Eye of the Viper

The Making of an F-16 Pilot

Peter Aleshire

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 career: 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. Only a few select individuals will have what it takes.

Award-winning journalist Peter Aleshire 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.

Globe Pequot / Lyons Press

Pages: 312 •

978-1-59921-722-2 • eBook • November 2005 • $13.99 • (£8.95)

Subjects: History / Military / Aviation, History / Military / General

Eye of the Viper

The Making of an F-16 Pilot

eBook

Summary

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 career: 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. Only a few select individuals will have what it takes.

Award-winning journalist Peter Aleshire 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.

Details

Globe Pequot / Lyons Press

Pages: 312 •

978-1-59921-722-2 • eBook • November 2005 • $13.99 • (£8.95)

Subjects: History / Military / Aviation, History / Military / General

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.

Reviews

". . . allows readers to experience the fascination and the fear of being an F-16 fighter pilot."--Publisher's Weekly

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Features

Take the best pilots. And the best teachers. Put them through a taut-nerve, adrenaline-infused training program where only a handful of mistakes will lead to dismissal. The stakes are high and few succeed.

Eye of the Viper

The Making of an F-16 Pilot

Peter Aleshire

Eye of the Viper

The Making of an F-16 Pilot

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