Naval Flight Officer - Popular Culture

Popular Culture

  • One of key characters in the popular film Top Gun was LTJG Nick "Goose" Bradshaw, played by Anthony Edwards, an F-14 Radar Intercept Officer (RIO) teamed with his pilot, LT Pete "Maverick" Mitchell, played by Tom Cruise. Several others were LTJG Ron "Slider" Kerner, RIO to LT Tom "Iceman" Kazansky; LT Sam "Merlin" Neills, LT Bill "Cougar" Cortell's RIO; and LTJG Leonard "Wolfman" Wolfe, LT Rick "Hollywood" Neven's RIO.
  • In the film Flight of the Intruder, Willem Dafoe played LCDR Virgil "Tiger" Cole, who served as an A-6 B/N (Bombardier/Navigator) with his pilot, LT Jake "Cool Hand" Grafton, played by Brad Johnson.
  • In the film Behind Enemy Lines, Owen Wilson played LT Chris Burnett, a Weapon Systems Officer in an F/A-18F.
  • In the CBS TV Series JAG, Sibel Galindez played the F-14 RIO to then Commander Harmon Rabb.
  • NFOs are sometimes referred to by the slang phrase "Guy/Gal in Back", or "GIB" for short. An alternate deprecating moniker is "Self-Loading Baggage."

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    “If our entertainment culture seems debased and unsatisfying, the hope is that our children will create something of greater worth. But it is as if we expect them to create out of nothing, like God, for the encouragement of creativity is in the popular mind, opposed to instruction. There is little sense that creativity must grow out of tradition, even when it is critical of that tradition, and children are scarcely being given the materials on which their creativity could work”
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