The Pilot’s retirement ceremony and festivities

We share a summary of the pilot’s retirement festival. After just under 22 years in the Air Force, he’s finished!

I’ve started this post a few times and have done so I’m going to split the pilot’s amazing military career summary and all the articles we did to celebrate into two posts. did. .

This is a day we have been excited for a while and we are very grateful that so many friends and family were able to celebrate with us.

Photos of so many people we love who came to celebrate with us:

The pilot retired a few weeks ago and spent the entire weekend celebrating this important milestone. The family started flying on Wednesday afternoons and evenings, so we caught up with drinks and Zimburger at our house here. On Thursday we held a family pickleball party in Corbett. We returned here for dinner and Friday was a big day.

He had the standard “Fini Flight.” This is the final flight in the squadron. He led four ships of some of his closest friends around Tucson, fired several more guns, allowing us to head to the flight line to see his land. Everyone cheered as they flew overhead, which was pretty emotional.

He finally got into a taxi to park the jet and waved to everyone. Top Gun style.

One of his closest crew chief friends came from Vegas to become the last Chief of his crew.

We sprayed him with water and champagne,

I took 1 million photos

(I love these women)

(He’s been a pilot since he was 7 years old)

Then we headed inside for the official ceremony.

I wasn’t quite sure how they would integrate his incredible career into a short ceremony, but they did an incredible job. Short version: He awarded 3,400 hours on the A-10, four deployments, seven and a half years professor at the A-10 school building, a bronze star, and multiple merit service medals. He was an instructor pilot, an evaluator (which can give check rides to other pilots), combat search and rescue, and a forward air controller.

Despite all his achievements being on paper, I was able to really see behind the scenes he has done as commander of the squadron over the past three years. He would always check in on the phone to sort out the issues. I sorted it all night with his computer and really cared about everyone in the squadron. He helped others through severe illness and major life changes, helped transitions find new opportunities and jobs, wrote awards, helped them retire and transition, and provided constant support to the squadron. . He did all this while working hard to balance everything and family life.

It’s an honor to be on his side and I’m proud of his achievements and his leadership.

After the ceremony, it was party time! We headed to the squadron bar where the Hawaii In Brothers (Ode to the roots of the 47th Squadron) was catering.

(It had all the patches of all the squadrons that he was part of it)

And they awarded several more awards internally.

Everyone went home and chilled and reorganized, then we created an open house at Three Canyon, a local beer garden with live music. I thought friends and family would jump in and say hello when they wanted and leave (especially because we were on base for most of the day), but all of our friends would do it as we We closed the restaurant together. It was epic.

The next day I planned some optional events for friends and family who were in town: hiking at Sabino Canyon,

P’s basketball game (she was in the tournament so she couldn’t miss the club game),

Dinner at El Charo.

For a group of 25, El Charo really went even more. I booked a reservation a few months ago and they had us a set menu in the back room.

Children’s Table:

Everyone got their salad, guacamole, salsa, chips, and potato chips with green chili cheese, and they had the choice of enchiladas, tacos or tamale. We had a margarita pitcher for the table and everything was very easy, very fresh and very good. It was a great way to close the weekend!

Now that the pilot has retired from the Air Force, there have been a few questions about what the pilot will do. He has taken the next few months off and then he’s back in the world of commercial airlines. For now, he enjoys the right time for X-Box time with his friends, enjoys the extra nap and just takes it easily. I’m so glad he’s got the opportunity to cool down a bit after such a high stress lifestyle for so many years.

xoxo

Gina

*All photos of the FINI flights and ceremony are amazing Christie Harris