THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, June 9, 1995 TAG: 9506090512
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A12 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: THE WASHINGTON POST
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium: 85 lines
All his life, Scott F. O'Grady had hungered for action - in the forested mountains of the American northwest, on family trips to ski or bobsled in exotic places, and especially in the skies, as an Air Force fighter pilot.
He got his wish in full measure in the rough hills of Bosnia, where he lived on bugs, grass and rainwater, hiding by day and moving only at night to avoid capture or death.
To the waiting world, Air Force captain O'Grady, 29, became the hero of the moment, the surprise survivor at the center of a rare success story for international forces embroiled in the grim Bosnian conflict. ``One amazing kid,'' as President Clinton referred to him.
But when he talked to his sister on the phone early Thursday, O'Grady made his adventure sound like a walk in the park. Stacy O'Grady said her big brother told her he ``can't quite understand what all the fuss is about.'' He told her he had suffered little more than some hunger pangs, dehydration and a neck burn, apparently suffered when he ejected from his shattered F-16 fighter jet.
That blase account was quite different from one given by a military doctor who examined O'Grady aboard the Norfolk-based amphibious assault ship Kearsarge, where O'Grady was taken after his rescue. The physician told the Associated Press he ``looked terrible and seemed tired. He was hypothermic and shivering.''
To the pilot's father, William O'Grady, a radiologist who lives in Alexandria, Va., his son has always been a soul in search of adventure. ``He only wanted to go with the F-16. He didn't want anything else. He's a hot shot. . . . He's always looking for action. I guess he got it.''
His mother, Mary Lou Scardapane of Seattle, told reporters that when friends found out her son was the missing pilot, ``they all had the same response: `If anyone can pull through this, Scott will.' ''
Scott O'Grady was born in Brooklyn, N.Y., on Oct. 12, 1965. The family moved to California and back to New Jersey before settling in Spokane, Wash., when Scott was about 9, family members said.
Scott's younger brother Paul said growing up in the mountains of the American northwest probably enhanced Scott's ability to survive because he was ``kind of used to that mountainous terrain. . . . He's been well-trained. He's told me about these survival things.''
His sister Stacy describes him as a quiet person who loved sports and loved ``to try new experiences - parachutes, gliders, bobsleds. He loved things that were exciting,'' and he loved to travel, she said. At the age of 11, she recalled, ``he wanted to go to Atlanta and train to be a ninja fighter.''
She says he always had a competitive streak. When he was 3, Stacy was born on his birthday. ``He was not happy that I came into his life that way and stole the spotlight,'' she laughed. ``He'd take balls and bounce them on my head in the crib.'' But she also remembers a time on the school bus, when she was in the sixth grade and he was in the eighth, when he grabbed a bully who was ``pulling back my coat collar and choking me. . . . I think Scott scared the bejesus out of him.''
According to the family, Scott developed his love of flying after his father - a private pilot - took him aboard a Cessna 150 from Long Beach to Catalina Island.
Scott attended the University of Washington, his father recalled, but ``wasn't studying as he should have. I asked him what do you want to do? He said, `I want to fly.' '' He applied to the Naval Academy but, his father said, ``his SAT scores were a hair short.''
Scott earned a degree in aerospace aviation management in 1989 from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Ariz. He became a certified flight instructor, commercial pilot and glider pilot.
After he was commissioned into the Air Force on April 20, 1989, O'Grady trained in the Euro-NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training program at Sheppard Air Force Base in Texas. He served as an F-16 pilot in South Korea, in Germany and most recently in Aviano, a NATO base in Italy. ILLUSTRATION: Photo
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Capt. Scott F. O'Grady sits in the cockpit of a fighter plane in a
photo supplied by his sister. He was rescued early Thursday near the
wreckage of his F-16C plane, which was shot down over Bosnia.
KEYWORDS: RESCUE U.S. AIR FORCE BOSNIA U.S. NAVY
U.S. MARINE CORPS by CNB