Fighter Pilot Longevity ?
 

The risks of flying aside especially in the early jet days, I have noticed what I think may be a trend of jet pilots, particularly fighter pilots, to live very long lives after retirement. Obvious factors such as physical fitness and remaining very active obviously play a role, but I wondered if some of you ex-squadron pilots would mind doing a quick mental roll-call of how your mates fared in terms of general health and longevity after a career of FJ flying.

Pickled products tend to last longer :ok:

Imagegear

But a rumour in the early days of AI radar was they tended to sire girls rather than boys

AI, no; it was the 'g'.
Girl when on the squadron, boy on the OCU - restricted combat training.

H2S, girls.
Between us we had 10 girls. Copilot subsequently had a boy but only did one tour. Pilot friend had one of each.

My wife had a little girl whilst I was serving as an instructor on a FJ OCU - lots of air combat training too! :ok:

As for longevity - this past 12 months there have been 4 funerals of FJ mates (past and present) that have been linked to low mental well-being. Also, quite a few seem to be copping the Big C at the moment as well... So I would suggest that you may need to rethink your hypothesis. :(

As for myself, when I grow up I'll let you know when I plan to die, but who knows I might be the first to live forwever! :cool:

LJ

I'd be interested to hear if the OP has any numbers to support that; the figures I've seen tend to suggest the opposite (lies, damn lies etc...). Statistically we ought to live longer than average since one has to be in perfect health to become a pilot in the first place.

Life insurance companies would have a good idea

I've got zero evidence, purely anecdotal. The suggestion has been made that those who served pre 1965 tended to fare better than those in the post 1965 jet era. Once again, too many factors to draw any conclusions, more for interest than serious statistical analysis.

Why girls...?


The theory behind aircrew on a flying tour having more girls than boys is backed up by some facts - the sex of a child is determined by the sperm that fertilises the egg, and therefore if there is a hostile environment then a population survives better with a higher proportion of females than males. The female carrying sperm tend to handle a poor environment better - hence more girls are born in a hostile environment. There are many factors in determining the hostile environment which produces more surviving female than male sperm in aviation: low oxygen levels; low pressure; changes in G; more exposure to UV radiation at altitude; electromagnetic fields/radiation caused by increased electrical installations - etc etc.


Boys can be born, but girls are more likely. If you want a boy, then beware of coming home from a flying detachment where the second bang is the door closing behind you when you get home!


W. (Two daughters - both born on a flying tour).

Me too !! Both on jet tours.

I gather it applies to people like deep-sea divers and racing drivers too. Something to do with stress? Two girls, both while in a flying post (and don't tell me airline flying isn't stressful)

You can probably weigh your anecdotal evidence yourself, fonsini. Average uk male age at death is 81.5 (2012 fig); if your buddies are beating that figure, perhaps your theory holds water

Fonsini, no, pre-1965 was the period when there was more flying at high and very high altitudes and still significant nuclear fission products from atmospheric testing. Post 1965 there was more use of low level training and less emphasis on very high level training.

Thanks for the clarification Pontius, I confess I was thinking the opposite.

Interestingly the fighter pilots I know personally do all have daughters.

Someone must know.....
 

....and I suspect it might be whoever pays our pensions. In 1965 the average length of time for a full career officer retiring at 55 to draw his pension was - THREE YEARS!!!
My just about to be my F-i-L showed me those figures from the (as it was then)
Officers' Pension Society.
At one of my resettlement financial seminars in about 1996/7 I asked the question again but no-one seemed to know the answer.

The Ancient Mariner

(F-i-L lived to 91,chuffed to bits that he'd beaten the actuarial odds)

Salute!

I have to subscribe with the mortality tables that are based upon fighter pilots. Any clue where those might be?

If you can pass an astronaut physical for 30 or 40 years and routinely fly stressful maneuvers until you are 50 years old, then seems to me that you have good genes.

Glenn and Cernan just died, and Aldrin just made a low pass over launch pad 39 at the Cape in the back seat of an F-16.

I had to stop in mid life after 25 years of the astronaut physicals and then took the physicals until about 10 years ago. Other than corroded lungs due to smoking for over 50 years, things seem fine. A couple or three combat tours prolly added some stress besides being away from wife and kids, but whatthehell.

If I had the $$$ back then, I would have started a life insurance company for old fighter pilots. How many average bears can pass all those physicals and not have serious mental or physical problems for 20 or 30 years? Most of my classmates have been married to the same person for 40 or 50 years, and the ones that flew fighters have usually gone west due to weird cancers or such and not heart problems.

So I blame my existence on good genes, despite my poor health habits like drinking and smoking and chasing women.

Gums opines...

Just to skew the correlation between FJ ops and having daughters, I know of a RAAF boggy who sired two daughters before commencing his basic flying training.

Perhaps having the attributes to succeed in the FJ world includes a propensity for having daughters. :confused:

"Fighter pilots always have daughters.....

....and I had yours last night!" :ok:

Dad was a night fighter pilot 1942: he'll be 95 in August. One of each so the daughter bit would have been fazed out during his time on shipping strikes.

As a helicopter driver I'm still current ATPL with Class 1 medical, it must be in the genes.

Best 6 seconds of her life I'm sure....

LJ: I'm sorry to hear of your losses.

Back to the original question: I've wondered the same thing. I started practising medicine in 2009 and have looked after a number of WWII pilots, as well as a number of aircraft mechanics. I have also looked after a few people who served in various roles in the army, but it seems to me that the RAF personnel seemed to be disproportionately represented and to be in particularly good nick for their ages.

