Engen, Donald D.
First Edition
Smithsonian History of Aviation and Spaceflight Series
Rising from aviation cadet to vice admiral, Donald D. Engen played a key role in the Navy's remarkable transition from propeller planes to jet fighters that flew at twice the speed of sound. In a career that encom-passed dive bombing in the Pacific during World War II, flying the Navy's first jets, breaking altitude records äs a test pilot in the late 1950s, and commanding a squadron and air wing during the Vietnam War, Engen led technological and tactical break-throughs that transformed aviation warfare.
In this account of his first twenty-five years as a naval aviator, Engen vividly recalls the slow Start, heroics, and hardships of the golden age of jet airplane development. Flying from bases and camers throughout the world, Engen and his fellow pilots achieved new heights, speeds, and distances in death-defying tests that epitomized a period of exhilarating experimentation. By the mid-1960s, when Engen assumed command of the Navy's largest and newest camer, USS America, jet blast deflectors, angled decks, steam catapults, and mirror visual landing Systems enabled the near-simultaneous launch of four planes per minute. This capability provided the United States with a powerful, flexible peacekeeping force.
Recounting with understated humor the challenges that military life posed to bis family, Engen conveys the adventure of flying the world's fastest and most sophisticated airplanes. Replete with detail, his memoir charts his individual flights, his extraordinary career, and the progress of naval aviation.
Hardcover with dust jacket
341 Seiten / pages
many photos
Ex-library copy, very good condition
Washington D.C. - London - 1997 - Smithsonian Institution Press
Art.Nr. 24331
