THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, November 17, 1994 TAG: 9411170472
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A01 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DALE EISMAN, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 82 lines
Above desert sands that one pilot described as the most desolate he had ever seen, an elite number of Navy pilots this week are quietly becoming the first American women to fly fighter aircraft in hostile airspace.
``I'm enjoying it,'' Lt. j.g. Joy Adams, one of the pioneering fliers, said Wednesday from the carrier Dwight D. Eisenhower. ``I don't think there's been any pressure.''
Adams of Winchester, Va., commands an F/A-18 in Strike Fighter Squadron 105, the Gunslingers, from Cecil Field, Fla.
She catapulted off the Ike's deck Wednesday for a patrol mission over southern Iraq, enforcing the United Nations ban on Iraqi air traffic below the 32nd parallel.
``It's been pretty quiet,'' with no sign of activity by Saddam Hussein's air force or army, Adams said. A few weeks ago, thousands of Iraqi troops swarmed over the desert in what the U.S. military interpreted as preparations for another invasion of Kuwait.
In a telephone interview, Adams and three other pilots, all men, matter-of-factly discussed their historic deployment. The several hundred female sailors and pilots among the Ike's almost 6,000 crew members are the first of their gender to deploy on a combat ship.
America and Iraq are not at war, but the U.S. military is assuming a combat-like posture in operations around the Persian Gulf.
``Everyone has been very supportive, accepting,'' Adams said. For her and other women in the crew, she said, there's an almost palpable sense of relief at getting to work after months of media scrutiny and speculation about how they would perform.
``There's no way we can run away from you all at this point,'' a laughing Adams said of reporters. But she insisted that the attention given to their deployment and the death of a female pilot, Lt. Kara Hultgreen, in the Pacific last month, has not put an additional burdens on the Ike's women.
``There's always pressure, individually and self-motivationally, to do well,'' she said. ``But I don't think anybody has felt . . . that we need to prove something.''
It's much the same among the men, said Capt. Greg Johnson, commander of Carrier Air Wing 3. ``We're very comfortable with them. We've trained with them. . . . Once you put your flight gear on, and put your mask on and your visor down . . . we really don't know the difference.''
Hultgreen's accident, which came as she was preparing to land on the carrier Abraham Lincoln, has triggered a new round of criticism and questions about whether women should be put in combat situations. But Johnson and Cmdr. David Martin, Adams' squadron commander, said the women they're flying with have passed every test.
``It's sort of a nonevent for us,'' Johnson said.
In addition to patrolling the no-fly zone in southern Iraq, fighters, bombers and other planes from the Eisenhower are practicing reconnaissance flights and providing close air support to American and allied troops defending Kuwait's border with Iraq.
Navy planes have been flying such missions since the end of Operation Desert Storm, Johnson noted, so everyone is familiar with the procedures and the risks involved. So far, ``the hardest thing to deal with is the weather,'' he said.
Operations are going smoothly, agreed Lt. Rob Osterhoudt, an F-14 pilot and member of Fighter Squadron 32, the Swordsmen, based at Oceana Naval Air Station in Virginia Beach. That's particularly true ``considering all the pressure that's been put on us . . . by the press in general and by the American public.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo
``Everyone has been very supportive, accepting.''
Lt. j.g. Joy Adams
Color map
Their Mission
For copy of map, see microfilm
KEYWORDS: U.S. NAVY FEMALE PILOTS
WOMEN IN THE MILITARY
by CNB