Phantom Eagle and Captain America, both famous comic book superheroes, fertilised the imaginations of many young boys, and no doubt a few girls, growing up in the 1950’s. The Silver Aviator may not be comparable to the comic book superhero, but is nevertheless uniquely a product of those times…a baby-boomer still ‘waggling wings’.
Silver Aviators, lived youth in an era of post-war optimism. Those exciting and innovating days of the 1950’s and 1960’s when aircraft manufacturers were churning out shiny new models at a prolific rate and birthing entire new categories of aeroplanes. Silver Aviators have each occupied a formative step on the ladder of aviation history when the idolised backdrop of wartime air aces merged with dreams of flying freedom. The dream of; “I am going to be a pilot”….has metaphorically fire-walled many throttles on the way to a life-long aviation love affair.
Age data on aircraft pilot’s is relatively easy to obtain. For example, U.S. statistics list the average age for all US pilots at approximately 45 years. Then, to cap that off there are over 1,600 pilots around the world who count themselves as members of one of the the world's most distinguished pilot organisations, the United Flying Octogenarians. Each of its members having flown as pilot in command after reaching their 80th birthday.
Silver Aviator’s are undoubtedly septuagenarians. Baby boomers outwardly exhibiting the ravages of their age but when it comes to flying an airplane they are inwardly many years younger. They are a unique genre of pilots drenched in the spirit of the noblest of superheroes, while harbouring an irresistible passion to fly an airplane and ‘waggle wings’.
Silver Aviator, ‘Young Bob’ flys his Baron in the mountains of Papua New Guinea and is an United Flying Octogenarian.
Bazflyers qualify as Silver Aviators
Fifties comic book superhero “Captain America”
