Posted by lex, on April 16th, 2011
The Collings Foundation has a new war horse in the stable, and gave an old war horse a ride in her.
(05-14-18 – the video was embedded – here is the link – Ed )
Col. Day had 5000 hours in his log book, and 4500 of them in fighters before he volunteered for combat duty in Vietnam. He stood up the first “Fast FAC” squadron to fly high risk forward air control missions, and was shot down on his 65th sortie up north. Badly injured in the ejection, he nevertheless managed to evade his captors and cross the DMZ back in to South Vietnam, becoming the only American POW to escape from North Vietnam. Recaptured by Viet Cong just miles from a US base, Col. Day spent five years and seven months as a guest of the Hanoi regime, who broke his body but not his spirit.
He is the only person ever to have been awarded both the Medal of Honor and the Air Force Cross.
I hope you enjoyed the flight, colonel. And a tip o’ the tam to the Collings Foundation for setting it up.
Editors Note – 05-14-18 I wrote about the Misties awhile back. An amazing group of pilots.
