The book I read is an autobiography, Return With Honor, By Captain Scott OGrady withJeff Coplan.
Jeff Coplan is a prominent writer for the New York Time Magazine. He isalso the author of Gold Buckle. This young captains life began in Long Beach California in 1967. Scott OGradyhas two siblings a brother and a sister, Paul and Stacy. His Father was a doctor at LongBeach Community Hospital and also a certified pilot. His mother was a house wifewhich is one of the hardest jobs of all.
His family was very patriotic. Scott was an average student throughout his years in school. Even though he wasaverage he had a very strong will to succeed. Being that his father was successful in hiscareer he had very high expectations for his three children, but also spent timeentertaining them often times by taking them for rides in his Cessna 150, which is a smalltwo seater plane.
This is how Scotts life as a pilot began when he was six years old, Thefirst day he went with his dad he was presented with a certificate that read, this is tocertify that Scott OGrady has navigated the air ways and flown up to Santa Catalinasunique Airport in the sky, which overlooks the ocean from an altitude of 1602 feet. Bythe time he was in the eighth grade he became fixated on the idea he was going to be apilot In high school he was a kicker on the Long Beach Gators, which was his high schoolfootball team. He began as a second string player but a good friend, who was aprofessional kicker, helped him to improve. This along with his strong will led him tobecome an all star kicker. In the fall of his senior year he slaved to boost his grades. Heapplied for admission to the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.
Even though hisgrades were good his Sat scores were low and he was rejected. He was disappointed buthis goal was still to become a fighter pilot. So he enrolled in an aeronautical engineeringprogram at the University of Washington in Seattle. He then switched his major toaccounting then to business then to forestry. He joined a fraternity and was in the ROTCprogram. He took a short break from school then went back to live with his dad inSeattle.
His dads friend knew of a good school, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical Universityin Florida. Scott applied and was accepted for the fall term but the Florida campus wasfull so it was suggested that he go to the satellite campus in Prescott Arizona. The schooland the location were depressing so he put a lot of time into the ROTC program andbecame the vice commander of more then a hundred cadets. He graduated afteraccumulating high credentials. He was then accepted into the Euro-NATO Joint Jet PilotProgram at Shepherd Air Force Base in Texas from which he graduated and was now aUS Air Force pilot.
After several years and much traveling around the world the Air Force stationedhim in Aviano Italy in 1992. In 1995 he was briefed to enforce a no fly zone in Bosnia. At that point he was shot out of the sky. His plane was mangled, but he managed tosurvive the crash by ejecting out of the plane. After he landed he had to escape Bosnianstorm troopers that were on the constant lookout for him.
He had little water and nofood. He survived off of eating ants and foliage that he found. After five days of beingconstantly persued he finally made radio contact with NATO who sent a rescue team tosave Scott OGrady. The thing that impressed me most about Captain Scott OGrady is the fact that even when he was enduring the hardest parts of his life he never gave up. For examplewhen he applied for the Air Force Academy in Colorado and was rejected he still persueda college education.
I chose to read about Scott OGrady because he impressed me with hisdetermination to live and to gain world wide recognition for his heroic conflict. I thinkhe is a very courageous person and represents his country well. Scott made a large contribution to the country when he choose to go to the AirForce and enforce world peace. The next contribution he made was the ability to restorehope in other troops who were fighting in Bosnia at the time.
I would recommend this book to anyone who thinks that cant over come smallobstacles in life. This book shows that anyone can overcome anything if they are strongwilled and put their mind to it.Category: English
