Jimmy Leeward

It’s not always easy to describe a relationship with someone to other people. Some people you just know are your friends though you don’t spend a great deal of time with them. Somehow you know that you and they ‘see’ eye to eye on many things. And when they die, you feel you’ve lost a “close friend” even though, over the years, your time with them may be one or two days at a time once a year.

I guess that’s how I feel about Jimmy Leeward’s passing. It was spectacular to say the least and I know Jimmy would not have wanted it the way it went. I only hope he knows, we know he was trying his best.


But why should I consider myself a friend, even a grieving friend of Jimmy’s? I think it has to do with our mutual passion. Our lives run a sort of parallel in pursuit of that passion. Though just 3 years older than me, we both grew up with the examples of WW2 vets to live up to. We most likely read the same comic books and saw the same movie serials at our local theaters at Saturday matinees. We most likely built the same model airplanes, and devoured every detail about the great WW2 fighters and bombers and the men who flew them.


We both started flying in our teens, and that passion has lasted even now. We both became professionals in this passion and that is how I turn this relationship into friendship. We reached a point where he knew my name and flying background and I his. We both respected each other, because we had lived the same “life,” if you will, as aviators. He became a “speed freak” maybe, pushing the limits of science of powerplants and airframes. Me? After an airline career, I push old airplanes around in a ‘show & tell’ in an exercise I hope to bring to life that immense struggle of a generation both Jimmy and I love and owe so much too. I respected his part in this passion and I know he respected mine. And respect is part and parcel of friendship.


Those that died that day with Jimmy were killed by the weakness in aluminum molecules and adverse aerodynamics, not by the lack of skill on Jimmy’s part. The video clearly shows he was still trying.


And this is the basis of my grief. A family man, a dreamer, and traveler with me in this passion we call aviation. A respected aviator. “Blue skies and strong tailwinds, my friend”. And you can now really touch the face of God.