The DC-3 – “The best airplane ever made” – Navy Lt. Cdr. Bob Fults
Dave Perkins (whose comments you can find sprinkled at many of my posts) writes that he’s been working on a project — “something special” for weeks. And it has finally happened.
“Bob is my father-in-law, and his daughter is the women I’ve spoken of, the wife I lost 19 years ago.
Bob and his wife have always treated me like a permanent family member, and have treated my present wife with affection for many years after I remarried. Great people. They’re my parents now, and that’s the way it is.
Bob is 90 years old and a veteran Navy pilot in the Pacific theater back then. He finished with flying in 1946 and has always told me he’d like to get back into the cockpit of the old DC3 and try it again.
Saturday I finally got it to happen.
I produced this video and voiced and mixed the soundtrack to serve as an ad for the guys who keep the planes flying, but the commercial aspect is almost unnoticeable, given that it’s all for the purpose of thanking the vets anyway. A good cause, and no profit in it at any rate.“
Take a look… and have a tissue handy.
DC-3 brings back many memories. When I was a kid in the ’40-’50’s I use to have to fly back and forth from home on the coast of Ecuador, South America to school in Quito, Ecuador at an altitude of 10,000 feet, smack dab in the middle of the Andes Mountains.
The pilots of Panagra Airlines use to let me stand between them when they landed the DC-3 in Manta on the coast. I started doing that when I was in first grade traveling by myself. I got air sick EVERY time going in and out of Quito, it was rough and you had better have your seat belt on tight.
Yes, the DC-3 was a real friend of mine.
Thanks for the post, Andrea. Bob can’t stop talking about that day.. 🙂
Don, check out http://www.douglasc47.org/index.html
that’s the site for this plane.
http://www.pacificprowler.org
is for their B25. Great guys, both veterans, and Jim Terry does this all on account of his Uncle John, who flew B25s in the war. They were so respectful of Bob and worked really hard to make sure he had a perfect day.
My pleasure. We owe Bob and his generation a debt of gratitude we can only repay by fighting as hard for our country as they did in their day.