The National Aviation Hall of Fame in Dayton, Ohio, has announced its Class of 2011 inductees. They are: the late Capt. Iven Carl Kincheloe, a record setting jet age test pilot hailed as “the first man in space;” retired Col. Charles Edward McGee, a Tuskegee Airman and fighter pilot with 409 combat missions in three wars; S. Harry Robertson, pilot and aviation safety pioneer recognized as “the father of the crashworthy fuel system;” and the late Gen. Thomas White, former Air Force Chief of Staff and Cold War architect of integrating space technology into modern defense systems. The NAHF will formally enshrine these four men during a ceremony on July 16 in Dayton. They will join the hall’s 207 current members. NAHF also announced that the Navy’s Blue Angels flight demonstration team is recipient of the 2011 Milton Caniff Spirit of Flight Award. (For more on Kincheloe, see The Last Flight of the X-2 from the Air Force Magazine archives; from more on White, read Space Control and National Security.)
The Air Force and Boeing agreed to a nearly $2.4 billion contract for a new lot of KC-46 aerial tankers on Nov. 21. The deal, announced by the Pentagon, is for 15 new aircraft in Lot 11 at a cost of $2.389 billion—some $159 million per tail.