Diamonds in the Sky

Meet the first woman to fly jet formations as a Blue Angel.

Lieutenant Commander Amanda “Stalin” Lee joined the U.S. Navy Flight Demonstration Squadron (better known as the Blue Angels) in September 2022. Last year, Lee debuted as the team’s #3 Left Wing pilot, flying as part of a four-aircraft diamond formation in the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet. Lee is currently on tour, performing at airshows across the country in her new role as the #4 Slot Pilot. Lee’s 2024 teammates include #1 Flight Leader, Commander Alexander P. “Scribe” Armatas; #2 Right Wing, Lieutenant Commander Jack “Uncle Rico” Keilty; #3 Left Wing, Lieutenant Wes “Trash Blast’Er” Perkins; #5 Lead Solo, Lieutenant Commander Griffin “Push Pop” Stangel; and #6 Opposing Solo, Commander Thomas “Franz” Zimmerman.

The path to Lee’s selection as the Blue Angels’ first female jet demonstration pilot began years earlier when she enlisted in the U.S. Navy. She later received her commission as an officer, and in 2016, she earned her wings as a naval aviator. Lee also completed a B.S. in biochemistry from Old Dominion University. After going through advanced flight training, Lee transitioned to the F/A-18E/F and served two combat deployments aboard the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman (CVN-75). She has logged more than 1,800 flight hours and completed 225 carrier-arrested landings. Lee recently spoke with Air & Space Quarterly’s senior editor Diane Tedeschi.

Why did you want to fly for the Blue Angels?
Growing up in Minnesota, I never went to airshows. I first became aware of the Blue Angels when I started out as an aircraft maintainer on the F/A-18. My first duty station was at Oceana in Virginia Beach, Virginia. They have an airshow there every year. I remember sitting in my backyard at home and seeing the Blue Angels practice for the first time. I thought it was the coolest thing—that was my first exposure to them. As far as applying to the team, I don’t think I necessarily looked to the sky and thought that was something I could do—or even wanted to do. But a big part of the Blue Angels mission is community outreach, something I’m very passionate about. That’s what really inspired me to apply to the Blue Angels.

What is the most important trait or skill a formation demo pilot should have?
I feel like I could name a few. The first thing that comes to mind is it’s a very humbling job. It is such a simple thing that we’re doing: flying formation. It’s something we learn to do in the very first military aircraft we fly. But in the Blue Angels, we’re doing it in such a precise fashion, as close as 12 to 18 inches apart from each other. That means we are very disciplined and critical of ourselves—and of each other. Because, again, in that teamwork and team mindset mentality, if one of us is not performing well, then all of us aren’t performing well—because we kind of move as one. Like I said, this is a very humbling job. It’s the hardest flying I’ve ever done, and I feel like I am humbled every single day—and I will be until I leave this team. So an important trait is the ability to be resilient. You need to be able to accept criticism, learn from the mistakes, compartmentalize, and move on, so that you can continue to grow as an individual aviator and as a team.

Do you have a pre-performance routine before flying at an airshow? 
As far as our timeline on the day of an airshow, we arrive at a designated briefing space an hour prior to the pre-flight brief—that’s our sterile time to get our headspace right and maybe eat lunch. You want to settle in and get your mind focused for the demo.

Do you perhaps listen to music during that period?
No, but we engage in conversation similar to the ready room banter pilots favor when they’re out in the fleet. I usually eat my lunch or snack prior to getting there so that I can chit-chat with people. Right now, it’s applicant season, so we will have people who are applying for the team for next year—the 2025 Blue Angels team. They’re now coming to show sites, and we’ll have an opportunity to mingle with them prior to the brief. We even invite them into the brief so that they have an idea of what they’re getting themselves into. In all cases, we are always back in the room 10 minutes prior to the brief. Five minutes prior to the brief, we are sitting down in our seats. One minute prior to the brief, there is no talking. Everybody gets quiet. We know we’re getting ready to do our thing.

What is your favorite maneuver to execute when you’re flying at an airshow?
As I’m sure almost all Four pilots would say, the Double Farvel. That’s the maneuver where both myself and Scribe will fly inverted formation off of each other. Because it’s a brand-new maneuver for me this year, it is very challenging, which I enjoy—so that’s my favorite maneuver to execute. From the viewpoint of a spectator, my favorite maneuver to watch is the Delta Breakout, which is the last maneuver we execute prior to landing. It’s the one that’s in front of the crowd. It looks like we burst in all directions.

If you were flying your F/A-18 solo, what is your favorite maneuver? 
I think really it just comes down to tactics. Out in the fleet, our mission is to be good tactical aviators, and it’s a challenge to truly master the tactics we execute. That’s something I always strive to do so I can be a part of the team. The team mentality is something I also enjoy about the Blue Angels. Since joining the Blue Angels, I’ve learned so much more about what a team is and what it takes to be a good teammate—I will certainly bring this forward in my next command. All of this is to say we don’t usually get a ton of time to just go out there and mess around and do whatever we want. The most fun we’ll have in the fleet is flying our basic fighter maneuvers—the kind of flying you see in the dogfighting scenes portrayed in Top Gun and other films.

How fast have you flown in the Super Hornet?
We don’t typically break the speed of sound, although the jet is more than capable of doing so. It is something I have done a handful of times. As a flight instructor, I would usually take my students up to break the sound barrier on their very first flight in the F/A-18—just to check off that box. From inside the cockpit, however, breaking the sound barrier is very underwhelming. It’s something we’re not allowed to do in the airshow industry, especially around all these populated areas, because you will most certainly break some windows.

