Mustang selected as Blue Angel

[Pilot Fighter]

Blue Angels name first woman F/A-18E/F demonstration pilot. Lt. Amanda Lee makes history.

History has been made as the Blue Angels name their first woman F/A-18E/F demonstration pilot .

www.pnj.com

 

[FlyingAccountant]

Lee grew up in Minnesota, and while attending the University of Minnesota in Duluth and working at UPS, she decided to enlist in the Navy, graduating from Recruit Training Command in Great Lakes, Illinois, in 2007.

I'd always heard women couldn't make the Blues because they didn't have the core strength to work the spring on the stick, but having worked at UPS in college myself loading trucks in 100 degree weather, it's an amazing workout program and thus I'm not surprised she made it.

 

[Pilot Fighter]

I'd always heard women couldn't make the Blues because they didn't have the core strength to work the spring on the stick, but having worked at UPS in college myself loading trucks in 100 degree weather, it's an amazing workout program and thus I'm not surprised she made it.

I’ve never heard anyone suggest that women couldn’t handle flying without a g-suit. No, we haven’t seen a woman on the team for a number of reasons.

I think you’ve combined a few things. Blues don’t wear g-suits because of a concern that the inflation and deflation could affect control of the stick at close to full deflection. As they fly a pretty fixed routine, unexpected g-load is less likely. And, they look cooler without them.

I think the spring thing you reference dates back to the A-4 when they used a bungee to provide a little more stick resistance. With a little more resistance, it was easier to feel minute changes in stick position. It wasn’t that dramatic. I don’t believe the Hornets ever needed anything that native adjustments couldn’t provide .

 

[SlumTodd_Millionaire]

And, they look cooler without them.

Don’t tell that to @Boris Badenov

 

[BobDDuck]

Don’t tell that to @Boris Badenov

Flight suit != G-suit.

 

[derg]

Good for her.

Some dude at work was “fit to be tied” about it, so that means it’s a good thing.

 

[///AMG]

Careful with the term "mustang"......lots of them get pissed at people using that term when said "mustang" wasn't a prior E-6 or more (not really sure if she was, but I am guessing possibly/probably not).

Also agreed, good for her. My buddy was her OPSO during her first JO tour, said she was good to have around.

 

[H46Bubba]

Careful with the term "mustang"......lots of them get pissed at people using that term when said "mustang" wasn't a prior E-6 or more (not really sure if she was, but I am guessing possibly/probably not).

Also agreed, good for her. My buddy was her OPSO during her first JO tour, said she was good to have around.

Damn grumpy cat LDO and.CWOs! Had a few good pilots that were awesome, and they never made it past E-5 before getting their commissions.

 

[ChasenSFO]

Happy the first woman to make it to the flight demo team is a Minnesotan. They often fly in Duluth, I'm sure that'll be badass for her.

 

[Pilot Fighter]

Careful with the term "mustang"......lots of them get pissed at people using that term when said "mustang" wasn't a prior E-6 or more (not really sure if she was, but I am guessing possibly/probably not).

Also agreed, good for her. My buddy was her OPSO during her first JO tour, said she was good to have around.

Yeah, we discussed this awhile back. I tend to embrace the more inclusive or liberal use of the term versus the traditional usage that usually described E-6+ to warrant officer because things have changed a bit. I think the traditional use became firmly entrenched because it was the most common. I’m okay with including commissioning programs that are limited to active duty enlisted folks. I don’t include prior enlisted service and an off-the-street commission. Nobody ever considered NavCads like my father as Mustangs because it was a commissioning program that included a brief period of enlisted service.

In naming the thread, I wanted to highlight what I thought was the real achievement.

 

[Pilot Fighter]

I’m hoping that they don’t derail her tour like they did Commander Donnie Cochran, the first black Blues skipper. Instead of letting him do his job, the Navy marched him around the country in their post-Tailhook PR efforts.

He eventually stepped down as the demands were impacting safety and team dynamics.

 

[Lawman]

I’m hoping that they don’t derail her tour like they did Commander Donnie Cochran, the first black Blues skipper. Instead of letting him do his job, the Navy marched him around the country in their post-Tailhook PR efforts.

He eventually stepped down as the demands were impacting safety and team dynamics.

