Great men, in support of a great man's plan. James H. Doolittle was more than a normal person. He was a visionary. People remember him for the raid, and as a pioneer, but sometimes don't really know what it was he pioneered.
His greatest contribution in my mind is that he devised a way to orient an airplane in cloud. He spoke to and advised instrument makers into the manufacture of the artificial horizon, developed the best combination of instruments for flight into a single instrument panel, and helped to develop the practices in which to enable all pilots to fly an airplane with no outside visual references.
Whenever one enters an airplane, the same six instruments chosen by Jimmy are on feature, Cessna or Boeing. They are there because he found the six necessary to fly the airplane and they are still there because he found ALL of them that were necessary.
If I got to ask Mr. Cole (co-pilot of Jimmy on the raid) a question, it would be something along the lines of , "What was it like to sit in the presence of such greatness? Being then a young pilot, knowing he had won every air race trophy, Schneider, Thompson and Bendix, showed the Army the utility of the airplane by flying one across the country in 1919, devising the standard six flight instruments and instrument flying procedures, and proving them in solo flight in the late 20's, and came up with the raid, what was that like, tell us all about it!?"
Chris...
Topic: 70th anniversary celebration of the Jimmy Doolittle Raiders. video (Read 1673 times)