Aviation icon takes final flight

The aviation world has lost a world-famous pilot and Air Force Test Center icon.

Robert A. “Bob” Hoover – fighter pilot, test pilot and master of aerobatics – passed away Oct. 25 at the age of 94.

In his long aviation career, there wasn’t much that Hoover hadn’t accomplished. In 1944, he was shot down during his 59th combat mission off the coast of Southern France and spent 16 months as a POW in Stalag Luft 1. Just two weeks before V-E Day, he managed to escape and ultimately completed his flight to freedom in a stolen Focke-Wulf 190. After the war, he was assigned to the Flight Test division at Wright Field where he evaluated a wide variety of Japanese and German airplanes and quickly established a reputation for his remarkable piloting skills and spectacular aerial hijinks.

Runner-up to Chuck Yeager from a list of more than 100 test pilots considered for the assault on Mach 1, Hoover was selected as the back-up pilot for the Air Force’s accelerated X-1 test program. He flew high chase for all Yeager’s flights and thus enjoyed a vantage point which was truly unique. Sitting in the cockpit of his FP-80 at 40,000 feet on October 14, he later recalled that “I had my head on a swivel watching for him,” and, as Yeager shot by, he managed to shoot the one-and-only photo taken of the X-1 during its milestone flight. His dreams of flying the X-1 were dashed just a month later when he broke both legs bailing out of an F-84.

Following a brief stint as a test pilot with General Motors, he went to work for North American Aviation in 1950. In addition to testing all models of the F-86 Sabre and early models of the F-100 Super Sabre, he completed the first flights of the Navy’s version of the T-28 and the swept-wing XFJ-2 Fury.

Throughout his life he dazzled millions of people around the world with breathtaking demonstrations of his incomparable aerobatic skills. Whether it was a 16-point roll in his P-51 Mustang or his famed dead-engine energy management maneuvers in the Shrike Aero Commander, Hoover performed with the same remarkable skill and precision that prompted Yeager to call him “the greatest pilot I ever saw.”

Article courtesy of the Air Force Test Center History Office