Bert Rutan was horrified to find that the plane he had designed was so filled with fuel that the wing tips began to drag on the ground as it descended the runway. He picked up the radio to alert the pilot, his older brother Dick Rutan. But Dick never heard the message.
Nine days and three minutes later, Dick, along with co-pilot Gene Yeager, accomplished one of the greatest milestones in aviation history: the first around-the-world flight without stopping or refueling.
Dick Rutan, a distinguished Vietnam War pilot, died Friday evening at a hospital in Coeur d’Alene. idaho, along with Burt and other loved ones. He was 85 years old. His friend Bill Whittle said his death came on his own terms when he chose not to spend a second night on oxygen after a severe lung infection.
“He played the airplane like someone plays a grand piano,” said his brother Burt Rutan, who was often described as having a velvet arm due to his effortless flying style.
Burt Rutan said that he had always loved designing airplanes and was fascinated by the idea of an aircraft that could fly clearly around the world. His brother was equally fond of flying. The project took six years.
Mr. Rutan became very concerned during the testing of the light graphite aircraft, Sailor, There were mechanical failures, any one of which could have been catastrophic in the remote ocean. When the plane was completely filled, it could not cope with the turbulence. And then the question was how the pilots could endure such a long flight with so little sleep. But Mr Rutan said his brother had an optimism about him that gave them all confidence.
Mr. Rutan said, “Dick never doubted whether my design would actually succeed even though there was still some gas in the tank.”
Voyager takes off from Edwards Air Force Base California Just after 8 a.m. on December 14, 1986. Rutan said that with so much fuel, the wings had only inches of clearance. Dick couldn’t see as they began to slide down the runway. But at the time Mr. Rutan called over the radio, co-pilot Yeager gave a speed report, causing the message to be suppressed.
“And then, the velvet arm really came out,” Mr. Rutan said. “And he very slowly brought the stick back and the wing tilted upward, about 30 feet at the tips of the wings, and it lifted very easily.”
He returned to a hero’s welcome as thousands gathered to watch the landing. The Rutan brothers and Yeager were both awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal by the President Ronald Reaganwho described how a local official in Thailand at first “refused to believe some cockamamie story” about a plane flying around the world on a tank of gas.
“We had the freedom to pursue a dream and that’s what’s important,” Dick Rutan said at the ceremony. Some philanthropists think that our security is more important than our freedom because freedom is very difficult to obtain, and once lost it is even more difficult to regain.
Richard Glenn Rutan was born in Loma Linda, California. He joined the U.S. Air Force as a teenager and flew more than 300 combat missions during the Vietnam War.
He was part of an elite group that hovered for hours over enemy anti-aircraft positions. The missions’ call sign was “Misty” and Dick was known as “Misty Four-Zero”. The many awards Dick received included the Silver Star and Purple Heart.
He twice survived ejecting from planes, once when his F-100 Super Saber was hit by enemy fire over Vietnam, and the second time when he was stationed in England and the same type of aircraft suffered a mechanical failure. Was. He retired from the Air Force with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and started working as a test pilot.
Mr Rutan said his brother had always experienced thrills, such as when he was stranded at the North Pole for a few days when the Russian biplane he was in landed and then sank in the ice.
Dick Rutan set another record in 2005 when he flew nearly 10 meters (16 km) in a ground-launched rocket-powered aircraft in Mojave, California. This was the first time that US mail was carried by such an aircraft.
Greg Morris, president of Scaled Composites, the company founded by Burt Rutan, said he first met Dick when he was about seven years old and over the years he always found him generous and welcoming.
Mr. Morris listed Rutan’s legacy in the Vietnam War, aircraft testing and Voyager flight as “larger than life in every sense of the word.” “Any one of those contributions would become a legend in aviation. All of them together, in one person, is absolutely unimaginable.”
Whittle said Rutan was courageous in his final hours in the hospital – sharp as a tack, calm and joking with them about what might happen next after death.
“He’s the greatest pilot that ever lived,” Mr Whittle said.
Dick Rutan is survived by his wife of 25 years, Chris Rutan; daughters Holly Hogan and Jill Hoffman; and grandchildren Jack, Sean, Noel and Haley.