Impressions can mislead, but it would be worth looking into.

I had the privilege yesterday of singing at the funeral of Flt Lt George Harris RAF (Ret) in Hong Kong Cathedral. He died last month aged 93. His son gave a moving eulogy. He had tried to enlist at the age of 16 in 1939 but was told to b----- off and come back in two years' time. He did and trained in Rhodesia before flying Mustangs in Burma. I met him here a couple of times and of course he had a fund of riveting stories. He had a son and a daughter and was cremated wearing his RAF pilot's tie.

Don't judge others by your own standards, Westie!

Seconded. One, Tommy Thompson, a single Nav died at 55 on retirement.

Another factor relevant in early 60s was survival. Our dep nav instructor to us all, to stunned silence, announced at 50% would be dead by 38. He was not far off. I read a novel about a USAF F100 wing in UK which suggested can equally high mortality among aircrew.

To live a long life you have to have something to live a long life FOR.

90-year-old former aviators mostly have two things in common: they did all the wrong things as far as good health is concerned when they were young, but they settled into a meaningful, healthy and satisfying life in retirement. They found something other than flying to live for.

Not as easy, or as common, as it might seem.

I plan to live forever. So far, so good. ;)

Albert, very true. Of my Rotary Club most of the members when I joined, and all older than me, are still there 20 years on with only two who have shuffled off, one very old and one a heavy smoker.

I would think that the screening that military pilots have to pass just to be admitted to the club would put them among the healthiest people so it makes sense that on average they would stay healthy longer.

Two boys, sired in (almost) exactly those circumstances. Mind you, on the ME fleet I found going away for a couple of weeks of intense alcohol, nicotine, food, & gasoline fuelled fun, without 'adult' supervision, infinitely more relaxing than putting in face time on the sqn.

Why daughters?
 

Personally I subscribe to the 'g' school of thought. On my first squadron (Lightnings) all new offspring were daughters but then a 'g' limit was imposed on the F6 fleet in an attempt to reduce fatigue index consumption and all subsequent issue on our squadron were sons, my first included. My second son 3 years later was born while I was on a ground tour thus furthering the 'g' theory.

The problem with answering the OP's question is that fighter pilots are a small statistical subset, even in a survey of RAF officers. My extensive research (5min on google!) threw up two surveys for pilots generally; an ALPA (US pilots union) which showed pilots dying three years younger than wider population. Confusingly, figures from a study of American Airlines pilots showed the opposite, with them living five years longer than average American white males.

ONS did quite a bit of work on this, and the AFPS15 discussion document claimed that in general, those who were commissioned into the Armed Forces tended to live a little longer than civilian counterparts. Those who were enlisted lived a slightly shorter life.

• A UK male who was aged 60 in 2010 would generally have a life expectancy of 86 years and a similar female would have a life expectancy of 88 years.
• A retired male Officer who was aged 60 in 2010 would have a life expectancy of 90 and a similar female would have a life expectancy of 92.
• A retired male Other Rank who was aged 60 in 2010 would have a life expectancy of 87 and a similar female would have a life expectancy of 90.

The morale of the story is clear. I should have enlisted for only a couple of years, got commissioned and then identified as female.

Al R beat me to it, but in a far more informative manner. Discussing this very thing last year with a chum in MB who had been talking to the Pensions lot and he said the same as Al, albeit with the extra caveat of Services thrown in. Retired RAF (officers) had the best chances for longevity with Army (ORs) in last with the RN bobbing around the middle. Probably obvious if you think about it really and assume that individuals actually make it to retirement.

In light of this discussion, when my Stn Cdr asked me what my career aspirations were a while back, told him to draw more in pension than I did in salary. He initially frowned, then you could see the cogs turn before he realised I might just be on to something. He still wouldn't let me put that and lottery winner down as aspirations on JPA though. No sense of humour some people 😁

But I do also wonder whether as hard as the military life can be sometimes it is also a lifestyle that leads to longevity? Relatively active, we are supposed to take care of ourselves - fitness tests, medicals etc and a bit of mental challenge trying to square circles, all the things that we read about as being good for warding off dementia, heart disease etc. Certainly a lot of my civilian family and friends of the same age but without the military lifestyle look far more harassed, haggard and overweight than I do.

Edited to add - the M/F question - does that also extend to associated Branches / Trades? I know a few Comms Engineers and ABMs and daughters seem to be the norm there too. My ex's father was a very senior Comms type, desperate for a son, over the years and tours he kept popping out daughters. Good for me at the time, but he did look harassed!!!

May I suggest that g is not the cause of sex selection in offspring but rate of change of g. This may explain the motor sport connection especial considering the frequency of rate of change.

Presidents of the usa and other alpha males also have more girls. I don't know why, but I doubt it has to do with g-force.

I thought fighter pilots were all talk and no action :E

Pontious Navigator

Was the novel any good, and if so, could you give the title please?

But back to the thread. I read a report somewhere which said the most important thing regarding longevity for retired officers was if they got another job. Those that did, lived far longer than those who simply retired at 55 and did nothing afterwards.

If we're going to include WW2 pilots, as several have here, that can only be used to bump up the average by the statistical atrocity of ignoring the thousands who died tragically young in that conflict.

It's just another perk of flying - Fly high, fly fast and live (a tiny bit) longer!

Albeit minimal, Einstein's twin paradox (time dilation) theories back you up (assuming you don't cock-up on the job, that is). :ok:

The case of the travelling twins ? Einstein Online