JOIN US'We go up there and have a great time'
These two boys perform their best when they’re up in the air, but they have no airs about themselves. Flying the most envied fighter aircraft, F-16 Fighting Falcons, Captain Chris Nations and Captain Ryan Worrell are as cool posing for pictures as they are at the controls in the cockpit.
Ask Chris how it is to fly an F-16 and pat comes the reply, “It’s like a roller-coaster ride, only that you are controlling it.” And Ryan has been flying the F-16 for the last four years. “Imagine you hit the skies straight up and then drop yourself down. It’s an inexplicable feeling,” he says.
None of these moves come easy to these two men, who practise for hours on end to perfect a particular manoeuvre. “We first design the manoeuvre, plan it; first test it on simulator and later implement it - after all regulations are met,” Chris tells Metrolife even as he was obliging people for pictures.
The two fly at 600 km per hour at a height of 15,000 ft. The training levels to qualify to fly a F-16 aren’t easy. “You are first put on a small flight and then sent over to train at the operational unit. Only later do you qualify to fly,” observes Chris.
A day without flying is dull and the boys love their machines and say they have no fear and can’t wait to get up in the skies. “We just go up there and have a great time. We are so used to flying that we are focussed on demonstrating the aircraft combat capability,” explains Ryan, who says that this is his very first show in India.
Chris and Ryan went to the same air force school and they have their respective families to thank for their professional feats. Talking about his father, Chris says, “My dad always told me that he’s confident about me and the others needed to watch out.” Ryan’s family is proud of him. “My father used to say ‘give every job at hand your best shot’ and I follow that in letter and sprit till date,” he sums up.