Lockheed Martin’s First Female F-35 Production and Training Pilot Takes Flight*
Monessa “Siren” Balzhiser took flight as Lockheed Martin’s first female F-35 Production and Training Pilot. The former United States Air Force F-16 pilot joins the ranks of an elite group of female F-35 pilots that have paved the way before her.
Siren describes her first F-35 Production and Training flight:
“It was amazing and a bit surreal,” she said. “If you can imagine every emotion that you can think of happening in one location—nervousness when stepping out to the jet, to the pure excitement of being strapped into one of the most powerful fighter jets in the world, to scared of messing up, to a huge adrenaline rush—it was just all encompassed in my one little glass cockpit.”
*Source: F-35.com, F-35 Lightening II, News and Features