NAVAL AIR STATION JOINT RESERVE BASE FORT WORTH, Texas — Air Force test pilot Capt. Steven “Winwood” Wodnall christened the remains of his Lockheed Martin F-35B Lightning II aircraft today by busting a champagne bottle over the still smoldering wreckage, sources confirm.
Wodnall officially named his aircraft the “Whiskey Dick” while his commanding officer and members of his pilot squadron looked on in amusement. “In the immortal words of the Bard of Avon: It provokes the desire, but it takes away the performance,” Wodnall said, to the consternation of the onlooking crew members who did not attend a fancy boarding school back east.
“Whiskey Dick” earned its name after the F-35B crashed in December during an otherwise perfect vertical landing procedure on the reserve base’s flightline. Accident investigators determined the aircraft had suffered a bout of ejectile dysfunction.
