And Rightly So!

14th Flying Training Wing Public Affairs

4/24/2008 - COLUMBUS AIR FORCE BASE, Miss. — Base officials identified the two pilots killed Wednesday in a T-38C crash on base.

Major Blair Faulkner, 43rd Flying Training Squadron instructor pilot, and 2nd Lt. Matthew Emmons, Specialized Undergraduate Pilot Training class 08-14, died when their aircraft crashed on initial takeoff at about 12:30 p.m. April 23.

“This is a difficult time for the (Columbus) team,” said Col. David Gerber, 14th Flying Training Wing commander. “Our thoughts and prayers are with the family, friends and squadrons of the pilots.”

The last Columbus AFB aircraft-related fatality was 24 years ago, when two T-38s collided March 21, 1984. Three people died in that incident.

A board of officers will investigate the incident.

It is a dangerous job, training pedestrians to become pilots. I believe that it is the skill and training of the instructors, and that experience that they pass on to their students, that curtails the loss of life both in training, and in war. God Bless the families of Major Faulkner and Lt. Emmons.

High Flight
by John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth

And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth

Of sun-split clouds…and done a hundred things

You have not dreamed of…wheeled and soared and swung

High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,

I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung

My eager craft through footless halls of air.

Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue

I’ve topped the windswept heights with easy grace

Where never lark, or even eagle flew.

And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod

The high untrespassed sanctity of space

Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.