Retired Air Force lieutenant colonel Christine Mau, who now works for Lockheed Martin training F-35 pilots, says ‘flying is the ultimate equalizer’ she talked about sexism and ‘killing bad guys’

This story is part of “Ceiling Smashers,” a series in which successful women across industries tell MarketWatch how they broke down professional barriers.

When she was a child, Christine Mau’s home in Laguna Hills, Calif., sat beneath the flight path of F-4 jets screeching across the sky from the since-decommissioned El Toro Marine Corps Air Station in Irvine.

“There I was as a five-year-old, looking up at these big, bad F-4s just making noise and just looking awesome,” Mau, 44, told MarketWatch. “I told my mom, ‘I want to do that someday.’”

The urge to fly runs in the family. Her father was an Air National Guard C-130 pilot turned Continental Airlines UAL, +0.50% pilot, and her grandfather flew the B-24 bomber in WWII.

But Mau didn’t see her ambitions crystallize until around sixth grade, when she watched Maverick and Goose fly an F-14 Tomcat in the 1986 film “Top Gun.”

‘There I was as a five-year-old, looking up at these big, bad F-4s just making noise and just looking awesome. I told my mom, ‘I want to do that someday.’

Mau nabbed her top choice of airplane after pilot training: the two-seat F-15E Strike Eagle fighter jet, which she considered “the most impressive airplane at that time.” She flew the F-15E for most of her career, clocking more than 500 combat hours in Operations Iraqi Freedom, Southern Watch, Northern Watch and Enduring Freedom.

“I loved that you had a crew working together,” she said, referring to the pilot and weapon systems officer involved. “It’s also a total badass fighter that drops every bomb in our inventory.”

Read full details at: https://www.efogator.com/2019/05/the-first-woman-to-pilot-f-35-fighter.html

Women like men are capable of every feat ever reached or attained by men if not disenfranchised by misogynists.

Bravo! Lady fighter pilot