A Day That I’ll Always Remember, Would Rather Forget

1328 Words6 Pages
A Day That I’ll Always Remember, Would Rather Forget My story begins and ends on Sunday August 28, 1988. It was a cloudy and muggy day at Ramstein AB, Germany and I had been volunteered along with my best friend, Dave Janney, to work the annual air show. I was a brash 21 year old and Ramstein was my first duty station after basic military training. Dave and I are to provide communications during the air show, which required us to park our vehicle in what is known as the infield on the flight line or the grassy area between the runways. As we concluded installing the communication systems and wiring, we relaxed and had time to take in some of the aerial demonstrations. By the time we got to the closing aerial demo, there were approximately 300,000 people along the flight line to witness the maneuvers. The Italian aerial team will perform the final demonstration for this year’s air show. Their maneuver is called the ‘pierced heart’ formation. When performed flawlessly, the stunt is exhilarating as red, white and green smoke lace the sky to make the heart. The stunt involves two groups of aircraft creating a heart shape in front of the crowd along the runway. In the completion of the lower tip of the heart, the two groups pass each other parallel to the runway. The heart is then pierced, in the direction of the crowd, by a lone aircraft. The culmination of this maneuver occurs just 135 feet above the crowd. Due to the close-quarters and the nature of this aerial maneuver, there is zero margin for error. It is approximately 3:30 pm and I vividly remember the announcer saying with an Italian accent to the crowd, “this formation is to show our love and appreciation for all of you”. I also remember a voice in my head saying, as the solo aircraft made its descent to pierce the heart, ‘man this is going to be close and weird if they crash’. At that moment an

More about A Day That I’ll Always Remember, Would Rather Forget

Open Document