Passing of Bob Hoover
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Passing of Bob Hoover
Good Afternoon All:
Very sad news of the passing of Bob Hoover.
I had the privilege of watching his airshow at Deer Valley airport north of PHX back in the late 1960's
May his last flight had following winds, fair skies as he flew west for the last time
Bob Hoover, one of history?s greatest pilots, dead at 94 | NewsCut | Minnesota Public Radio News
One of the greatest pilots in the history of aviation died this morning, according to reports.
Bob Hoover, a World War II fighter pilot, a former Air Force test pilot, and the chase plane pilot for Chuck Yeager when he broke the sound barrier for the first time, was 94.
Having been shot down over Nice, France in World War II, Hoover spent 16 months as a POW, spending much of the time in solitary confinement as punishment for two dozen escape attempts. Finally, he succeeded just before the end of the war by stealing a German fighter.
Had he remained at the POW camp a few days longer, the Allies likely would have reached him. But now he faced possible extinction at the hands of any friendly pilot who would presume his Focke Wulf was manned by the enemy.
Hoover said he hugged a cloud ceiling at about 4,000 feet, figuring he would duck up into it if he was spotted by any Allied aircraft. He planned on flying west until he saw signs of Allied territory. “I wanted to see windmills to be sure,” he explained. That would signal friendly Holland.
By the time he reached Holland, Hoover said, “My gas tank was registering close to zero.” He chose to land while he still had full control of the fighter, and selected an open field. Hoover dropped the fighter’s landing gear and settled in.
A ditch suddenly loomed ahead, and Hoover said he did not want to end up trapped in a German fighter on its back, where the Allies might not realize an American was inside. He said he “just reached down and sucked up the gear” to get the fighter to stop before tipping into the ditch.
Hoover said he wondered, “What the heck are you going to do now?” He didn’t have to wait long. “All of a sudden pitchforks came at me from every direction,” Hoover said. Dutch farmers who spoke no English were understandably angry with the man who emerged from the German fighter.
Providence intervened in the form of a British Army truck approaching. Hoover queried the truck’s occupants: “I hope you can help me. I’m a Yank; they think I’m a Kraut!” With perfect British aplomb, the soldiers whisked Hoover to safety.
Hoover said he did not consider his actions in escaping to be heroic. “I was no hero. I didn’t do anything but be stupid,” he chuckled. Hoover said, “It’s a stupid story. For about a year and a half I wouldn’t tell anyone that story.” But word got out years later at an air show, and Hoover acknowledged his feat, albeit with disarming self-criticism.
A few years ago, the Federal Aviation Administration tried to ground Hoover, saying he was too old to fly.
“Possibly in the entire history of the conduct of the airman medical certification program, no one decision has created more controversy,” federal air surgeon Jon L. Jordan wrote later.
Aviators throughout the world shrieked with outrage until the FAA relented. Many of them had seen his famous air show act, which he performed with both engines on his plane turned off.
In 2012, a pilot in a P-51 ran out of options when his landing gear malfunctioned. He’d tried everything to deploy it but nothing worked.
Officials tracked down Hoover by telephone, then patched him in to the pilot of the stricken pilot.
“Boot enough rudder there at landing gear down speeds, get a side load on it, it would force it out and into the locked position,” Hoover said. “I’ve been there, I’ve done that a couple of times.”
Jeanes, on the phone from Dallas to Hoover in Los Angeles, encouraged Gardner to keep trying the maneuvers over Mobile Bay. “Just slip it, skid it, yaw it, whatever you have to do to get some air under the door.”
It worked. The landing gear deployed and the pilot landed the P-51 safely.
In 2010, Hoover delivered the Charles Lindbergh lecture at the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum.
With his death, it’s safe to say the nation will likely never hear first-hand stories like this again.
Years before I learned how to fly, I remember we were driving back East — probably 1992 — and as my wife drove I was reading the Star Tribune account of the big Oshkosh air show, which I’d never attended. I recall reading aloud to her the description of Bob Hoover’s performance, in which he shut off both engines to his plane and then spent the next — I don’t know — what seemed like 10 or 15 minutes flying close to the ground, pulling up, rolling, diving, and eventually landing and rolling to a stop exactly at show center.
