Every year, the association Danske Flyvere invites its members to meet remarkable people who completed something extraordinary. Last October it was Andreas Mogensen, the first Danish astronaut, who told us about his space missions. This week, we met two pilots from the Royal Danish Air Force: a pilot who had to eject when his F-16 crashed into the North Sea, and a female helicopter pilot who was on a mission to rescue him.
The event took place on a Tuesday evening at the Frederiksberg Castle (photo above) which is a home to the Royal Danish Defence College. We met in the cafeteria for dinner first. With Anne and Thomas:
Many arrived early, to have a chance to mingle with the fellow pilots:
And soon Søren, our chairman, invited us for dinner:
With Steen and Vagn:
We always get very good food there:
After the dinner we moved to the Palace where our speakers TIO and HED (it is on purpose that I don’t mention their real names) were getting ready for the talk:
On the 27th October 2015 HED was on a training flight when due to a problem with landing gear he was forced to use his ejection seat. 10 minutes later he was picked up by a helicopter with TIO as pilot-in-command. Though we all knew what happened, we were very excited to meet the heroes in person, and to hear the story directly from them.
The ejection handle from the F-16 fighter HED flew that day was later found somewhere in the North Sea, and returned to HED. He keeps it as a good memory:
We saw the video of the ejection, pictures, and heard many interesting details. Two hours went very quickly. I asked TIO and HED whether I could have a photo with them, and they kindly accepted:
Again, a very interesting evening, and in a great company!
