WWII Veteran Gets Special Birthday Gift | Aero-News Network
Aero-News Network
RSS icon RSS feed
podcast icon MP3 podcast
Subscribe Aero-News e-mail Newsletter Subscribe

Airborne Unlimited -- Most Recent Daily Episodes

Episode Date

Airborne-Monday

Airborne-Tuesday

Airborne-Wednesday Airborne-Thursday

Airborne-Friday

Airborne On YouTube

Airborne-Unlimited-12.01.25

AirborneNextGen-
12.02.25

Airborne-Unlimited-12.03.25

Airborne-FltTraining-12.04.25

AirborneUnlimited-12.05.25

AFE 2025 LIVE MOSAIC Town Hall (Archived): www.airborne-live.net

Sun, Mar 12, 2017

WWII Veteran Gets Special Birthday Gift

Flies In A B-17 For His 99th Birthday

A WWII veteran received a special gift for his 99th birthday ... a ride in a restored B-17 bomber. And Sergeant Eugene Leonard said the experience took him right back to 1941.

Fox News reports that the flight was arranged by Guy Coulombe, who befriended Leonard at a monthly meeting of Pearl Harbor survivors in San Diego two years ago. Leonard had recently lost his second wife, and Coulombe hoped that the B-17 experience would cheer him up.

Leonard joined the Marines in 1936, and later served in the Air Force as a mechanic. During the war, he was shot down and survived, according to the report.

While Leonard said he spent "thousands of hours in the R4D and C46," the birthday ride was his first time in a B-17.

Coulombe said that Leonard was probably indirectly responsible for saving about 40 lives during the war through his work on airplanes and "preventing pilots from making mistakes."

(Image from file)

FMI: Full Story

Advertisement

More News

ANN's Daily Aero-Linx (12.03.25)

Aero Linx: American Aviation Historical Society AAHS is dedicated to the preservation and dissemination of the rich heritage of American aviation. Our purpose is to collect, preser>[...]

ANN's Daily Aero-Term (12.03.25): CrewMember (UAS)

CrewMember (UAS) A person assigned to perform an operational duty. A UAS crewmember includes the remote pilot in command, the person manipulating the controls, and visual observers>[...]

NTSB Prelim: Maule M-7-235A

Immediately After The Right Main Tire Contacted The Runway Surface, The Right Main Landing Gear Failed On October 31, 2025, at about 1227 Pacific daylight time, a Maule M-7-235A, N>[...]

Airborne-Flight Training 12.04.25: Ldg Fee Danger, Av Mental Health, PC-7 MKX

Also: IAE Acquires Diamond Trainers, Army Drones, FedEx Pilots Warning, DA62 MPP To Dresden Tech Uni The danger to the flight training industry and our future pilots is clear. Dona>[...]

Aero-News: Quote of the Day (12.04.25)

"On December 3, 2025, at approximately 10:45 a.m., a Thunderbird pilot ejected safely from a F-16C Fighting Falcon aircraft during a training mission over controlled airspace in Ca>[...]

blog comments powered by Disqus



Advertisement

Advertisement

Podcasts

Advertisement

© 2007 - 2025 Web Development & Design by Pauli Systems, LC