Page 40 - Never Fly Solo

CHAIR FLYING | 13
“FLEXIBILITY IS THE KEY TO POWER”
(U.S. AIR FORCE SAYING)

To prepare for every scenario in battle, fighter pilots are
taught to ask always, “What if . . . ?” What if the weather
changes? What if one of us gets shot down or loses an engine?
What if the tanker can’t refuel us? We come up with a plan
for every possible scenario and then execute those plans in
our head—not while we’re in flight but earlier, while sitting
in a chair, strapped into a flight simulator, or during a mis-
sion briefing. We leave that briefing confident in our ability—
and our wingmen’s abilities—to adapt to change and to
execute. In essence, we become more flexible.
Once again, it’s not about walking to the jets motivated
and with a positive attitude. We should already be motivated;
otherwise, what are we doing in a flight suit? The only thing
that ultimately matters is how we perform.
I first learned the habit of chair flying during pilot train-
ing at Williams Air Force Base in Arizona, when I was a
young student struggling to learn all the maneuvers, radio
calls, and emergency procedures with my classmates. The
training was intense, stressful, and, at times, overwhelming.
The instructors told us the best way for us to learn was to
simulate flying while sitting down as if we were in the cock-
pit. If we had time, we would rehearse in the cockpit of an
actual flight simulator. When at home, some students even
used a plunger, stuck to the floor between their legs, as a
mock control stick. The point was to rehearse the maneuvers
in real time and carefully mimic each step or skill exactly as
if we were flying four miles up at Mach 2.
Most of the work we did was in our minds, with subtle
physical motions that supported the imagined event. Many