Combining work with pleasure

There are aerial stunts, and then there is combat.

Maj. John Klatt of the Minnesota Air National Guard takes both to the limit — taking similar risks and drawing similar lessons from each.

An F-16 fighter pilot in his day job — with two combat tours in Iraq under his belt and a third coming up — Maj. Klatt will take his acrobatics to the air in a Staudacher S-300D in this weekend’s 2008 Joint Services Open House Air Show at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland.

Both are lightweight planes in their classes with eye-popping maneuverability, and flying them requires intense concentration and mental toughness — but that’s where the similarities end.

The F-16 is a dogfighting jet with 27,000 pounds of thrust capable of flying twice the speed of sound at high altitude. It was the first fighter aircraft built to sustain 9-g turns. (G-force is a measure of an object’s acceleration — a typical cough registers 3.5 g.) The F-16 packs a M61 Vulcan cannon and two Sidewinder missiles and has a maximum takeoff weight of 37,500 pounds.

The Staudacher, a single-engine propeller-driven plane built by Jon Staudacher for competition in unlimited class aerobatics, features tubular and wood construction, weighs 1,250 pounds, and has a top speed of 250 mph.

Maj. Klatt, a Minnesota native, is ranked among the top 10 U.S. pilots in unlimited class aerobatics. He is an aerial ace who places himself in peril with every torque roll, hammerhead or other gravity-defying maneuver he pulls off thousands of feet above the ground.

But while the 41-year-old father of two says he takes both his stunts and military stints seriously, he stresses that the latter carries a potentially heavier price.

“One is for entertainment, and the other is obviously mission-oriented,” Maj. Klatt said. “When you’re flying with the Guard in wartime, there are lives on the line.”

Shortly before Christmas, Maj. Klatt’s will be sent on a third tour in Iraq as part of the 148th Fighter Wing out of Duluth, Minn.

The double-duty danger can take a toll on his family, he says, but the lessons he learns flying air shows and F-16s reinforce each other.

“They’re both pretty rigorous,” he said. “They both require that you pay attention to fitness and staying awake and doing the right thing.”

Maj. Klatt’s fascination with flying began when he was a child, when his father, an aircraft mechanic, took him to air shows.

Some 16-year-olds get cars for their birthdays. But Maj. Klatt’s father staked him the first $600 toward obtaining a private pilot’s license. He later washed and fueled airplanes to earn enough money for flying lessons.

Maj. Klatt got his commission and joined the Guard in 1989, and within a year was flying huge C-130 military transports during Operation Desert Storm. He has since logged more than 2,000 combat hours over Iraq at the helm of an F-16.

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