You began your Navy career in the enlisted ranks. Can you tell us what you did and how you eventually became an officer?
Yes, I was an AT2—Aviation Electronics Technician Second Class, a petty officer. I joined the Navy in 2007 in hopes to find a way to get back to college. I had started off college at the University of Minnesota in Duluth, and I enlisted out of Duluth. I originally wanted to go to medical school, that’s why I was working toward a degree. After enlisting, I went through boot camp and all of the schools I needed to attend to qualify as an AT. I was assigned to maintain aircraft for a squadron based in Oceana, and I immediately jumped into college classes to try to get a little bit closer to earning a degree.

My division chief saw all the long hours I was putting in—both on the job and as a college student—and he brought up a commissioning program called Seaman-to-Admiral (STA-21). I had no idea what that program was, but he said I would be a good candidate to be an officer and I should submit a package. I worked on it for an entire year, trying to fine-tune all the details. I submitted my package in July of 2008, and I ended up getting selected for a pilot spot. Working on the F/A-18 was all I knew, and I very much wanted the opportunity to come back and fly the type of aircraft I had spent so many hours maintaining.

Has your enlisted experience been useful to you now as a naval aviator?
I’ll say that the things I learned as a maintainer in the enlisted ranks do not necessarily apply as a pilot, mostly because I’m not the one fixing my own aircraft. What I do understand is what it takes for an aircraft maintainer to get to where they are today. I understand the long hours and how hard it is to get certain qualifications. And when I was a maintainer, I didn’t fully understand the daily demands of the pilots in my squadron. When you don’t see a pilot, you think they’re not at work. You think they just show up to the airplane, fly that airplane for an hour, land, and then they’re gone for the day. In reality, pilots are studying constantly—something they’ll do throughout their entire careers. It is not: “I’m going to learn how to fly an aircraft and be done with it.” It is constant learning, constant adapting. Tactics are changing. The world is evolving.

Is being catapulted from the deck of a carrier as fun as it looks?
It’s probably the closest to a roller coaster ride that you can get. Getting a cat shot—the acceleration on that thing is crazy. You’re going from zero to 130 to 160 knots [185 mph] in less than three seconds. It’s quite a ride. It’s something that will always put a smile on your face.

Are carrier landings as nerve-wracking as they’re often portrayed in movies?

Oh, for sure. I haven’t been on an aircraft carrier since I deployed. I came home in 2020, right before Covid hit, so that’s the last time I was on an aircraft carrier. I’m going to have to go back to the fleet on a deploying squadron and get re-carrier qualified in November, and I’m already nervous thinking about it. It’s something you get better at, though. The nerves calm down after the deployment is under way and you’re executing landings consistently. But it’s good to have those nerves every time you go flying. It keeps you on your toes. It keeps you from becoming complacent. 

What do you remember about your first arrested landing on a carrier?
I was so nervous. As soon as everything came to a halt, my legs were shaking so bad I could barely hold the rudder pedals down to brake. It is so exhilarating, though. It’s mostly adrenaline rushing through you. You’re running off of instinct from the procedures you’ve learned over months and months of training. It’s an incredible experience. I’ll never forget my first cat shot and my first trap.

When you’re stationed aboard a carrier, is ready room banter an outlet for stress and a way for the aviators in the squadron to relate to one another?
Yeah, that’s a good way of describing it. When you join a ready room and you join a squadron, it becomes your family for the period of time you’re with them. It doesn’t matter who’s rotating in and joining the squadron or who’s rotating out and leaving the squadron. They are with you. They’re your new family. You shall love them. I think it’s important to acknowledge that and to understand that every single person in the ready room brings something different to the team to make you better as a collective. The sooner you recognize that and learn to love everybody’s quirks, the better. We’re on the road with each other so much, whether we’re in a fleet squadron, doing workups to deploy, or going on six- to 10-month deployments. With the Blue Angels, we’re on the road 300 days a year. 

Have you received any cute comments or funny questions from the children you interact with at the airshows?
It’s mostly the parents who reach out to me—they’re just so excited for the example I’m setting. There are some young girls who come to me with tears in their eyes. It just goes to show how much of an impact you can have through your actions. At airshows, I encounter hundreds of people, and I might have said a single word to them or looked at them in passing. To know that it might have made a difference in their lives and inspired them to do something is why we do what we do.

What do you find most rewarding about your Blue Angels assignment?
Sometimes we’ll land from a flight demonstration, and we will personally think that we had an awful flight. After we exit our aircraft, we have to go over to the crowd-line and talk to the fans. Then we’ll do pictures by the jets, all the while thinking that we had this really terrible flight. During the debrief, we’ll watch every single maneuver—frame by frame on a video—to make sure we can do something better next time.

It’s important, though, to not look at our own performances through a soda straw. We need to take a step back and think about the children and the fans who are at the crowd-line with tears in their eyes, thanking you for everything you’ve done—including the great performance you thought was just awful. Take a step back and recognize what an incredible opportunity this is. Even with our busy schedule, our time with the Blue Angels is going by so quickly. I’m already sad that November is just a blink away.  

This article is from the Summer 2024 issue of Air & Space Quarterly, the National Air and Space Museum's signature magazine that explores topics in aviation and space, from the earliest moments of flight to today. Explore the full issue.

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