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The husband of the soon to be New Governor General


Fido

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William "Billie" Flynn is one of the best pilots to ever fly into combat for Canada. Flynn is known for having piloted CF-18s almost immediately after graduating from the Royal Military College in Kingston, piloting the tighter for more than two decades for Canada. He commanded 441 Fighter Squadron and the Baltic Rats, as they flew combat missions over Kosovo and the former Yugoslavia. He Hew 25 combat sorties himself and has gone on to become one of the best test pilots in the world, as part of the Eurofighter program and now Lockheed Martin's F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program. Flynn has every right to bask in what has been a fantastic career; but for all his accomplishments he manages to keep himself down to earth. He is married to Canadian astronaut Julie Payette and has two sons aged 8 and 18. 

A military brat, Flynn is the son of a tighter pilot. He was born in Germany and grew up on bases in Chatham, St. Hubert, and Bagotville. If you ask him about where he's from he'll finally work his way around to the Rideau Lakes region of Eastern Ontario, just over an hour away from Ottawa. 

"I grew up around jets and for as long as I can remember, that's what I wanted to do," says Flynn. 

Flynn began his military odysscy at the Royal Military College in Kingston. He graduated in 1981 and embarked on a career that would lead him all over Canada, with a stop back in Germany and a combat call to Kosovo. 

Following in the footsteps of his fighter pilot father, Flynn climbed into the cockpit of the CF-18 for the first time shortly after graduating from pilot training in 1982, being selected as a CF-18 pipeline pilot. 


"It was a trial to see if young pilots could make the transition to a brand new airplane; so we were kind of like guinea pigs." 

After piloting more than 70 aircraft, Flynn still speaks fondly of the CF-18s he says he grew up in. 

"It's like your first girlfriend, your fist love. I loved the jet. I was lucky enough to fly it on both coasts of Canada and in Germany in the day. I went to war in Kosovo in the CF-18. I loved the jet. It's the jet I would want to go to war in." 

Flynn would take that girlfriend into combat when he deployed to the Balkans in 1999 as commander of Canada's air force contribution to Operation ALLIED FORCE and Operation ECHO, the US-lead NATO bombing operation that would lead to the withdrawal of Yugoslav forces from Kosovo. 

"I say facetiously that I saw all of Kosovo and Serbia from 25,000 feet. Both north and south as well as east and west. 

Flynn flew 25 combat sorties himself during Operation ALLIED FORCE, mostly dropping precision-guided bombs on enemy targets. As a unit, the 69 pilots that made up the Balkan Rats, supported by the 250 members of the ground crew in Aviano, Italy, would account for 224 combat sorties and conduct 10 per cent of all the bombing missions for ALLIED FORCE. By the end of the 79-day mission, Canadian pilots had dropped 500,000 pounds of munitions on the forces of Yugoslav dictator Slobodan Milosevic. 

"We train and we focus everything we do in peacetime to go to war. When you step across that line from peacetime to combat, it really is interesting. It's a big step up in intensity and focus because you can't afford to screw tip. When you screw up in peacetime it's just a bad day and you come home with your tail between your legs. When you screw up in combat, somebody's going to shoot you down or even worse; in a sense, you're going to drop that incredibly lethal set of bombs in the wrong place." 

Six years later, as a result of the successes of their bombing missions, both pilots and crew would see Governor-General Michaellc Jean bestow battle honors on both 441 and 425 Tactical Fighter Squadrons. 

"I came back from combat, having been the commanding officer of Canada's greatest fighter squadron, 441. I commanded the Balkan Rats in combat and we were astonishingly successful. We were overwhelmingly good for a tiny little air force, and you can't beat a high like that." 


After leading the Balkan Rats into combat in Kosovo and returning to his command in Cold Lake, Alberta, Flynn decided it was time to move on from his military career after 23 years of service. 

"I had a great air force career. Everywhere along the way I got lucky and had incredibly interesting postings and opportunities." 

Since leaving the Forces, Flynn has moved on to a successful career as a test pilot. 

"What I really wanted to come back to was being a test pilot. I read the book The Right Stuff "when I was in pilot training and it's one of two books in my life that changed the course of what I do." 

Flynn would find himself working for EADS, the company that emerged from the combination of Aerospatiale Matra, Cunstrucclones Aeronauticas S.A. and DaimlerChrysler Aerospace, where he flew as part of the Eurofighter program. 

"Every flight is extraordinary' because we flew a fraction of what we flew in the F-35 or even in the F-16 world ... It was just really exciting. It was a really fun airplane to fly as a prototype." 

Following his experience in the Eurofighter program, Flynn decided it was time to come back to North America when his wife, astronaut Julie Payette, became pregnant with their second child. 

The decision also coincided with an opportunity to join Lockheed Martin in the development of the F-35, one of the largest single defence initiatives ever developed. 

Flynn, who has been flying chase in an F-16 and conducting simulator work on the F-35, describes the new jet as a big jump forward in technology. 

"You were the limiting factor, the pilot. That's no longer the case," says Flynn. 

As a result of those advances, Flynn also says that the F-35 will require a new skill set, one that Canada's current CF-18 pilots aren't trained for. Instead, he says the true masters of the F-35 will come from the video game generation currently entering high school and university. 

"It is so disheartening for the Canadian CF-18 pilots in Bagotvillc and Cold Lake for me to tell them--because they're 35 years old--to tell them that they will never master the F-35 like they did the Hornet." 

Still, Flynn says the F-35 is an incredibly simple plane to fly if you have the right skills. 

"You will master this airplane if you are capable of thinking on the level of the young generation of pilots that are just now coming out to fly. You have to be part of the video game era." 

In addition to his job with Lockheed Martin, Flynn also served as the 201 1 president of the Society for Experimental Test Pilots, an organization that includes some of the biggest names in aviation history. The society was created in order to address safety concerns for test pilots including names like Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Chuck Yeager, Alan Shepard, Igor Sikorsky and John Glenn. 

"Everybody that has been important in the development of aviation in the last 50 years is a part of that organization. It's just a walking museum to be around them at our annual symposium and banquet." 

While the society was initially incorporated in California, international chapters now serve members from around the globe. 

"It's a group of almost 2,500 experienced test pilots from all over the world ... If you are an experienced professional test pilot, then you have likely strived to be a part of that organization." 

For all that Flynn accomplished in his career, he never managed to land himself a call sign. 

"I have done everything imaginable in buffoonery to have earned a call sign in the air force. People only know me as Billie."

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Flynn is the son of a tighter pilot

 

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piloting the tighter for more than two decades for Canada

I don't know who wrote it but they should stop drinking.:P

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