Yaniv Kelai leads us to an office chair and in front of him are three large computer screens.
"You will see," he reassures me and the children around us.
"We'll talk for a few minutes, you'll get a brief explanation of the plane and its operation, and then you'll fly the plane. It's much simpler than it sounds."
It's not really simple, but a few minutes later we take off.
Pulling a blue and red handle, aiming the steering wheel at a point marking the horizon in the sky, and when the noise of the wheels bouncing on the runway subsides, and they seemingly detach from the ground - we almost feel this pressure in the ears and stomach that often accompanies takeoff.
Above us is a room ceiling, around us windows and the sounds of children laughing, but in front of us, on three screens, the whole world is spread out, including the shadow of the plane disappearing as we take off higher.
Welcome to "325 Squadron" - a squadron consisting of a prestigious real flight simulator at the Schneider Center for Pediatrics, which gives its occupants a real flight experience for about half an hour.
A squadron born in memory of Herzl Shai Kelai, Yaniv's father, who was killed 40 years ago during the First Lebanon War.
A squadron that is all a dream of Yaniv, who wanted to commemorate his father in a special way.
"Let's fly and recover," is written in the corridor leading to the squadron, and distinguishes between the corridors of the white wards and the compound of the "Our Children" association in Schneider.
A huge bear, wearing a flight suit and a pilot's hat, greets the children in the waiting room, whose colorful walls have pictures of almost every place in the world you choose to fly to - from the Eiffel Tower in Paris to the Statue of Liberty in New York.
On a small table next to the simulator are surprises for the children: Air Force magazines, blue rubber bracelets donated by a friend, pens bought by Yaniv's grandfather.
All for the commemoration of Herzl.
"I think that when I started the project, I still did not understand the potential that is embodied in it to the end," says Yaniv.
"I did not understand that a personal connection could be formed here between the two Air Force personnel, who explain the activity of the simulator, and the children. I did not know what added value it would have, beyond the fun of feeling like you are flying an airplane."
Throughout his life, Yaniv grew up remembering his father, and over the years he also enlisted in the Air Force.
To this day he serves in the corps, and thus also manages to connect the hospital children with the simulator volunteers, Air Force personnel themselves, some of whom even serve today in the squadron where his father served.
"Today I can say that this flight gives children a lot, and especially a sense of control over their lives. After all, in the hospital they lose control. They are sent for tests, surgeries, they have not many choices but to do what they are told. And here, even if it is only half an hour "They have control. And it's amazing."
"Went out to rescue casualties"
Yaniv's father, the late Herzl Shai Kelai. "I am very interested to know what happened there," Photo: From the family album
He is 40 years old, married to Lior (36), and a father of three.
He currently lives in Tel Aviv, but as a child he grew up in Be'er Sheva.
His grandfather, Ovadia Kelai, was a senior bank manager and a city council member.
To this day, at the age of 91, he engages in volunteer activities in the city, and serves as chairman of Yad LaBanim.
His father, the late Herzl Shai Kelai, was the eldest son of the three children of Ovadia and Batya. Yaniv knows his good character and pleasant spirit ("he was a humble and quiet man who liked to read almost a book during the day") .
On the first day of the war, June 6, 1982, Herzl, who served as an airborne mechanic, flew with four other crew members to rescue casualties from Nabatieh in southern Lebanon.
On the way, their helicopter was hit by terrorist fire, and all crew members were killed.
Herzl, who after his death was promoted to the rank of Major, was 31 at the time of his death.
Yaniv was then a seven-month-old baby, an only child.
Only years after his father's death, when he was already an Air Force officer, did he discover the details of the circumstances of his death.
"At first we only knew what they told my family. There was an incident and the plane was shot down, and no one survived. The time he was killed was a different time, when not much information was given, and before commissions of inquiry were made about each incident to know exactly what happened.
"Today I know a little more details, because after returning from an officers' course I was looking for more information about my father's accident. I found out the helicopter went out to rescue casualties. And were accidentally revealed.All these details were not known.
"I was very interested to know what happened there, and I was mainly surprised because I thought the families did not know it was a very specific mistake. When I told these details to my family, they were less surprised. For them the event was already and has nothing to do with this information."
Yaniv does not remember his father, and knows him only from stories, but already as a child he felt the need to take on more responsibility, to fill in the gaps.
