Many female pilots have broken several aviation records. One of them is Evelyn Bryan Johnson, a colonel in the Civil Air Patrol, who was nicknamed “Mama Bird”. She logged 57,635.4 flying hours, equivalent to almost seven years of flight time. She also trained more pilots than anyone in history.
Evelyn followed the footsteps of Raymonde de Laroche, the first female to get a pilot’s license (incidentally on Women’s Day). Laroche was also instrumental in shaping, as the firsts often are, in shaping Amelia Earhart, “The Face of Female Aviation” who inturn was the source of inspiration for Ann Baumgartner, the first American woman to pilot a US Army Air Force (on America’s first jet aircraft) the Bell YP-59A.
One person shaping another, shaping another, and another, has been the way of human endeavors. In this article, we will touch upon the top five military pilots who made history and broke records.
5. Sabiha Gökçen
Story behind the World’s First Female Combat Pilot
On the 22nd of March 1913 in Bursa Hüdavendigâr Vilayet, Ottoman Empire, Sabiha Gökçen was born. Although she would be orphaned at a young age, she would, in 1936, became the world’s first female fighter pilot. Eleven years prior to this distinction, she was adopted by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, who is the founder of modern Turkey (and the nation’s first president). It was Mustafa who accepted Sabiha ‘s request to pursue aviation.
Sahiba enrolled in the Turkish aviation league in 1935 and was later sent to the Soviet Union for advanced glider and parachute training. For this record-making achievement, she trained at Eskişehir Military Aviation School, completed her military pilot training, and flew combat aircraft. A year later, Sabiha participated in Combat Operations during the Dersim Rebellion. She also accompanied Mustafa on international flights as a symbol of modern Turkish womanhood and represented Turkey abroad at aviation events. Sabiha became an instructor pilot and military educator, training new generations of pilots in Turkey.
| Aircraft flown | Breguet 19, Curtiss-Wright CW-22, Potez 25, Vultee V-11 (A-19) |
| Rank | First Lieutenant |
Finally, Sabiha was globally recognised for her dedication and selfless service in the military. She was awarded a gold medal by the Turkish Aeronautical Association and honored for her lifelong contributions to Turkish Aviation. Her awards and medals include:
- Romanian Army Aviation Badge
- Commemorative medals
- Gold medal awarded by THK
She has an airport (Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen International Airport) and a metro (M4 Kadıköy-Sabiha Gökçen Havalimanı Metro Hattı) named after her. She was also selected by the United States Air Force as the only female pilot for the poster of “The 20 Greatest Aviators in History”.
After Sahiba’s death, her ethnic background caused some controversy, as BBC reported in 2004 that “newspaper speculation that her father might have been Armenian – killed in the mass slaughter of Armenians in 1915 – has provoked uproar.” There are also reports that hint that Hrant Dink, the journalist who first broke the story that Sahiba might have been an Armenian orphan who survived the massacres in 1915, had prompted to “push the button for his annihilation”, as Dink was assassinated.
4. Eileen Collins
The first woman to pilot a space shuttle
Eileen Collins started her military journey with aircraft such as the Northrop’s T-38 supersonic jet and the Lockheed’s C-141 strategic airlifter. Her piloting journey had started with one of the most-produced planes in the world – Cessna. Her precociousness as a child is summed up in an anecdote when she inquired with NASA about the qualifications needed to become an astronaut. The largest space agency in the world replied that space missions were exclusively carried out by men. Upon learning about this. Collins replied, “Well, times have certainly changed.” Time did change, but it took Eileen to show that women could pilot space capsules, as she holds great distinctions, such as being:
- The first woman to pilot a space shuttle
- The first female commander in shuttle history (she was a part of STS-63, STS-94, STS-93, STS-114).
Here are Collins words, describing how she felt when she was selected to be a part of space missions:
“ In 1990 I learned that I was going to pilot the space shuttle when Duane Ross at NASA called me. He handed me off to [commander of the Apollo 16 mission] John Young. I asked, “Am I going to be a pilot or a mission specialist?” He said, “You’re going to be a pilot. You will be the first woman pilot of the space shuttle.” John Young is one of my heroes; he not only walked on the moon but was the first person to land the space shuttle. I hung up the phone. I didn’t feel like jumping up and down or partying. I felt a sense of relief, a huge sense of calmness.”
– As reported in Time Magazine
Eileen retired from NASA in 2006 and in 2021 authored the book: Through the Glass Ceiling to the Stars: The Story of the First American Woman to Command a Space Mission.
3. Valentina Tereshkova
In space, for nearly three days, on her own
Valentina Treshkova was, and still is, the youngest woman to space. Her record of crossing the 100 km barrier of space has stood for almost half a century.