It is the first and only time in my life I’ve read a dispatch in a newspaper, or anywhere else, and couldn’t believe the wonder of it all. I was like a kid from 50 years earlier, reading about the exploits of larger-than-life people like Lindbergh.
In a 2010 tribute in Smithsonian’s Air & Space Magazine, air show pilot Debbie Gary provided a more accurate description:
The first time I saw Bob Hoover fly I was a new show pilot standing next to the great Curtis Pitts and hoping for words of wisdom. It was March 1972, and Pitts and I were watching the airplane he created perform at Miami’s Tamiami Airport. The sky was a frenzy of tiny Pitts Specials panting through snap rolls and outside loops. It was noisy, and Pitts said nothing during the performance. Even after the airplanes landed and Hoover taxied out, Pitts was quiet—until Hoover, on takeoff, rolled the twin-engine Shrike Commander. It was as graceful and fluid as a cat stretching its back. The show tempo shifted from salsa to whipped cream. Pitts turned and grinned at me. “Have you ever seen anything so smooth?” he asked.
For the next 20 minutes, we watched North American Rockwell’s big, beautiful cross-country transport flow through giant loops and vertical climbs, four-point rolls and half Cuban eights. Two engines roared, then only one, but the airplane kept dancing. When the second engine stopped, the roar became a glider’s whoosh. The airplane swept past in a deadstick loop, followed by an eight-point roll, then waltzed down to the landing: LEFT two-three, RIGHT two-three, LEFT two-three—the wings banked steeply as one tire kissed the runway, skated, rolled, then lifted as the wings banked the other way, and that wheel skated, rolled…. “Now that’s flying,” Pitts said to me as Hoover, still without power, maneuvered up the runway and onto the taxiway, stopped precisely at show center, then climbed out in his business suit and waved his straw hat at the cheering crowd.
Hoover once demonstrated how to pour ice tea while he rolled his airplane, spilling not a drop and inspiring other aviators to try the same thing with varying results.
We lost a true, one-of-a-kind aviation hero today,” Jack Pelton, the CEO of EAA said today. “We all knew of Bob’s incredible aviation career and witnessed his unmatched flying skills. It was Bob Hoover as a person that also made him legendary. He was a true gentleman and unfailingly gracious and generous, as well as a good friend of EAA through the years. We can only hope to use his lifelong example as a pilot and a person as a standard for all of us to achieve.”
“Bob Hoover brought great richness to the aviation experience, and he leaves behind a legacy of heroic caring and sharing with the general aviation community,” Mark Baker, the president of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, said. “The first time I met Bob, I was seated next to him at an aviation event, my 8-year-old son by my side. Bob both spoke and listened to his aviation dreams. He offered encouragement and some great stories. And though my son is long since grown, neither he nor I have ever forgotten that an aviation legend gave a child who dreamed of flying his full attention and encouraged him to dream even bigger. Bob Hoover was so much more than a great pilot. He was a great man and a model for what our community can and should be.”
In his 94 years, Hoover met Orville Wright, Eddie Rickenbacker, Charles Lindbergh, Jimmy Doolittle, Chuck Yeager, Jacqueline Cochran, and Neil Armstrong, spanning the golden age of flight.
His plane resides in the Smithsonian’s Air and Space museum.
Very sad news of the passing of Bob Hoover.
I had the privilege of watching his airshow at Deer Valley airport north of PHX back in the late 1960's
May his last flight had following winds, fair skies as he flew west for the last time
Bob Hoover, one of history?s greatest pilots, dead at 94 | NewsCut | Minnesota Public Radio News
One of the greatest pilots in the history of aviation died this morning, according to reports.
Bob Hoover, a World War II fighter pilot, a former Air Force test pilot, and the chase plane pilot for Chuck Yeager when he broke the sound barrier for the first time, was 94.
Having been shot down over Nice, France in World War II, Hoover spent 16 months as a POW, spending much of the time in solitary confinement as punishment for two dozen escape attempts. Finally, he succeeded just before the end of the war by stealing a German fighter.
Had he remained at the POW camp a few days longer, the Allies likely would have reached him. But now he faced possible extinction at the hands of any friendly pilot who would presume his Focke Wulf was manned by the enemy.