"I do not know anything else, because I was born into a situation where Dad is not present, but in retrospect I was very mature already at a very young age. My mother had no one to consult, so from a young age she would consult with me. For example, about a mortgage, buying a car Etc. I really remember I did not understand anything about the mortgage, but I wanted to help so I studied the subject. And I was always a soloist. I insisted on doing things myself, because that's what I knew.
"Today I can say that it probably also affects my family life. As an adult, it is difficult for me to see situations of quarrels between siblings or between spouses. After all, I did not have it. We were me and mother and that is it."
When he was 14, Yaniv and his mother moved to Tel Aviv.
"I guess my mother wanted some change, and Tel Aviv was an opportunity for me and her. For me it was a big change. It was not just to leave Be'er Sheva, but the city where I grew up and where there was a large commemorative plant for my father. My family donated an ambulance in his name. Dad, and the neighborhood where my grandparents live is called Ramot Herzl Kelai neighborhood. In the center there is also a monument with a garden in his memory. I really remember how I removed the sign with his name when I was 8. Years later, when the garden and neighborhood were renovated, my son removed Unveiled above the new sign, also at 8 years old.
"In those days it was less common to be a kid without a dad. I wasn't ashamed of it, but I wouldn't talk about it much. Since I enlisted I think it was easier for me to talk about not having a dad, because I was part of the Air Force family, where he grew up."
Yaniv proudly repeats this phrase, "Air Force family," several times.
He spreads both hands to the sides, placing an imaginary helmet on his head.
"When I was 8, some officers from the squadron came to us with a helmet that was specially cast to fit a child's head, gave it to me and flew me from yards to the north, and back. It was super exciting and very special. In general we had a very good relationship with my father's squadron, especially Around Memorial Days and Holidays, they would invite us to the squadron's events, and hold special events for the families.
"Maybe that's why it was always clear to me that I would enlist in the Air Force. Not only because of my dad, but also because of the great love I developed for the squadron and airplanes.
Yaniv enlisted in January 2000, and first served as a flight inspector.
Over the years, he advanced to the position of Commander of the Supervision Tower at Palmachim Base, and today is a permanent major and serves as an internal auditor in the Air Force. Today, in recent years, he has also begun studying civil aviation, and also met his wife, Lior, in the corps in 2007, where she served as an officer in training services. They married after about a year and a half.
"When all my friends started graduating from the military, I stayed. I was about 24, with a lot of responsibilities. I felt I had a moral obligation to my father to stay in the corps."
"Like they're really in the sky"
Flying in a simulator.
"You can get a complete picture of everything that is happening around you: the shadow of the plane, cars on the roads and boats in the sea, and even clouds or rain," Photo: Schneider spokeswoman
20 years after he officially joined the Air Force family, Yaniv felt he had another duty - to commemorate his father.
"In the last decade, I started running half marathons, and I printed the slogan on running shirts.
'RUN WITH IT in memory of Herzl Shai Kelai'.
The translation 'run with it' has a double meaning - both run with the shirt, and pass the message on.
I handed out the shirts to a lot of acquaintances and friends, and they send me pictures of them running in all sorts of places.
It's nice, but I always felt it was not enough.
That I need to do more. "
Why take it upon yourself?
"I feel like there is no one else to do it. My grandparents are already adults, and so is my mother, and I want my children to be educated about who their grandfather was."
He points to a gilded commemorative plaque above the computer screens, on which his father's name is engraved.
"I'm very excited when a child comes here and sees this sign, which they made in Schneider, or wears a bracelet that says squadron name. That's exactly why I do it all, for these children, and for my children. If my father is not there to pick them up from home The book and the garden or visit and play, at least they will get to know him through the stories and projects. "
It's hard to excite him.
He is already a veteran military man, who rarely reveals his feelings.
But when he talks about the simulator, that spark ignites in his eyes and the tone of speech becomes enthusiastic, as if he would once again yield the 8-year-old who receives a special helmet and flies in the sky.
"As a kid, I always played with simulators that were at the base, and over the years I got to know all kinds of new versions and developments of simulators.
"Look," he exclaims, "it's amazing. You can even see the view here, get a full picture of everything going on around you: the shadow of the plane spinning beneath it, cars on the roads and boats at sea, and even clouds or rain. And all this when it simulates perfectly The plane and its aimers.
"When I saw it, I thought to myself who can not enjoy a real flight, and I thought of sick children in a hospital. I decided to bring such a simulator to the hospital and allow the children to experience a flight, as if they were really in the sky."
"Everyone who could - donated"
9-year-old Rafael flies in a simulator.
