Howdy
Al took me on my first cross-country in the F-106 (had to be in 1982 - 83 sometime).
We took off at night from FAT to SLC and I was #4 (JAD, Jamie, Howdy, Me). It was
a dark and stormy night and I got lost a couple of times on the radio. We stayed with Al's folks
overnight and then did some intercepts for a mobile radar control unit. We had enough
gas to get back to FAT at low level and we had a great tour of the country. There was one
herd of cows that still refuse to give milk after our low-level pass :) |
Al took off one day in 1990 in one of our F-16 ADFs to do an FCF flight after some maint. He
had an exciting time when, after switching to BUC (back-up fuel control), the engine flamed out
and the EPU (Emergency Power Unit) did not start. He set up for a flame-out pattern with
windmill RPM power only and lived to tell the tale.
Al wrote a very cool poem in 1999 to commemorate the event entitled:
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The William Tell 1980 Overall Champions
Bob Boehringer, Jim Kilpatrick, Steve Ishmael, Jan Pedersen,
Al Heers, Bill Lucido, Dave Cobb, Paul Carroll |
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| Here are some links to a William Tell 1980 website. Al was one of the WT80 team members.
The 194th FIS from Fresno was the 1980 overall winner.
A lot of the pictures were taken by Jim McNab and other members of the Fresno team |
Steve Ishmael 1984. Whenever Steve came into town on Friday
afternoon for drill Weekend you could hear the unique sound of
his NASA F-104 in the overhead pattern. That was the sign to
head for the club for Friday afternoon beer! |
Steve in front of his SR-71. Steve flew just about every aircraft
in the NASA inventory. He ejected out of an F-18 once. Broke
a couple of bones. Took a lickin', but kept on tickin' |
A Fresno F-4 with refueling receptacle open. |
William Tell Assorted Pictures #1
William Tell Assorted Pictures #2
William Tell Assorted Pictures #3
William Tell Assorted Pictures #4
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| A Motely Crew off to Survival Training in 2002 |
Helo Approach |
Final Approach |
Full Stop |
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This last sequence of eight photos are from Al's last flight.
See more on the Fini-Flights page.
Jon Flaugher as SOF, Baggy, Grinder, (looks like the top of Buffy's head)
Howdy and Meat |
JAD and Moto |
Taxi out |
All good things... |
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| The traditional hose-down |
Howdy, Baggy and PC |
PC and Howdy |
Baggy and Moto |
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