Hoover said he hugged a cloud ceiling at about 4,000 feet, figuring he would duck up into it if he was spotted by any Allied aircraft. He planned on flying west until he saw signs of Allied territory. “I wanted to see windmills to be sure,” he explained. That would signal friendly Holland.
By the time he reached Holland, Hoover said, “My gas tank was registering close to zero.” He chose to land while he still had full control of the fighter, and selected an open field. Hoover dropped the fighter’s landing gear and settled in.
A ditch suddenly loomed ahead, and Hoover said he did not want to end up trapped in a German fighter on its back, where the Allies might not realize an American was inside. He said he “just reached down and sucked up the gear” to get the fighter to stop before tipping into the ditch.
Hoover said he wondered, “What the heck are you going to do now?” He didn’t have to wait long. “All of a sudden pitchforks came at me from every direction,” Hoover said. Dutch farmers who spoke no English were understandably angry with the man who emerged from the German fighter.
Providence intervened in the form of a British Army truck approaching. Hoover queried the truck’s occupants: “I hope you can help me. I’m a Yank; they think I’m a Kraut!” With perfect British aplomb, the soldiers whisked Hoover to safety.
Hoover said he did not consider his actions in escaping to be heroic. “I was no hero. I didn’t do anything but be stupid,” he chuckled. Hoover said, “It’s a stupid story. For about a year and a half I wouldn’t tell anyone that story.” But word got out years later at an air show, and Hoover acknowledged his feat, albeit with disarming self-criticism.
A few years ago, the Federal Aviation Administration tried to ground Hoover, saying he was too old to fly.
“Possibly in the entire history of the conduct of the airman medical certification program, no one decision has created more controversy,” federal air surgeon Jon L. Jordan wrote later.
Aviators throughout the world shrieked with outrage until the FAA relented. Many of them had seen his famous air show act, which he performed with both engines on his plane turned off.
In 2012, a pilot in a P-51 ran out of options when his landing gear malfunctioned. He’d tried everything to deploy it but nothing worked.
Officials tracked down Hoover by telephone, then patched him in to the pilot of the stricken pilot.
“Boot enough rudder there at landing gear down speeds, get a side load on it, it would force it out and into the locked position,” Hoover said. “I’ve been there, I’ve done that a couple of times.”
Jeanes, on the phone from Dallas to Hoover in Los Angeles, encouraged Gardner to keep trying the maneuvers over Mobile Bay. “Just slip it, skid it, yaw it, whatever you have to do to get some air under the door.”
It worked. The landing gear deployed and the pilot landed the P-51 safely.
In 2010, Hoover delivered the Charles Lindbergh lecture at the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum.
With his death, it’s safe to say the nation will likely never hear first-hand stories like this again.
Years before I learned how to fly, I remember we were driving back East — probably 1992 — and as my wife drove I was reading the Star Tribune account of the big Oshkosh air show, which I’d never attended. I recall reading aloud to her the description of Bob Hoover’s performance, in which he shut off both engines to his plane and then spent the next — I don’t know — what seemed like 10 or 15 minutes flying close to the ground, pulling up, rolling, diving, and eventually landing and rolling to a stop exactly at show center.
It is the first and only time in my life I’ve read a dispatch in a newspaper, or anywhere else, and couldn’t believe the wonder of it all. I was like a kid from 50 years earlier, reading about the exploits of larger-than-life people like Lindbergh.
In a 2010 tribute in Smithsonian’s Air & Space Magazine, air show pilot Debbie Gary provided a more accurate description:
The first time I saw Bob Hoover fly I was a new show pilot standing next to the great Curtis Pitts and hoping for words of wisdom. It was March 1972, and Pitts and I were watching the airplane he created perform at Miami’s Tamiami Airport. The sky was a frenzy of tiny Pitts Specials panting through snap rolls and outside loops. It was noisy, and Pitts said nothing during the performance. Even after the airplanes landed and Hoover taxied out, Pitts was quiet—until Hoover, on takeoff, rolled the twin-engine Shrike Commander. It was as graceful and fluid as a cat stretching its back. The show tempo shifted from salsa to whipped cream. Pitts turned and grinned at me. “Have you ever seen anything so smooth?” he asked.