I worked with a former-but-still-proud Thunderbird at a joint job…

It was interesting conversation about how that unique requirement of PR face on a service combined with competent aviator and safety/skill etc… It’s like as much as be a good stick there was a face man aspect, an ability to get along on the road, a weird say the right things and fill a particular niche of the team requirement because they still have a military bureaucracy requirement for things like annual evals, sim time, no notice exams…


It’s almost like to be a leader in that organizational model you’re looking for something entirely not in alignment with what you’re trying to find in any other leadership position. So in a way you’re almost trying to staff this tiny organization by searching for a needle in a haystack of aviators. In some ways it would almost be better if we just hired semi-actor/pilots to do the flying and signing swag job and had a secret staff of non beautiful people in the background to do the bureaucracy stuff.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[JDean3204]

So…

I too graduated in 2007 and decided to read this article because I remember a female sailor who was picked up on the STA-21 and an SNA slot in 2008. Sure enough, I went to AT “A” school with this pilot, she was a pretty dedicated and squared away sailor. Very good on her!

In “A”school, you have some reasons to graduate top of the class. Acceleration to Petty Officer providing you keep your nose clean for the six months after graduation. So this sailor and I were the top two in that class, a dang tie as far as test scores. We had a board with the NATC chiefs and I was ultimately selected. I say that not to toot my own horn at all, but because I went on to not only lose that acceleration to E-4 but to damn near get the boot out of the Navy with a second alcohol related incident resulting in an NJP. I always felt she deserved that more than I did because I was an idiot in my young days, but now she’s flying for the blue angels and I’m flying rubber dog sh*t out of H… Cincinnati lol.

A job well done Ma’am.

 

[///AMG]

In naming the thread, I wanted to highlight what I thought was the real achievement.

haha sorry, I wasn't trying to be super serious. I got what you were trying to say, and I agree

(I also think that being annoyed at this technicality is ridiculous. It is like saying "you weren't a waiter, you were just a hostess, you'll never be one of us"). Also, plenty of kids getting very rapid (and unwarranted IMO) promotions in certain rates to E-4/E-5/E-6, and most detrimentally to the Navy, E-7. If people want to bitch, it should be about how we have devalued the Navy Chief, by promoting gobs of folks who are nowhere near ready to wear those anchors. Some are great, many are not. Eventually, at least most of them get it, but they are woefully unprepared for the job in many instances (we don't help them either, by rolling them from one community to a completely different one right when they put those khakis on). But at least we have the initiation season tight, making them build those boxes and walk around all the time, getting hazed instead of actually you know, getting mentorship..

 

[Roger Roger]

My first college roommate graduated with an aviation degree but no CFI, kinda drifted for a while, then enlisted in the USCG. After a couple years enlisted he got a slot to become an officer and go to flight school, last I heard he was flying Hercs in Hawaii. I think the structure of the military must have been really good for him, he was kind of a goof-off/slacker when I knew him.

 

[Bandit_Driver]

The last I knew the Blue Angles F-18 had a spring added that applies 40 pounds of nose-down pressure. It allows the pilot to feel the small changes easier and also helps with inverted flight, I read somewhere recently.

 

[JordanD]

My first college roommate graduated with an aviation degree but no CFI, kinda drifted for a while, then enlisted in the USCG. After a couple years enlisted he got a slot to become an officer and go to flight school, last I heard he was flying Hercs in Hawaii. I think the structure of the military must have been really good for him, he was kind of a goof-off/slacker when I knew him.

Coast Guard always seemed like a really cool military flying gig, but from what I understand it’s insanely hard to get into, even more so than the other branches. I’ve always heard CG basic is one of if not the most intense.

 

[Pilot Fighter]

The last I knew the Blue Angles F-18 had a spring added that applies 40 pounds of nose-down pressure. It allows the pilot to feel the small changes easier and also helps with inverted flight, I read somewhere recently.

I wasn’t aware. Makes sense.

 

[knot4u]

Why is it a big deal for a female to fly as a Blue Angel? The Thunderbirds have had female pilots in the past.

 

[form810]

Watched the Blues today. I would not want to be part of the post-sortie debrief. I would love to be a fly on the wall, though. Suffice it to say, the Blues were having the blues. In music world terminology, the performance was not tight.