F/A 18E Super Hornet

I'm rather busy with my second child right now, so, just to keep the blog alive, I'll keep posting photos of older models.

Today : a Super Hornet armed to the teeth. Such a manly symbol!

Errrh -nope. Look at the pilot's name:

This is a woman's plane. Not only Cmdr Sara Joyner  was among the very first female fighter pilots, but she became the US Navy' first female squadron leader, and was then promoted in 2010 to head a whole Carrier Air Wing.

And don't get me wrong, my interest for Cmdr Joyner is not one for a hot-chick-piloting-a-deadly-machine, it is one for a fine and highly professional person, who has achieved something that was more or less unthinkable when she was a kid.
As such, I hope Joyner will be an inspiring exemple for my daughter, whichever career (or carrier?) she will embrace.

In the narrow field of women fighter pilots, and as a Frenchman, I naturally also thought of Caroline Aigle, but her destiny is way too sad to be told to a child. Even in her death did she achieved something unreachable to a man.

Caroline Aigle 1974-2007