The Eye Of The Viper: The Making Of An F-16 Pilot - Softcover

Peter Aleshire

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1592288227 ISBN 13: 9781592288229

Publisher: Lyons Press, 2005

Synopsis

Hand-picked, pressure-tested, and full of astronaut gung ho, the young pilots of Eye of the Viper are poised for the toughest assignment of their the exhaustive six-month training course at Arizona''s Luke Air Force Base, at a cost of $2 million each. Luke, the world''s largest fighter wing, is the only F-16 fighter training base in the United States, and each year it produces one thousand pilots who will fly the F-16 from Korea to Afghanistan to Iraq.But being among the elite pilots who are selected for the course is by no means a guarantee that they will earn the right to fly the F-16, perhaps the most agile jet fighter ever sent into combat. Only a few select individuals will have what it takes.Award-winning journalist Peter Aleshire, given unprecedented access to the pilots and teachers at Luke, provides a full blast of the rigors and intensity of the course--the personalities, the incredible machines, the irreverence, the bravado, and the toughness, not only of the hand-picked students seeking a place in the warrior subculture, but of the veteran pilots who must teach them how to stay alive.Readers will quickly come to understand the extraordinary mental and physical demands on a modern pilot--and the incredible joy and sense of freedom that makes most F-16 pilots describe their single-engine, weapons-laden, needle-nosed jet in terms that sound more like true love or helpless addiction than a relationship with a mere airplane.Eye of the Viper is a frank, ambitious, eminently entertaining look at the ambitions, fears, frailties, and courage that make or break the young pilots at the exquisitely sensitive controls of a $35-million jet.

About this title

About the Author

Peter Aleshire is an accomplished historian and investigative writer who has published four books on the history of the Apache Wars. He lives in Phoenix, Arizona.

From the Back Cover

Hand-picked, pressure-tested, and full of astronaut gung ho, the young pilots of Eye of the Viper are poised for the toughest assignment of their careers: the exhaustive six-month training course at Arizona's Luke Air Force Base, at a cost of $2 million each. Luke, the world's largest fighter wing, is the only F-16 fighter training base in the United States, and each year it produces one thousand pilots who will fly the F-16 in places like Korea, Afghanistan, and Iraq.
But being among the elite pilots who are selected for the course is by no means a guarantee that they will earn the right to fly the F-16, perhaps the most agile jet fighter ever sent into combat. Only a few select individuals will have what it takes.
Award-winning journalist Peter Aleshire, having been given unprecedented access to the pilots and teachers at Luke, provides a full blast of the rigors and intensity of the course-the personalities, the incredible machines, the irreverence, the bravado, and the toughness, not only of the hand-picked students seeking a place in the warrior subculture, but of the veteran pilots who must teach them how to stay alive.

Edition details

• Publisher: Lyons Press
• Publication date: 2005
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1592288227
• ISBN 13: 9781592288229
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 312