Passing of a real pilot

[Bill Greenwood]

Word is received tonight from Erik of the passing of Jerry Billing, Canadian Spitfire pilot of Malta fame at age 94. His level of flying was beyond what most of us can even aspire to and some of you may have seen him fly Cliff Robertson's Mk IX at EAA Oshkosh.

Rest in peace for a well deserved rest.

[crusty old aviator]

I remember Jerry! He wanted to punch Tom Poberezny's lights out for having Cliff's Spitfire left outside in winter, without first checking the specific gravity of the Prestone. The radiator burst from frozen coolant and Tom didn't feel that EAA was responsible nor should pay for the repairs. Oh, was Jerry mad! I'm not sure how it was resolved, but the warbird community learned that Tom possessed little respect for historic aircraft.

I found this puzzling because Tom asked me to cover the cockpit of a Pitts, used in the movie Cloud Dancer, which was parked in the homebuilt area at Oshkosh '78. It started raining before I could get to it, and was Tom ever mad at me! He explained to me, rather curtly, that it was an historic aircraft, since it had been in a movie, and needed to be protected from the elements.