R.I.P. The thread of death....celebrity or otherwise

[AWS260]

RIP Mr Fed's dad.

Thanks for posting that. It's a beautiful eulogy.

[Pyperkub]

I was worried it was something like this, he hadn't posted in a few days, and he's pretty active over at bluesky. I actually signed up there (after months of lurking on his posts) just to let him know we at OO were thinking about him.

[Kraken]

Indeed, a fine eulogy. I'm never glad that my parents are dead, but I'm occasionally grateful that their deaths are well behind me.

Here's an obit for someone who lived a remarkable life that caught my eye today: Bud Anderson, last WW2 triple ace, dies at 102. I'll quote the whole thing since I know many of you can't access the Boston Globe or the NYT.

Brigadier General Bud Anderson, who single-handedly shot down 16 German planes over Europe in World War II and became America’s last living triple ace, a fighter pilot with 15 or more “kills,” died Friday at his home in Auburn, Calif., northeast of Sacramento.

General Anderson, who teamed with renowned Brigadier General Chuck Yeager in combat and later in the storied age of pioneering test pilots, was 102.

His family, in a statement on General Anderson’s website, said he died in his sleep.

In his 30 years of military service, General Anderson flew more than 130 types of aircraft, logging about 7,500 hours in the air.

Piloting P-51 Mustang propeller fighters in World War II — he named them Old Crow, for his favorite brand of whiskey — he logged 116 missions totaling about 480 hours of combat without aborting a single foray.

When World War II ended, he held the rank of major at 23 years old. When he retired from active duty in 1972, he was a colonel.

His decorations included two Legion of Merit citations, five Distinguished Flying Crosses, the Bronze Star and 16 Air Medals.

He was promoted to the honorary rank of brigadier general by the Air Force chief of staff at the time, General Charles Q. Brown Jr., in a ceremony at the Aerospace Museum of California in December 2022. Brown called him “kind of a wrecking ball of a guy.”

General Anderson scored the third-highest number of “kills” in the Army Air Forces’ 357th Fighter Group, whose three squadrons downed nearly 700 German aircraft, mostly while protecting American bombers on their missions over Europe.

Yeager was General Anderson’s squadron mate and downed 13 German planes. Becoming the first pilot to break the sound barrier, in 1947, Yeager later joined with General Anderson in the test-flight program in California chronicled in Tom Wolfe’s book “The Right Stuff” (1979).

“On the ground, he was the nicest person you’d ever know,” Yeager said of General Anderson in reflecting on their wartime years.

But as he put it in his 1985 autobiography, “Yeager,” written with Lee Jonas: “In the sky those damned Germans must’ve thought they were up against Frankenstein or the Wolfman. Andy would hammer them into the ground, dive with them into the damned grave, if necessary, to destroy them.”

General Anderson attributed his prowess in dogfights to his exceptional ability to identify enemy fighters such as the Germans’ Messerschmitts and Focke-Wulfs when they were specks in the sky, just preparing to pounce.

“Part of that probably traces back to my fascination with planes as a kid, making models, filling up scrapbooks with pictures,” he recalled in “To Fly and Fight: Memoirs of a Triple Ace” (1990), written with Joseph P. Hamelin. “But part must be physical. My eyes, I’ve always believed, communicate with my brain a bit more quickly than average.”

Of the German fighter planes, he added: “I wanted to see them. I might have been a little more motivated than most.”

He flew his first mission in February 1944, with the 363rd Squadron, and became an ace (a pilot with at least five “kills”) in mid-May. He was credited with 16 kills in his own right and one-quarter of a kill for a mission in which he joined with three other pilots in shooting down a German plane. Yeager, who flew a P-15 in that squadron while holding the rank of captain, was shot down over France in March 1944. Parachuting with leg and head wounds, he was hidden by the French Resistance, eventually made it back to England and continued to fly in the war.

General Anderson became a test pilot at what is now Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio in the late 1940s and early ’50s. After retiring from the Air Force in March 1972, he was chief of test-fight operations for McDonnell Aircraft Co. at Edwards Air Force Base in California’s high desert. Yeager, whom Wolfe portrayed as personifying “the brotherhood of the Right Stuff” for his nonchalance in the face of flight emergencies, became deputy director of flight testing.

