Lieutenant Colonel Connie Jean Engel (USAF, Retired)

Connie J. Engel was the class leader, a Distinguished Graduate, and was awarded the ATC Commander's Trophy of Class 77-08, the first U.S. Air Force Undergraduate Pilot Training class to include women. Engel, along with the male and female members of Class 77-08, earned their wings on September 2, 1977. Engel entered the Air Force on November 4, 1971 as a nurse and later became the only OB-GYN nurse practitioner in the entire Air Force. After pilot training, she flew T-38s: first, as an instructor pilot at Williams AFB, AZ, then at Edwards AFB, CA, supporting a wide variety of flight test missions. Engel entered the Air Force Reserve in 1984 and retired in 1995 as a lieutenant colonel. Connie Engel, as a member of the first class of women Air Force pilots, was a 2016 inductee into the Women in Aviation Pioneers Hall of Fame.