Fallen Angel

On June 2, 2016, at 3:01PM ET, an Angel fell.  A Blue Angel to be more precise.  Captain Jeff Kuss, USMC, was a member of the Navy's Flight Demonstration Team, better known as the "Blue Angels" or simply "The Blues" to those of us have watched them since before we can remember.

It is not yet fully known what happened to the F/A-18 Super Hornet that Capt. Kuss was piloting in Smyrna, TN during a training flight.  However, what IS known according to witnesses, is that Capt. Kuss managed to maneuver his jet away from an area with civilians and towards tress, thus saving lives in his final act.  A true American hero.

I was born and raised in Pensacola, FL. NAS (Naval Air Station) Pensacola, if you didn't know, is the home base of the Blue Angels.  Over the years I have lost count of how many times I saw them fly, and no matter how many times I see them it always amazes me, and probably always will.  My most recent chance to see them was on July 4, 2015 when the girlfriend and I went to Pensacola to see my parents and take part in the annual "Red, White, and Blues" festivities at Pensacola Beach.  There are no words to describe a Blues air show (especially at Pensacola where they are loved the most).  Seeing "Fat Albert", the Blues C-130 bank and turn like nothing that size has a right to do and then having it fly right over your head to start the show.  What follows is an absolutely amazing display of precision group patterns.  The nail biting near misses when two jets fly towards each other and twist at the last second.  And, my favorite, the slow (relative term for a jet) fly-by of a single jet barely a couple of hundred feet off the waters of Pensacola Beach.  The final maneuver is always heart-wrenching for me, seeing the "Missing Man Formation", when the Blues come in from one direction in the classic Delta-formation, and then one of the pilots pulls up towards the sky, representing those who have fought and not made it home (an example of this is above this paragraph).

A friend of mine gave me this prayer for pilots and I wanted to share it:

Eternal Father, strong to save,
Whose arm hath bound the restless wave,
Who bid'st the mighty ocean deep,
Its own appointed limits keep,
Oh hear us when we cry to those in peril on the sea.

Lord, gaurd and guide the men who fly,
Through the great spaces in the sky.
Be with them always in the air,
In darkening storms or sunlight fair.
Oh hear us when we lift our prayer,
For those in peril in the air.
Amen

At the end of this I wanted to thank Capt. Kuss.  For being a member of the USMC.  For being a Marine Corps Aviator.  For being a hero.  And I want to thank his family.  We lost a member of the best flight demonstration team in the world.  They lost a son, a husband, and a father.  God speed, Captain Kuss.  

"Second Star to the right..."