Indy's Photography Blog

As many of you probably know, I'm big into photography and aviation. I'm third generation aviation - my grandfather on my mom's side was a Corsair pilot during WWII, my grandfather on my dad's side had his hand in Army aviation from the late 50's going forward. My father began his aviation career as a Huey pilot in Vietnam in '69-'70, and soon went to work for Bell Helicopter as a test pilot up until he retired last year. And then with me, I joined the Navy in 1988 as an aviation electronics technician, flew around 2000 hours on the Boeing E-6A Mercury aircraft, and now currently work as a V-22 electrical assembler. I also spent a year on the assembly line for the latest version of the Huey, the UH-1Y.

In any case, I've always had a fascination for aviation. I feel like a kid at Christmas every time I fly, and will go out of my way to see an aircraft when I find out an unusual one is flying in locally. I love to take photographs of aircraft when I can, and I've been amassing a collection on both flickr and flightaware websites. Feel free to click on the links to take a look at my images.

Last fall, I was able to fly on an aircraft that I had dreamed about flying on for years, the B-17 Flying Fortress. My flight took place on the Liberty Belle, a B-17G that entered service right at the end of WWII and did not see any combat action, but managed to persevere through being used as a test bed for Pratt & Whitney, and being sliced in half by a tornado in the 70s. It had been restored by the Liberty Belle Foundation, of which 12 years were expended to make her fly. Unfortunately, she was lost last month when she made an emergency landing in a farm field in Illinois and an engine fire went uncontrolled and consumed her. She was one of only about a dozen B-17s that still fly, and to lose her is a huge blow to aviation history.

In addition to having been able to fly on a B-17, I would like to soon be able to fly on a number of other vintage warbirds, including the B-29 Superfortress, the B-25 Mitchell, and a Vietnam era UH-1 Huey. These are on the top of my list right now. To be able to fly on these aircraft and to shoot pictures while doing it is a feeling that I can't ever get enough of.