 Veteran's
Airlift Command (VAC) is a new Minnesota-based organization that provides
nationwide air transportation to wounded warriors, veterans, and their
families for medical and other compassionate purposes. They do this
through a national network of volunteer aircraft owners and pilots.
This coming week, the group, founded by EAA
Warbirds of America member and Vietnam veteran Walt Fricke, will be at EAA
AirVenture Oshkosh with one its clients, Sgt. John Kriesel, a double
amputee who was wounded last October when a roadside bomb went off under
his Humvee in Fallujah, Iraq.
"He is going home to Minneapolis to
speak at a dinner, then he's meeting his unit at Fort McCoy (Wisconsin),
which is returning from 22 months of active duty," Fricke explained.
"Then we're going to take him and his family to Oshkosh before he
heads back to Walter Reed.
"What a great place to showcase what
we're doing."
Look for the VAC's Hummer H3 as it runs up
and down the flight line during the air show on opening day Monday.
General Motors recently provided the Airlift Command with the new vehicle
to provide ground transportation between Walter Reed or other military
hospitals and a number of general aviation airports.
Fricke also flies with the Trojan Horsemen
T-28 flight team, which now flies as the VAC Honor Guard Flight Team and
will perform with the Warbirds of America Monday and Wednesday at
AirVenture. Kriesel is expected to make some comments from the announcers
stand when the T-28 team is flying to help promote the organization.
"It's tough having to heal and worry
about just trying to get better, and then worrying abo9ut missing part of
my children's life at a crucial age (6 and 4) when they're becoming little
men," Kriesel said. "It's been really nice to not have to worry
about the financial portion of flying them back and forth, and this way
they get to see their mom and dad. It helps with the whole process."
Fricke himself was wounded in Vietnam when
a piece of shrapnel ripped through his Huey helicopter and severely
damaged his foot. He spent six months recuperating in a Fort Knox,
Kentucky, hospital, about 700 miles away from his family in Traverse City,
Michigan. "You're kind of isolated, and that has an impact on a guy's
recovery," he said of the experience.
As he neared the end of a successful career
in the banking and finance industry, Fricke started thinking about what he
was going to do after retirement. His experience as an isolated, wounded
soldier weighed heavily, and his first thoughts were to go over to the VA
Hospital in Minneapolis and fly families between neighboring states with
one of his own airplanes. Fricke owns a Beagle Twin, Cessna 210, the T-28,
and a Husky on amphibious floats.
He also considered joining he Angel Flight
organization, but in the end decided to create the VAC. In fact, Fricke
got so excited with the idea he took early retirement in January 2006 to
get going on his idea.
Starting with nine pilots scattered around
the country, they made their first flight in November 2006. Since that
time, more than 300 aircraft-ranging from Cessna 182s and Mooneys all the
way up to King Airs, PC-12s and Citations - and 400 pilots have been
recruited. To date, more than 100 missions have been flown.
Fricke recently heard from a pilot who had
just flown a young marine amputee from Walter Reed to Illinois. "He
e-mailed me that this was the most gratifying day of his life,"
Fricke said. "Others have left leave voice mails, all choked up
describing the trip they just took, and that's the typical reaction I get
from pilots."
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