FLYING For the Colors

One month after graduating from the Israeli Air Force Academy, the Six-Day Arab-Israeli war broke out, thrusting Zvi Kanor into his first days of jet combat.

In 1972, Navy A-4 combat aviator Chuck Sweeney was awarded three separate Distinguished Flying Cross medals for strikes against the North Vietnamese, all conducted in the span of a week.

Editor’s Note: In October 2010, Sgt. Jonathon Blank of U.S. Marine Corps 1st Force Reconnaissance Company lost both his legs in an improvised explosive device blast while deployed in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. Blank recently obtained his Skydiving A License, the certification required for jumping without supervision, through a program offered by non-profit Operation Enduring Warrior […]

In 2010, U.S. Navy aviator LCDR Brynn Tannehill made the very personal and arduous decision to begin the gender transition process. Like other service members dealing with acute medical concerns, she entered the Individual Ready Reserve until she was ready to return to service.

Editor’s Note: When pilot Maj. Kristin “Beo” Wolfe finished F-22 pilot training in 2013, she became the second-generation U.S. Air Force fighter pilot in her family. Trained to fly both the F-22 Raptor and the F-35A Lightning II, she now sets the bar for flying the service’s single-seat stealth combat aircraft as commander of the […]

Despite lack of representation in pilot training, USAF C-130 pilot Capt. Thessa Washington persevered to become one of only two Black pilots in her unit.

“What we didn’t want to do was leave him up there for another couple days, because he would have died,” the pilot of an Alaska Army National Guard Medevac flight told FLYING.

An Air Force C-17 Pilot Recalls Leading the Last Formation of the Afghanistan evacuation.