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Cold War era jets come to life, remind pilot of life-changing flight
AFMC News Service
Release 0235 EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. (AFMCNS) — A former North Korean air force pilot, who defected Sept. 21, 1953, to Kimpo Air Base in South Korea, recently visited here and rode in a MiG-15 for the first time since his historic flight to freedom. The event was a step back in time for Mr. Ken Rowe as he remembered escaping from the communist country with both his life and his airplane. “I was anti-communist,” Mr. Rowe said. “Since 1945, I wanted to come to the United States. I tell people I didn’t defect, I escaped.” Mr. Rowe joined the North Korean air force in 1950 and entered combat when he was 19, as a MiG-15 pilot. He was the youngest pilot to have flown in combat in Korea on either side. “I had to engage American planes, but I didn’t shoot any down,” Mr. Rowe said. “I’m very proud I didn’t shoot down any Americans.” Mr. Rowe said he spent two years flying for North Korea, always looking for the opportunity to escape. “One day I flew by myself, I went north, south and east, then turned sharply south,” Mr. Rowe said. “My mind was made up.” Mr. Rowe said after making it safely out of North Korean air space, he faced another challenge — how was he supposed to land at an American air base without being mistaken as a suicide bomber? “I was very lucky,” he said. “When I came to the base, the radar was out for maintenance work. I put my flaps out and landing gear down, rocked the plane side to side and shot colored flares.” These actions were the only signals he could think to perform to signify he wasn’t a threat, he said. Mr. Rowe landed without being shot down, but then nearly missed a head-on collision with a plane that was taking off at the same time. After the scare, Mr. Rowe decided to park next to a row of F-86 Sabres. An F-86 pilot was sitting in his cockpit at the time and was about to shoot, but decided not to at the last minute, Mr. Rowe said. Instead, the pilot got out of his plane and was the first American to greet Mr. Rowe, welcoming him to the base with a handshake. “After they realized I was a defector, there was pandemonium on the base,” Mr. Rowe said. “The only English word I knew was motorcar, so I just kept yelling motorcar! motorcar! about 10 times.” After debriefing for seven months, Mr. Rowe’s dream of going to America came true. In 1962, he became a United States citizen. “The United States was better than I expected,” Mr. Rowe said. Since his freedom-giving flight in 1953, Mr. Rowe has served as an advisor for the flight tests Chuck Yeager and Tom Collins conducted on the MiG-15 aircraft. He attended the University of Delaware, where he received a degree in engineering. He has worked for the University of North Dakota, DuPont, Boeing, General Dynamics, General Motors, Lockheed-Martin, Northrup Grumman, Westinghouse and General Electric. Recently, Mr. Rowe retired from the faculty of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University where he was an instructor in power plant thermodynamics for 17 years. The Classic Jet Aircraft Association vice president and owner of a MiG-15, Mr. Dave Sutton, contacted Mr. Rowe after researching the history of a MiG-15 he had purchased. Mr. Sutton said he knew the opportunity for Mr. Rowe to make history again was near. “This is something I’ve been interested in for a year,” Mr. Sutton said. “I found a copy of his book and became transfixed with his story. It is very much a pleasure to do this for him.” According to Mr. Sutton, the impact of this aircraft and pilot reunion made a cross-generational statement of the opportunities Americans possess. “The opportunity for him to fly from American soil in a privately owned ex-communist interceptor speaks volumes about the relative freedoms here in the United States,” Mr. Sutton said. Mr. Rowe recently experienced a high-speed ride and short hop in the air in the MiG-15 in lieu of a flight due to weather conditions. He will be given a full flight next month. Nevertheless, Mr. Rowe announced to a crowd of flight enthusiasts that the ride was a “wonderful experience” characterizing the MiG-15 as a “fast, fast car!”
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