Vintage Plane Flyby to Kick Off Parade Again

A minimum of three and as many as four vintage aircraft will conduct a flyby to start this year’s 4^th of July parade, as was done last year to start the Centennial parade.  The aircraft, which most likely will stage out of El Monte airport, will make two passes, parallel to Sierra Madre Boulevard, offset slightly to the north.

A C-45 twin-engine WWII trainer with USAF markings will be piloted by Roscoe Diehl, (USAF) a former Lockheed test pilot who also piloted for Western Air Lines and Delta Air Lines.  Mr. Diehl is a 1952 graduate of S. Pasadena High and a 1960 graduate of USC.

A T-28A single engine 1950s trainer with USAF marking, which was later used in Nicaragua as a fighter bomber, will be piloted by Col Mark Jansky (USAF), an F-16 pilot in charge of Air Defense of the Southwest United States.  Col. Jansky, raised in Sierra Madre, will be accompanied by his passenger Dr. Wendy (Jansky) Dineen, also raised in Sierra Madre.  Col. Jansky graduated from La Salle High School in 1981 and Long Beach State in 1986.  Dr. Dineen attended Alverno High School, from which she graduated in 1978, and graduated from COP Dental school in 1985.  She currently has a dental practice in Sierra Madre.

Two Beechcraft T-34A 1950s trainer aircraft with USAF markings are also scheduled to fly the parade route.  One of the planes will be piloted by First Lt. Brett Austin, a US army instructor.  As of press time, the fourth pilot was yet to be determined.