General Anderson commanded a tactical fighter wing in the Vietnam War and flew 25 missions in an F-105 Thunderchief that he named Old Crow II, bombing enemy supply routes along the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

Clarence Emil Anderson Jr., known as Bud since he was a boy, was born Jan. 13, 1922, in Oakland, Calif., and grew up in Newcastle, near Sacramento.

He was fascinated by commercial airliners flying above his town, and his father, a farmer, treated him to a biplane ride when he was 7.

“As far back as I can remember, I wanted to fly,” he recalled in an interview with the National World War II Museum in New Orleans.

He gained a pilot’s license in a civilian training program as a teenager, then, turning 20, he joined the Army’s air wing a few weeks after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, on Dec. 7, 1941.

He married Eleanor Cosby in 1945. She died in 2015. His survivors include his son, James; his daughter, Kathryn Burlington; four grandchildren; and five great-grandchildren, according to his website.

The last World War II mission for both General Anderson and Yeager came in January 1945, when they were extra pilots for a bombing raid over Germany.

When they saw that none of the other pilots were experiencing problems causing them to abort, they peeled off for an unauthorized joyride, buzzing buildings in neutral Switzerland and in France, then celebrated back at their base in a drinking contest with “rotgut rye,” as Anderson recalled it.

“Chuck collapsed first,” he wrote in a remembrance included in Yeager’s memoir. “I vaguely remember hitting him over the head with my canteen cup to make him stand up and keep going.”

They remained close friends in the decades after the war, often going on hunting and fishing trips together.

But for all the camaraderie and the exhilaration of winning so many dogfights, General Anderson saw war as “stupid and wasteful, not glorious.”

As he put it in his memoir: “Our nation must stay strong, and negotiate from that strength, while promoting better understanding among all the earth’s nations.”

[A nonny mouse]

Morgan Spurlock of "Super size me" has died of cancer.

Agree with him or not, he made a point. Although, there is some bias in his "reporting," to be completely objective about it.

R.I.P.

[McNutt]

I didn't do the research to know if his results were valid. I did love that movie though. He was great.

[hepcat]

Wow, that was one I was not expecting. He did make some fun/troubling/informative documentaries over the years.

[YellowKing]

Super Size Me has been pretty much debunked by other studies, and it turns out he was a lifelong alcoholic so a lot of his symptoms (like liver damage) were from that and not fast food.

[Kraken]

Apollo 8 astronaut William Anders, who took the iconic "Earthrise" photo, splattered a plane at age 90. Play the video embedded at the link to witness his last few seconds.

[Hrdina]

Apollo 8 astronaut William Anders, who took the iconic "Earthrise" photo, splattered a plane at age 90. Play the video embedded at the link to witness his last few seconds.

Wow, I just posted the NASA tribute video over on the Space thread, but hadn't read about the plane crash.

Is Orcas Island some kind of astronaut retirement community? I'm pretty sure that on his podcast Garrett Reisman mentioned flying there.

[Daehawk]

Flying a plane at 90? I mean we make fun of how bad elderly drive cars in their 60s. He should not have been driving a car never mind fliyng an airplane at 90. Geez. He lost his life because he wouldn't give it up I guess. He could have just as easily killed other people when he crashed too. Are there no rules with age and plane piloting same as car driving? I really think seniors should have to take and pass updated driving and flying rules. Sorry another great Apollo astronaut is gone but come on. 90.

[Kraken]

It's better to burn out than it is to rust.

[hepcat]

I used to worry about my father because he still drives and he refused to move to a retirement community. I had to practically break his arms to get him to accept having a housecleaner come in once a month. But at 89, I realized he just wants to live his life the way he wants to. Who am I to tell him to possibly live a year or two longer by doing something he hates/not do something he loves.

[YellowKing]

My sister-in-law's dad still regularly flies a private plane and he's in his early 80s.

