Air Force Lt. Col. Dane Coppini, a pilot with 15 years of experience who grew up in Ferndale, has been selected to be part of the flyover of four jets at the Kansas City Chiefs-Indianapolis Colts National Football League game on Sunday in Kansas City at 10 a.m. He was assigned to the 87th Flying Training Squadron (the “Red Bulls”) for the honor.
Coppini typically flies out of Laughlin Air Force Base in Del Rio, Texas, which is the No. 1 pilot-producing and flying Air Education and Training Command (AETC) base in the Air Force. He says his squadron puts in for a few flyovers a year, having been with them for about a year and not having done one yet. There will be two pilots per T-38C Talon (the U.S. Air Force’s primary training jet) selected for the honor as part of Military Appreciation Month for the NFL. Any Air Force pilot utilizes those jets for training before flying on their “primary platform,” he said.
View from the air Saturday as Lieutenant Colonel Dane Coppini prepares for his flyover. (Dane Coppini)
Coppini entered the military 19 years ago as an enlisted man, and served in security forces for four years as an “Air Force cop,” making the decision to fly after his first security forces deployment when he applied for Officers’ Training School and got selected to be a pilot candidate, going to training from there. He went to Air Force Special Operations Command for eight years, did a stint at the Pentagon for three years, and got selected to fly T-38s to “train the next generation of fighter pilots for the Air Force.”
He’s done 10 deployments, his first in Afghanistan, two as a pilot in Air Force Special Operations Command, three to various locations in Africa, and three to each Iraq and Afghanistan total.
As to his sense of respect for where he was raised, Coppini says, “I think the support from family and friends back home has been awesome. I think it’s one of those things when you grow up in a small town and that’s all you know, you don’t realize when you leave how neat and wonderful of a community it is, being in the redwoods in Humboldt County, and growing up in a farming community with family. It’s been great, even though I’ve been out seeing the world and I love what I do and love being an instructor and love the military, I enjoy coming home and probably appreciate it a lot more than I did growing up.”
Asked for retrospective thoughts on his career and how this honor can be traced back to his efforts, Coppini said, “I’ve been in for 19 years, I have a commitment for another three, I absolutely love what I do and at this point in my career not a lot of people get the opportunity to fly as much I do, once or twice a day to train instructor pilots. As a pilot, the higher up in rank you go, lieutenant colonel and director of operations for one of the units at Laughlin Air Force Base and soon to be possible commander by next summer, the opportunity for pilots to fly gets less and less as you get older, moving more into administrative and command responsibilities. So to be able to fly once or twice a day and instruct the next generation of pilots is an amazing experience, a blessing, and an honor. It’s re-invigorated my love for flying and being in the military, and I’ll do it as long as the Air Force allows me to.”
Coppini’s sense of purpose and individual drive was apparent to this reporter during high school track when Coppini, as a freshman, over 10 seconds behind this senior at the beginning of the year in the mile race, rallied to best him in the conference final.
Dane’s mother Carrie Coppini was effusive about the honor, as one might expect, saying that he told family weeks ago that it was scheduled, but with the government shutdown, it was on hold. Having been to Dane’s promotion ceremony for lieutenant colonel last May at Laughlin, she said, “We’re super proud of him, and he’s a ‘high flier!'” Reached two days before the game, one day after the news broke, she said family was making a plan to watch.
“The family is really excited, and so proud of him,” she said. “He’s just done so much in his career, of course… he started out as enlisted after graduating from college, and when he came back from his first deployment in Bagram (Afghanistan), he told me he was going to be a pilot. I said, ‘Oh.’ But he said, ‘I’m going for it,’ even though I told him, we don’t have any pilots in the family and it’s going to be a long shot for you to get into flight school. I didn’t want him to be disappointed, but lo and behold, Dane, he just plowed through, got accepted and was special forces while stationed in Florida, every four months he’d deploy for four in Special Ops. We’re just super-proud, and he’s amazing.”
In summation, Carrie Coppini said, “He loves Ferndale, he’s proud to be from here, he loved growing up here, and it was a good experience for him, I’m sure he’s thankful for everyone that’s helped him along his path.”
Coppini and his wife plan to retire to Springfield, Missouri, when the time comes.
_Ken McCanless can be reached at 707-441-0526._