Harrier

Sea Stories of a U.S. Marine, Book 4

By: W.R. Spicer

Narrated by: David Bondo

Book four of Sea Stories of a U.S. Marine relates a historic period in US Marine Corps Aviation, the first "off the shelf" procurement of a major weapons system from a foreign country and the introduction of the first operational V/STOL (vertical/short takeoff or landing) aircraft into the Untied States arsenal. The story is related through the eyes of our pilot and family from books one, two, and three. His writing style again puts the listener in the cockpit with him as he learns the intricacies of flying a V/STOL aircraft. His selection and assignment to the Harrier Program weaves him, his family, and his fellow pilots' careers into the fabric of Marine Corps Aviation history. He details the Corps' relentless efforts to assimilate a totally new aircraft for the Marine Corps Air Ground Team, a totally new aerodynamic concept, and the turbulence such a radical change creates. He describes how the Marine Corps carefully selected pilots with highly varied backgrounds who would and did risk everything to accomplish that "proof of concept". Those pilots solidified the V/STOL era of Marine Corps operations ashore and afloat so well with the initial aircraft, the AV8A Harrier, that more than 40 years later, the follow-on aircraft, the AV8B, Harrier II, is still in active service as the primary close-air-support aircraft in the United States Marine Corps.

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