Great Story: Married pilots hook up on military refueling mission

[Don Plumley]

Married pilots hook up on military refueling mission


The plane (bottom) of Navy Lt. Jeff McLean is refueled over Pakistan by the plane of his wife of one year, Christine McLean, whom he has not seen in six months. The photograph was taken by his wingman. The refueling rendezvous was a chance encounter on Jeff’s final mission.

Posted: July 1, 2010

As reunions go, it only lasted a few minutes.

But Jeff and Christine McLean were thrilled nonetheless to see each other, even though they couldn't hug, let alone kiss.

Married in May 2009 in Fox Point, the couple has spent most of their first year of marriage apart.

Really far apart. As in different cockpits in different airspaces.

Air Force Capt. Christine McLean pilots a refueling plane and Navy Lt. Jeff McLean flies an F/A-18 Super Hornet.

After Christine McLean was deployed from England to southwest Asia in May for refueling missions in the skies over Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries, she hoped she might hook up - literally - with her husband, who has been flying combat and support missions from the USS Eisenhower aircraft carrier since January.

But it wasn't until last week, on Jeff McLean's final and 40th flight on this deployment that he rendezvoused with the air refuelers over Pakistan and was happy to see it was his wife's plane.

As commander of her KC-135 Stratotanker, Christine McLean speaks to pilots of planes maneuvering behind the refueler to top off their fuel tanks. So the couple spoke for a short time. It was dark, which meant only a brief glimpse for the husband and wife.

The next day, Jeff McLean e-mailed his parents back home in Mequon with the happy news and included a picture taken through night vision goggles by another pilot in his squadron.

Jeff McLean wrote in an e-mail Thursday that he and his wife had tried to coordinate their flight schedules but with more than 50 KC-135 tankers taking off every day to refuel both Navy and Air Force fighters, it was too difficult to connect in the air. On his last combat flight, Jeff McLean knew she would be flying in the same area at the same time but since they had never been able to meet on previous flights, he was merely hoping to hear his wife's voice on the radio.
Chance meeting

"After I was done with my last mission in Afghanistan, the sun was just setting, and I changed frequencies to check in with my tanker and it was Christine!" wrote Jeff McLean, whose call sign is "Lick."

Though it was dark and turbulent - difficult conditions for aerial refueling - Jeff McLean said it was one of the highlights of the deployment. Fighter planes must refuel a few times on each mission over Afghanistan.

"After she gave me about 10,000 pounds of fuel, I flew right up next to her cockpit. She turned on the lights and waved, and I could see her, but it's pretty dark in my jet, so I'm not sure that she ever saw me waving . . .  We were able to fly together all the way out of country and back over the Arabian Sea at 500 knots, then I had to head back and land on the ship and she headed back to her base. As we broke apart, I lit my afterburner, which hopefully looked pretty cool in the dark. It was an absolutely perfect flight."

The couple, both 27, met at Homestead High School when she was a freshman and he was a sophomore. They dated off and on in high school before Jeff McLean left for the Naval Academy in Annapolis. A year later, Christine, whose maiden name is Todd, went to the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. They renewed their romance after they attended the Air Force-Navy football game together in 2003.

Right after their wedding last year, Christine McLean returned to her base in England and Jeff McLean returned to his base in Virginia. They managed a one-week honeymoon last fall in Antigua and saw each other in Washington, D.C., at Christmas. They stay in contact via e-mail, phone calls and video calls. But until their in-air meeting last week, they had not seen each other in person for six months.

Christine McLean called her parents in Mequon to tell them of the chance meeting with her husband.

"She was very excited. She had been very much looking forward to it," said her father, Richard Todd, an Army helicopter pilot in Vietnam. "We don't know much about the conversation between them. If I know those two people, it was all business. They're both very, very professional in their flying."

Christine McLean told her mother-in-law, Mary McLean, that she always took her camera on refueling flights on the chance her husband would be one of the many planes getting refueled.

Jeff McLean is scheduled to return to the U.S. later this month when the Eisenhower docks in Florida before heading to its home base in Virginia. Christine McLean is due to finish her overseas deployment and fly her plane home to Seymour Johnson Air Force base in Goldsboro, N.C., by late July or early August. That means, for the first time since they said "I do," the couple will be based together in the U.S.and only separated by a three-hour drive, said Mary McLean.

When they got married, "we knew that they would not be in the same place. They never have been," Mary McLean said. "But they like what they do and they understand the importance of their jobs."

[widgeon13]

Nice story.

[widgeon13]

Better story than this one. Let hope they both have a good ending.

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[FLYGEEZER]

Thanks for posting the story ! What a great way to start off my Saturday morning & the 4th of July weekend.

[Joe Bob]

Passing gas with your mate takes on a new meaning....

[Joeaksa]

Especially good story on the 4th of July Independence Day weekend!