TWS has a special affinity for the U.S. Navy’s Blue Angels, as the son of one staff member flew with the team a decade ago and the friend of another is flying with it now. Yesterday, the Angels lost USMC Captain Jeff Kuss in an accident in Smyrna, Tennessee.
In 2007, Lt. Cmdr. Kevin Davis, a squadmate of Lt. Cmdr. Tom Winkler, son of then-managing editor Claudia Anderson, died in an accident during an airshow. Until yesterday, he was the last Blue Angel to die in service to his country. At the time, Jonathan Last wrote a tribute to him, and the similarities are eerie. Like Davis, Kuss learned to fly at a young age and started with the team as Blue Angel #7, who narrates the show. His second year, Kuss piloted jet #6, the position he shared with Davis at the moment he perished.
Here’s Last:
Davis, 32, was a second-year member of the Blue Angels. During his first year, he was the squadron’s No. 7, meaning he served as the narrator when the Blue Angels performed, and flew media and VIP guests during single-ship demonstrations. This year, he was the No. 6 pilot, flying the opposing solo plane in demonstrations. Although the progression is not written in stone, next year Kojak would likely have moved up to fly No. 5, the lead solo plane, in what would have been his third and final year with the team. Flying seems to have been in Davis’s blood. He was one of three boys in a middle-class family, and he spent his youth in Massachusetts, where his father was a public school superintendent. As a teenager, he was active in the Civil Air Patrol. For college, he attended the Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. After graduating with honors in 1996, he entered the Navy’s Officer Candidate School. He earned his wings of gold–an extraordinary achievement in and of itself–in 1999.
That year, Claudia wrote a casual about her son, Tom, after Davis’s death:
Another friend who’s shared the vicarious thrill of Tom’s career exclaimed, “It’s like being in the NFL!” Well, sort of–without the money and without the personal celebrity, and with the military ethic of sacrifice. Blues get the same pay they would in any squadron–and they get two extra years tacked onto their commitment to the Navy for the privilege of serving. The team dedicated that final performance to their beloved brother Kevin Davis, killed in a crash during a show in South Carolina last spring. They ended the demo with the starkly moving “missing man” formation. As the six-plane delta flies slowly overhead, one jet breaks away and disappears straight up into the sky. At night, at the party downtown, talking once again with Tom’s wonderful teammates and friends, and with Kevin’s parents and brothers whom we first met two years ago, we realized that in a sense we too had become old timers, part of the Blues’ extended family, connected for life.
Also worth reading is Claudia’s Casual essay on “The Magic of Flight.”
Early reports and video suggest Kuss’s F-18 aircraft stalled shortly after takeoff, and that he steered the plane away from a neighborhood to avoid risk to others. Residents of Smyrna held a candlelight vigil for Kuss late last night. He is survived by his wife and two children. Please keep his family and his friends in your prayers as they mourn his loss.
May he rest in peace.
