Airborne at Reno

Our aerial coverage of Reno 2000 would not have been possible without the crew of NAA B-25J Mitchell N 1042B and Jack Frost and his hot-rod T6 N61 F Frostbite. Both aircraft and pilots provided skilled help in getting the photographs that illustrate this issue. The Mitchell is newly owned by John Lister and was being flown by Jeff Hefner and Greer Wright, both airline pilots and Warbird enthusiasts. Mitchell fans will recall that this B-25 spent many years with Frank Tallman and Paul Mantz flying as a camera platform for a wide variety of movies, television programs, and commercials. It was also the main camera plane for Catch 22 and after spending a number of years in Britain is now back in America. Given the film history of this veteran warrior, it was a real thrill for us to fly in the aircraft and use it once again as a camera platform. The Mitchell is now based in San Antonio, Texas. Jeff and Greer did a very professional job flying with a wide variety of aircraft and we really owe John, the pilots, and crew a debt of thanks. We will be featuring a full history of this aircraft in an upcoming issue of Warbirds International.

Jack Frost's hot-rod T-6 really gets out there and moves. Jack flew us with several vintage and veteran aircraft that will be featured in upcoming issues of Air Classics, Of note, Jack is now the owner of the old Mr. Awesome, which readers will remember as the firebreathing Yak 11 owned by Joe Kasparoff which had a massive R-3350 fitted to its nose along with a T-33 tail unit to handle all that power, Jack is planning to have the beast back in fine flying condition at Reno 2001 and we will be having, of course, a full report,