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About Flight
Review An Air America Pilot's Flight Back to His 'Spook' Years Vietnam Magazine, October 2019Neil Hansen's engrossing memoir FLIGHT, avoids the standard pilot cliches -- there is nothing stereotypical about the exciting "war stories" deftly recounted in this book. Hansen's riveting prose describes his adventures as an Air America civilian pilot for the CIA's clandestine Southeast Asia airline during the 1950--76 "secret air war" in Laos and Cambodia -- officially neutral countries, but the scene of countless U.S. covert operations.There is "an allure so mystical it borders on madness for those who play the game of war with abandon," he writes. "Machismo propelled those whose existence was spurred by the bursts of excitement that pushed life to its apex." Hansen flew for Air America from 1964 to 1975, logging 29,000 hours (9,000 of those dodging anti-aircraft fire in the secret combat zone). He was nicknamed "Weird" by fellow pilots for his bizarre behavior (although in the cockpit Hansen was "all business, all the time"), and his irreverent memoir certainly validates that sobriquet.Co-authored by veteran aviation writer Luann Grosscup, FLIGHT offers readers Weird's detailed page turning account of flying undercover "spook" missions with "a motley crew of aviators in Southeast Asia."FLIGHT also recounts Hansen's "descent" as he struggled to return to "normalcy" in the States. He couldn't cope with the sudden lack of his daily adrenaline fix. "I didn't learn about the idea of adrenaline addiction until much later, when the damage had already been done." FLIGHT is a wonderful slice-of-life book, filled with dark humor that allows us to psychologically endure bad things that happen, mundane and boring bits we put up with, and the moments of stark terror that confront us. Some 240 Air America pilots and crews died in the secret war in Indochina. Hansen's memoir is a tribute to all those civilians who fought on the war's "spook side" in now-forgotten places our government prefers to ignore -- Jerry D. Morelock FLIGHT Has Readers Saying 'Thanks for the Memories' Reviewed by David Beckwith, author of A Ransom Conspiracy, for the Key West Citizen, April 13, 2019 I usually sigh when someone sends me a memoir. I figure I might really enjoy it but more often than not I'm going to be bored to death. Luann Grosscup sent me a copy of "Flight" along with a polite request that I read it. My first reaction was lukewarm since I've never been particularly interested in airplanes or the airline industry. As it turned out, I found the the book to be fascinating (and well edited) and devoured it in three sittings. In 1964, Captain Hansen who had been flying for the Teamsters Union (i.e. Jimmy Hoffa) found himself unemployed as they dismantled their aviation department shortly before Hoffa was sent to prison. He began to send out feelers to several companies including one that had placed an ad in the Washington Post called Air America. Within a week he was sent a standard employment application along with a sheet explaining Air America's pay scale. He sent the application back and nothing happened for a couple of months. Then he was called in for an interview which primarily primarily consisted of two questions - can you fly good and do you drink a lot. After he said "yes" to question one and "no" to question two, he was immediately offered a job. Air America was the airline owned by the CIA. Its operations were unknown. Its schedules were irregular. Its pilots were shadow people. Its world was the world of spooks, covert air ops, adventure, and danger. Hansen would be flying in Viet Nam, Cambodia, Laos and other locations to be determined in Southeast Asia. It could not have been a better fit for Hansen, an addicted adrenaline junkie. He would end up staying in Asia for over a decade and was fortunate enough to live to tell about it. In "Flight", Hansen takes the reader through a historical journey to little known places as the Viet Nam confli
