Top_Gunn

My Feedback: (6)

Robert N. Buck it is; you're up.

Buck, a TWA captain (and later, chief pilot), and his crew flew their B-17 "Two Kind Words" into thunderstorms and snow to conduct research on radio communications in bad weather, a big problem for aviation, especially military aviation, in the 40s. (And yes, it was a B-17, complete with turrets, not a Stratoliner.) His book "Weather Flying" is still in print, with a new edition coming out later this year. In his autobiography, "North Star over My Shoulder," he said he preferred forecasts prepared by people over the computer forecasts, not because people are better forecasters but because by talking to a human forecaster you could find out how certain the forecast was. Buck dropped out of school in his teens to pursue youth aviation records. If ever you needed a story to show that formal education isn't needed for smarts, this is the one. He taught himself instrument flying when the only instruments you had for that were turn-and-bank, airspeed, and the wet compass. Later on he learned celestial navigation from books. There's a story that he wanted to give his son the middle name "Betelgeuse," after one of his favorite stars, but his wife nixed that and they compromised on "Orion."