[LordMortis]

I used to worry about my father because he still drives and he refused to move to a retirement community. I had to practically break his arms to get him to accept having a housecleaner come in once a month. But at 89, I realized he just wants to live his life the way he wants to. Who am I to tell him to possibly live a year or two longer by doing something he hates/not do something he loves.

My dad is "only" 84 and I feel the same way. Both parents are on the faster and faster decline and more and more "accidents" are happening but they continue to stay active slowing more and more while avoiding medical assistance, including meds. I don't think they love what they do (except gardening) but it's all they know. I'm mostly concerned with my dad getting up the roof to clean the chimney from his wood burning stove for which he still chops and gathers wood. He's literally fallen off a ladder and broken his neck before and his legs give out fast nowadays.

Two years ago I had to come to peace with it when mom fell down the stairs and lay there for a day with a broken arm not wanting to bother anyone while may dad was out hunting and resting half hour by half hour to drag a deer out of the woods a mile back to "the property" two hours from their house. Making him in prime shape to get her up the stairs and to the hospital after she was a day with a broken arm doing nothing. Peace with the way they are going to do things does not come easy. The driving thing scares me though. As it's not just them for whom a problem would happen if they have problems. I don't know how to monitor and gauge that though. I can only hope they have in your 80s you have to certify your license every couple of years. If not, then you ought to.

[Punisher]

Flying a plane at 90? I mean we make fun of how bad elderly drive cars in their 60s. He should not have been driving a car never mind fliyng an airplane at 90. Geez. He lost his life because he wouldn't give it up I guess. He could have just as easily killed other people when he crashed too. Are there no rules with age and plane piloting same as car driving? I really think seniors should have to take and pass updated driving and flying rules. Sorry another great Apollo astronaut is gone but come on. 90.

I don't like this idea. I think that if you are seeing a doctor regularly then they should be able to decide if you need to be retested. If you aren't seeing a doctor regularly then yearly tests once you hit X age would be good.
The actual age doesn't mean anything as I'm sure there are 90 year Olds that drive fine.

[Blackhawk]

There's a difference between flying a plane and doing aerobatics. And it's likely not an accident that he was doing them over a lake.

My guesses: either he started his loop too low, or didn't have the strength to pull back on the stick with the resistance from the dive.

[Daehawk]

I noticed he seemed to be in a loop. I wondered right away if he hhad some medical issue arise during flight and was out of control at that point.

[Isgrimnur]

It can happen to the best of professionals.

[Blackhawk]

I noticed he seemed to be in a loop. I wondered right away if he hhad some medical issue arise during flight and was out of control at that point.

He went into the dive inverted. That's consistent with a loop or a reverse immelmann (split-S.)

Essentially, you fly up high, then rotate 180 degrees so that you're flying upside down, then dive and pull out so that you come out facing right side up. For the loop you just continue back up to where you started, while for the reverse immelmann you keep going in the opposite direction (it's the dogfighting equivalent of a bootlegger turn in a car.) Everything in that video showed exactly that - except that he was either too low (not enough room, like in Isgrimnur's video), or wasn't able to pull the stick enough to make the turn tight enough (some aircraft have considerable resistance under stress.)

[Blackhawk]

Like this:

[coopasonic]

Are there no rules with age and plane piloting same as car driving?

There are rules. I don't know the specifics, but my father-in-law is a private pilot and has to have an annual stress test to keep flying. He turned 80 last year and is going to stop flying this year. It's tough for him to give it up, but he's been doing it for 50 years and he knows continuing to fly is risky. He's pretty healthy for an 80 year old guy that has been retired for close to 20 years.

[gbasden]

Are there no rules with age and plane piloting same as car driving?

There are rules. I don't know the specifics, but my father-in-law is a private pilot and has to have an annual stress test to keep flying. He turned 80 last year and is going to stop flying this year. It's tough for him to give it up, but he's been doing it for 50 years and he knows continuing to fly is risky. He's pretty healthy for an 80 year old guy that has been retired for close to 20 years.

Every pilot has to have a medical to fly, whether you are 20 or 80. You have to be signed off by a doctor frequently to be able to legally fly. I'd be more worried about most elderly people driving than I would about an octogenarian who has made it through their medical flying.