BSD Mailbag

Not sure that anyone reading BSD will find this interesting, but it was the highlight of my 24 year AF career. I'm a 1984 grad and was commissioned as a 2Lt in the AF after school.  I fly an airplane for the Air Force called a C-17.  It is a large jet that carries cargo for the military.  We can carry troops, equipment, or be converted into a hospital and carry patients.

For the last few years most of our flying has been to the Middle East, Iraq and Afghanistan in support of our operations over there.  Typically long flights into less than ideal environments (to say the least).

When Penn State requested a military fly by for the Northwestern game the Air Force put it up as one of the approved public relations flights.   The squadron that I fly for saw the flight and  put in the request to fly it knowing that I am a Penn State alum and fanatic.  We got lucky and were given the trip.

The morning of the game we left Charleston at about 0800 and arrived in State College about an hour and a half later.  We had to drop off one pilot who went to the stadium with a radio.  Jake Buss was that pilot, his dad was an All American soccer player for State back in the day.  Jake's job was to stay in radio contact with us from the top of the stadium and let us know when we were to fly over.  Had the best seat in the house.

My favorite place in the world is Beaver Stadium while the Blue Band is playing our National Anthem.  To fly over was wonderful.  My wife, son, mom, college roommate, and 109,000 of my closest friends were there.  The plan was to fly over the Beaver Stadium as the National Anthem ended.  Usually time control is easy but on that Saturday it was raining and the cloud  base was a little lower than we'd have liked.  So we held down in the valley south of the stadium about 15 miles away.  The team stayed on the field for pregame warmups a little longer so all of our timing went out the window, we had to do some quick math and got pretty close to on time.

We actually had Jake start singing the National Anthem as the band played and we timed our arrival for after that.  We were about 8 seconds late, not too bad considering Jake is a better pilot than singer!!  We flew over at a couple hundred feet and right around 250 miles an hour.  The stadium looked great during the run in, it just towers over the landscape.

Right thru the uprights!	It's going to hit the scoreboard!

The real highlight was after the game.   Our flight crew (5 pilots and 2 loadmasters) were given passes to the press box.  We had great seats, free creamery ice cream and sideline passes.  I took my son down onto the field during the game and got our picture taken with the cheerleaders.

Took the crew to the Rathskellar for drinks after the game and we flew home on Sunday morning.

Not a bad way to spend a Saturday.   I've got a flight this weekend so I won't be sitting in our normal seats this Saturday watching PSU and OSU from section EJU row 75.  Hopefully, I can catch the highlights.

I'll be there for the Purdue game though.

WE ARE