You Lose Friends in the Military

In the military environment you lose people, you lose friends. In the flying environment, particularly the, the fighter environment, which is, you know, as I said, it, it can be fairly hazardous, and we lost a lot of, a lot of people. Not as many as in the Sabre days certainly, but enough that, you know, you went to way too many funerals and, you know that was always tough.

Interviewer: How do you cope?

It was tough on the family...Well, family. You know the squadron's a family, your own, your own family is, is supportive. So it's very much just leaning on each other, as people do in any situation where, where you lose somebody, you, you lean on family, and, and that's what we did. So we lost, I probably personally lost about forty friends, some close friends. My son's godfather was killed in a, in a Tudor flying accident in Calgary, quite a few years ago. The toughest thing I think for me, the toughest loss, is when you're the commanding officer, and you lose somebody. That was the toughest, and I lost a pilot during my tours as squadron commander. A great young guy, they're all great young guys, and probably the toughest single moment was giving his wife the flag off his, off of his coffin, and it was, it was her birthday, so...

Interviewer: You're never prepared for that.

No.