For the next 20 minutes, we watched North American Rockwell’s big, beautiful cross-country transport flow through giant loops and vertical climbs, four-point rolls and half Cuban eights. Two engines roared, then only one, but the airplane kept dancing. When the second engine stopped, the roar became a glider’s whoosh. The airplane swept past in a deadstick loop, followed by an eight-point roll, then waltzed down to the landing: LEFT two-three, RIGHT two-three, LEFT two-three—the wings banked steeply as one tire kissed the runway, skated, rolled, then lifted as the wings banked the other way, and that wheel skated, rolled…. “Now that’s flying,” Pitts said to me as Hoover, still without power, maneuvered up the runway and onto the taxiway, stopped precisely at show center, then climbed out in his business suit and waved his straw hat at the cheering crowd.
Hoover once demonstrated how to pour ice tea while he rolled his airplane, spilling not a drop and inspiring other aviators to try the same thing with varying results.
We lost a true, one-of-a-kind aviation hero today,” Jack Pelton, the CEO of EAA said today. “We all knew of Bob’s incredible aviation career and witnessed his unmatched flying skills. It was Bob Hoover as a person that also made him legendary. He was a true gentleman and unfailingly gracious and generous, as well as a good friend of EAA through the years. We can only hope to use his lifelong example as a pilot and a person as a standard for all of us to achieve.”
“Bob Hoover brought great richness to the aviation experience, and he leaves behind a legacy of heroic caring and sharing with the general aviation community,” Mark Baker, the president of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, said. “The first time I met Bob, I was seated next to him at an aviation event, my 8-year-old son by my side. Bob both spoke and listened to his aviation dreams. He offered encouragement and some great stories. And though my son is long since grown, neither he nor I have ever forgotten that an aviation legend gave a child who dreamed of flying his full attention and encouraged him to dream even bigger. Bob Hoover was so much more than a great pilot. He was a great man and a model for what our community can and should be.”
In his 94 years, Hoover met Orville Wright, Eddie Rickenbacker, Charles Lindbergh, Jimmy Doolittle, Chuck Yeager, Jacqueline Cochran, and Neil Armstrong, spanning the golden age of flight.
His plane resides in the Smithsonian’s Air and Space museum.
Last edited by a330pilotcanada; 25th Oct 2016 at 18:39. Reason: Full Article
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A great aviator has "slipped the silvery bonds of earth," from "High Flight."
Just one quick tale of Bob. During the Korean Conflict, Air Force pilots were running off the end of runways trying to get air born. Hoover went and demonstrated F-86, he would land stopping fairly quickly, turning around and taking off down wind and being air born well before approaching the end of the runway. The 86 being many pilots first sweep wing were rotating to early. His demonstration of waiting for the correct speed to rotate saved many an aircraft and aviators.
RA Hoover was not just a great advocate of aviation, he was a gentleman!
Just one quick tale of Bob. During the Korean Conflict, Air Force pilots were running off the end of runways trying to get air born. Hoover went and demonstrated F-86, he would land stopping fairly quickly, turning around and taking off down wind and being air born well before approaching the end of the runway. The 86 being many pilots first sweep wing were rotating to early. His demonstration of waiting for the correct speed to rotate saved many an aircraft and aviators.
RA Hoover was not just a great advocate of aviation, he was a gentleman!
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The first time I met Bob Hoover was at the Reading Airshow in Pennsylvania in 1974. After his daily performance he would walk the spectator fence line, wave his panama hat and shake hands. I next met at Marana Airpark in Arizona, when he was associated with Evergreen Aviation. His persona was no different there, as his persona at the airshows. He was the consummate gentleman. Bob is now flying at a much higher altitude with his wife and soul mate who passed away earlier this year.
Blue Skies Bob.
Blue Skies Bob.
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I flew from TOA during the 1980's while Bob was doing magic with a Shrike Commander. Numerous times I met him and talked with him. He certainly was the definitive pilot, always carefully within his and the aircraft limits while doing things lesser pilots could barely imagine, much less do. He also was a very kind, generous and courteous man. He was generous with his time, always encouraging aspiring pilots, and spreading a spirit of gentility everywhere he went. In these discordant times we need to recall his spirit and do our best to emulate his.
