×

Milestone

Air Crew’s Place in History Shows Progress

It took 63 years to get to this point, but a West Virginia Air National Guard 130th Airlift Wing crew has good reason to be proud. They are the first all-female crew in the unit’s history. Last week, the crew took flight on its way to Naval Air Station Key West’s Boca Chica Field, for an aeromedical evacuation training exercise aboard a C-130J Super Hercules aircraft, according to a report by WCHS.

Lt. Col. Kristen Hoeckel and Maj. Kelly Farris are pilots, Chief Master Sgt. Debbie Turrill, Technical Sgt. Emily Knight and Technical Sgt. Autumn Davis served as loadmasters for the flight. They have combined already logged more than 11,000 hours in the H model C-130 aircraft.

What a wonderful piece of positive news, particularly for our state.

But in what has begun to feel like a bit of cliche, it leads one to wonder “Why is this just happening? It’s 2023!”

Better, of course, than so much that prompts the question “Why is this STILL happening?”

“While it’s a historic flight for this unit, and I’m glad to be a part of this crew, I’ll be happy when it’s no longer newsworthy,” Hoeckel, a 22-year veteran of the Air National Guard, said. “It’s been a long, challenging road for women to be seen as equally capable. I just want to do my job, and be seen as a good pilot — not a ‘good female pilot.'”

Her words are reminiscent of the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who said “And when I’m sometimes asked when will there be enough [women on the Supreme Court]? And I say ‘when there are nine,’ people are shocked. But there’d been nine men, and nobody’s ever raised a question about that.”

Again, while it would have been nice if it had not taken 63 years to get here, this West Virginia crew has much to celebrate in being part of such a milestone. Now, let’s take Hoeckel’s words to heart and make enough socio-cultural (and, sadly, political) progress that such a crew is not a headline, but part of the norm.

Starting at $3.92/week.

Subscribe Today