She is also the only female astronaut/cosmonaut (a term that refers to astronauts from the Soviet Union) to have completed a solo space journey. During her mission to space, she “logged more flight time than the combined times of all American astronauts who had flown before that date.” Here’s NASA’s report on her spaceflight:
“Tereshkova was launched aboard Vostok 6 on June 16, 1963 and became the first woman to fly in space. During the 70.8 hour flight, Vostok 6 made 48 orbits of Earth. Upon completion of her mission, Tereshkova was honored with the title Hero of the Soviet Union. She never flew again, but she did become a spokesperson for the Soviet Union. While fulfilling this role, she received the United Nations Gold Medal of Peace.”
It is a testament to how Tereshkova was shaped by the Russian Revolution, which aimed at the equality of men and women in the sphere of work as well. The nation even had the idea of a “New Soviet Woman”, who wouldn’t simply be confined to domestic chores but stand on equal footing with their male counterparts.
Here are a few snippets on her evolution:
| 1966 – 1991 | an active member in the U.S.S.R. Supreme Soviet |
| 1968 | directed the Soviet Women’s Committee |
| 1974 – 1991 | member of the Supreme Soviet Presidium |
| 1997 | retired from the Russian Air Force (as a major general) |
The initial plans of the Soviet Union were to launch two female cosmonauts into space in late 1962. However, plans were later revised, and it was agreed upon that Valeri Bykovsky, a male cosmonaut would take charge of the Vostok 5, while the Vostok 6 capsule would be piloted by Tereshkova, who would have a call sign ‘Chaika’ or ‘seagull’ on this mission.
2. Jacqueline Cochran
The (female) pilot with the highest number of speed records
Often dubbed “Speed Queen”, Jacqueline Cochran held a number of distinctions, which included:
- The prestigious 1938 Bendix Trophy Race flying Alexander de Seversky’s P-35 pursuit plane.
- The first woman to fly a bomber across the Atlantic.
- The first woman to break the sound barrier
- “held more speed, altitude, and distance records than any pilot, male or female”.
According to the National Air and Space Museum, Jacqueline held a number of positions in aviation, including:
- A six-time recipient of the Harmon Trophy in the Aviatrix category and a one-time recipient in the National category.
- Two-time president of the Ninety-Nines – a women’s flying organization
- First female president of the Fédération Aéronatique Nationale (FAI, the official keeper of aviation records).
- overseeing training at over 100 bases and the missions of over 1,000 women pilots
- A consultant for the Air Force and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
Col. Jackie Cochran’s story from rags to riches (one of the very that makes up the enviable German word “elementargedanken”) has been rather poetically summed up, in her own words, as one from “sawdust to stardust”. If Carl Sagan’s imperishable book “Cosmos”, where he describes the mystery of human life as “The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff”, had been popularized by the time Cochran wrote her autobiography, maybe her self-descrbing phrase would have been a tad different.
Cochran had mixed feelings about the integration of women into the armed forces, and this led to some calling her ‘a complicated figure’:
Despite Cochran’s own riveting career and the WASPS accomplishments, she suggested the WASPS (Women’s Airforce Service Pilots) be disbanded. Cochran believed that only the best women should serve, but not in combat missions. She advised against women in space or as airline pilots, stating that the moment they had children they would leave service”
1. Lydia Litvyak
A Russian ace, the first female ace
Lydia Litvyak was only 21 when her aircraft was shot down by the Germans during World War II. Born in Moscow in 1921, she performed her first solo flight at 15, and by the time that Russia and Germany were at loggerheads during the Second World War, she had already trained 45 pilots. She is the first female fighter pilot to shoot down an enemy aircraft and has earned the moniker of being a “fighter ace”. It has been estimated that she had 12 solo kills and four shared over 168 missions.
It has been noted in some circles that Lydia was known as the ‘White Rose of Stalingrad’. This, however, might be a mistaken notion based on the spurious claim that Lydia had painted a rose (or a white lily, depending upon sources) on her earlier Yak-1. Some believe that Lydia was not killed but rather captured by Germans, after the crash of her aircraft. It was a rule of law that anyone who was captured by enemy forces as prisoners of war wouldn’t be recognized as a battle hero in the Soviet Union, said omaka.org:
“ On her fourth sortie of 1st August 1943, which entailed escorting IL-2 Shturmoviks, Litvyak was in the process of attacking German bombers when she was bounced by two Bf109s which damaged her Yak and it was last seen streaming smoke and being followed by several other Messerschmitts. One of her comrades flew low to search for the crash site, having seen no parachute and no explosion, but found nothing. With Soviet authorities concerned with the possibility of her being captured (traitorous in Stalin’s eyes) Litvyak was not awarded the Hero of the Soviet Union. This was rectified on 6th May 1990 when President Gorbachev posthumously awarded her the title and rank of Senior Lieutenant. “