First things first — no, I didn’t throw up.
It’s the first question that inevitably follows when someone hears you’re flying with the U.S. Air Force’s Thunderbirds, as I did Friday morning in advance of the Joint Base Andrews 2015 Air Show scheduled for Saturday. It’s the base’s first show since 2012 and the Thunderbirds are a big draw.
Years ago, I was lucky enough to fly with the U.S. Navy’s Blue Angels. I felt fortunate to get the chance for another adventure.
I was giddy, but the nerves didn’t really kick in until I settled into the cockpit. Peering at all the instrument panels, the oxygen switch and the yellow ejection handle, I started to sweat. I was going to be flying very, very fast. The F-16 Fighting Falcon, built by Lockheed Martin, is the aircraft of choice for the Thunderbirds. It has a maximum speed of Mach 2+ (1,500+ miles per hour). It can climb 30,000 feet per minute.
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[Air show returns to Joint Base Andrews in 2015]
The Air Force put me in good hands with Maj. Scott Petz, a veteran flier who’s logged more than 3,000 hours in the air and 400 hours of combat time. His call sign? Cheetah. On particularly good days you can call him ‘Awesome Cheetah.”
This turned out to be a particularly good day.
Cool doesn’t even begin to describe the sensation of being in the air in one of these planes.
It started like this: We lifted off at 150 mph accelerated to 450 mph then climbed at 30,000 feet a minute up to 15,000 feet. Piece of cake … not. But the G-forces I experienced on the way up were nothing compared to what we’d pull later in the flight.
From Andrews we headed to south east where Petz took the plane through a series of aileron rolls, inverted flight maneuvers, loops and high G maneuvering. The G-limitations for the F-16 range between negative 3 to 9-G.
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At times, I felt like I was floating weightless while the ground danced above me. Other moments, like when we were doing high-G maneuvering, I felt like I was being crushed by semi-truck. I was nervous about remembering the special breathing techniques I’d learned during my safety briefing, fearful I would pass out (now wouldn’t that look great on camera?) but for the duration of the flight, I never felt close to losing consciousness.
My stomach was another matter. A couple of times during the flight, I asked Petz to shift into “Southwest mode” — jokey talk for cruising along like regular commercial jets. But that didn’t last too long. After all, I could buy a ticket and fly commercial anytime.
It’s amazing what Thunderbird pilots like Petz can do with these planes. Ours was a solo flight, but in shows, team members execute maneuvers 18 inches apart at a speed of 500 miles per hour. Indeed. Think of all those folks who drive on the Beltway, who can barely manage to stay in their lanes while going a mere 50 miles per hour on solid ground.
It all came to an end too quickly. We touched down and taxied down the runway past crowds who’d gathered for preview day of Joint Base Andrews 2015 Air Show. I couldn’t resist waving at the crowds, but felt a little sheepish, seeing as I was only along for the ride.
If you’d like to experience what it was like, check out this video:
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