt a bird would penetrate.
See Kerry is a bonafide pilot!
Similar? The T-34 was indeed used for military training (USN/USAF); various models were produced by Beech since the early 1950's. So, why say "similar"? The T-34 was derived from the commercial version... the Beechcraft Bonanza. So... if I had to guess, I would say that Kerry and Thorne rented a Beechcraft Bonanza that day.
But to answer your specific question: NO... I can't see a poor seagull penetrating the aluminum (but still protectin' his lil' web feet). LOL. But... if the writing of Love Story was inspired by Al Gore, maybe we'll hear that Jonathan Livingston Seagull was inspired by John Kerry?
LOL ! Keep it up, Phil ! You get better with every pic.
But does he fly it himself? He owns a Gulfstram 5 as I recall, and has pilots for it. Plus, the Gulfstreams aren't stick aircraft.
I don't think so. I saw fighter pilots do it in the movie "The Rock." ;-)
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/423170.html
When the senator's delegation reached the south, he visited Uvda air force base where he asked permission from the local commanders for an overflight of the country. Although he had limited experience as a pilot, he was given a Fuga to fly and within a few minutes, when he wanted to look out over Aqaba from above, the pilot who was accompanying him said, "Senator, you better turn quickly because otherwise you'll be in Egyptian territory."
Amazing what CG can do in the movies today. The only way a fighter jet and its pilot can go under the Golden Gate Bridge is on the deck of a aircraft carrier.
Amazing what CG can do in the movies today. The only way a fighter jet and its pilot can go under the Golden Gate Bridge is on the deck of a aircraft carrier.
Fouga CM-170 Magister
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