Books by Dave "Bio" Baranek:
My Latest Book:
TOMCAT RIO: A Topgun Instructor on the F Tomcat and the Heroic Naval Aviators Who Flew It
First there was: TOPGUN DAYS: Dogfighting, Cheating Death, and Hollywood Glory as One of America's Best Fighter Jocks
And the prequel is: BEFORE TOPGUN DAYS: The Making of a Jet Fighter Instructor
All 3 books are available in multiple formats, please check out Amazon, B&N, and other retailers. To answer a question I've received: the publisher has planned an audiobook of Tomcat RIO, but has been delayed.
News:
- Here's a link to my recent interview with the indie cinema website The Wild Filmmaker: Link. We talked about making "Top Gun" and being an F RIO. Look around the site, they have a lot of fascinating material on cinema.
- Prints of many aircraft photos from Bio's books are available from Stocktrek Images, as well as mugs, stationery, licensed image files, and more. They now have more than 50 of my best images, including Fs, F-5s, and even "MiGs."
- Fighter pilot and podcaster C.W. Lemoine -- known as "Mover" -- recently interviewed a group of former TOPGUN instructors about filming the mo
Here's the original article from the California magazine May issue, presented as a tribute to author Ehud Yonay. This article and these photos inspired the Paramount motion picture "Top Gun." Think back to the days before the movie, before GoPro cameras and squadron videos on YouTube Yonay took readers into the cockpit with incredibly vivid descriptions. Be sure to read his sidebar at the bottom of the page, in which he finally got his own dogfight hop.
Inside the bubble: a Wolfpack pilot’s view, past his “backseater” and into a wild blue filled with fellow Fs. PHOTOGRAPHED BY C.J. HEATLEY.
Top Guns – by Ehud Yonay
California Magazine, May
At Mach 2 and 40, feet over California, it’s always high noon.
Yogi and Possum have a theory about hops – that is, air combat maneuvers. “The good ones always start out good,” Yogi says, so the only thing to do is ride them through and try not to screw up. They’re holding this thought as they blast off the oil-stained strip in their F Tomcat and head out to hassle bogeys – “enemy” planes – off the coast of Ensenada. The preflight brief was short an
Val Kilmer
American actor (born )
Val Edward Kilmer (born December 31, )[1] is an American actor. Originally a stage actor, he found fame after appearances in comedy films, starting with Top Secret! () and Real Genius (), as well as the military action film Top Gun () and the fantasy film Willow (). Kilmer gained acclaim for his portrayal of Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone's The Doors (). He was cast as a main character in films such as the westernTombstone (), and the crime dramas True Romance () and Heat (). He portrayed Batman in Joel Schumacher's Batman Forever (), and continued to star in films such as The Ghost and the Darkness (), The Saint (), The Prince of Egypt (), Alexander (), Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (), and The Snowman (). In , Kilmer reprised his role as Iceman in Top Gun: Maverick ().
In , Kilmer was diagnosed with throat cancer; he had a procedure on his trachea that damaged his vocal cords to the point where he had extreme difficulty speaking. He also underwent chemotherapy and two tracheotomies.[2][3][4][5] In , he published his memoir, titled I'm Your Huckleberry: A Memoir. Th
Contact: Bio@
Dave Baranek was born and raised in Jacksonville, Florida, where he grew up drawing airplane pictures and putting together scale model airplane kits. In his early teens he set his sights on becoming a jet fighter pilot or radar intercept officer. He attended Georgia Tech and participated in the ROTC to qualify for officer training, then entered the Navy in Shortly after he joined his first squadron he received the callsign "Bio," which many of his former squadronmates still call him.
He enjoyed a successful and satisfying year career in the Navy, starting with assignments to F Tomcat squadrons and the elite Topgun training program, and later assignment to the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the US 7th Fleet. At one point, he commanded an F Tomcat fighter squadron, responsible for nearly people and 14 aircraft worth about $ million. He completed his career with 2, F Tomcat flight hours and carrier landings. His logbook also records flight hours in the F-5F Tiger II.
While serving as a Topgun air-to-air combat instructor in , he had the unusual experience of flying aerial sequences used in the film "Top Gun," starring Tom Cruise and produced by Jerry Bruckhei
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