"Every time I see the kids on the flight, it fills me," Photo: Schneider spokeswoman
The money for the purchase of the simulator, NIS 10,000, was raised by Yaniv in a mass recruitment campaign on the GIVE BACK website.
"I set the target for the end of the recruitment for four months, thinking that if there was a lack I would complete the money out of my pocket. But then something amazing happened: the link ran like wildfire between all Air Force squadrons, word of mouth, ran on social media, and I reached the full amount within 24 Hours!
"On the one hand I was very proud and excited and happy, on the other hand it made me a little stressed. Suddenly I felt the weight of responsibility I had for this thing. I was a little scared, because apart from an idea I had nothing. And that's what pushed me to promote it quickly. "I am ready to accept a situation in which this project, in which masses of people have invested, will fail. I realized that people gave me money in trust to realize a vision I had, and I realized that I must carry it out quickly."
Yaniv decided to take the project a step further: in his vision he saw a closed room, which allows him to detach from the atmosphere of the hospital, and where the children become pilots.
"I decided that this project would be more than a simulator. That the children would also receive flight lessons and experience takeoff and landing and the like, but that there would also be a connection between them and the flight and the instructors.
"I went through several hospitals, and when I presented the idea to the director of Schneider Children's Hospital, Dr. Efrat Baron-Harlev, she told me, 'It is clear to you that it should be here.'
She told me that she, too, was a former Air Force woman, and had served as an operations officer in an operations squadron.
And really, during my work here, with the hospital, I was exposed to an organizational culture that reminds the Air Force of everything related to excellence, meeting deadlines and promoting projects.
And that's before we talk about childcare. "
It points to a blue-painted wall at the back of the room.
"When I got here, in August 2021, there was nothing here. There were no pictures, no paint, no life. This whole room was a warehouse. Now the equipment was crammed behind this wall, and all the space left is ours."
How did you manage to persuade more people from the corps to enlist in the project?
"We posted on several of the corps' WhatsApp and Facebook groups, and volunteers began to arrive who realized that a day in the simulator gives a lot to both parties. The pilot volunteers in what he loves, and working with the children empowers him no less than the children.
"Unlike all kinds of community projects that the corps does, such as building renovations or food distribution, whose dignity is in place, the activities in this squadron empower the pilots differently. The guide pilot sits with the child, explaining to him how to keep a horizon and turn right or left, and how "A plane worker. It's amazing, and the pilots always want to come again."
He still remembers the first girl sitting in the simulator, Deborah Leah.
"When you see a girl in a wheelchair and without hair arrive at the height of excitement, talking to a volunteer about flights and not diseases, you realize you did something good in the world. The guide asked her where she wanted to fly, and she asked for New York and even recognized the place from the air and the Statue of Liberty. "And she was happy when she managed to land. I was standing here behind her with some volunteers, and we all shed tears. Even me."
Today he has a group of about 50 volunteers from all over the air, some of whom are even retired.
The instructors also include a female soldier in regular service, who serves as a simulator instructor.
Among the volunteers is a place of honor for the members of the 123 Desert Birds Squadron, where his father served.
"I initiated an appeal to the squadron commander, and I was received with open arms. The commander of the Palmachim base, Brigadier General Omri Dor, also responded to my request, offered help from the base and visited here together with the former Air Force commander, Major General Amikam Nurkin."
Where did the idea to call the simulator "325 Squadron" come from?
"It's a bit of a funny story," Yaniv reveals.
"At first I chose the number because it's my father's name in gematria. Then I realized it was also the name of the first unit of the Air Force, which was set up to receive and care for the immigrant children. Then something was created that combines doing something good for children, and my father. And that is my goal. "
At least once a week he comes here, to the blue walls on which the squadron symbol in memory of his father.
An instructor device, guides the children himself, reaps the fruits that his dream produces.
"I get really excited every time I walk down this hall," he is embarrassed.
"I think it's a beautiful commemoration, and also a reminder to join hands with so many people like the people who donated money to the project, the hospital and Air Force volunteers. Everyone who could - contributed to this thing.Even the pictures here on the wall are surplus from my base.
"There are more than 100 people who feel involved in this, and they themselves are ambassadors of the project. Recently, a helicopter pilot who volunteers here approached me and said that all the regulars in the squadron want to come. It's amazing to me."
Every few weeks, Yaniv releases an update to the supporters of the mass recruitment campaign, and shares with them experiences from the simulator: a visit from the Air Force commander, a girl with cancer flying a plane, training of a new instructor staff.
"Every time I see the kids on the flight, it fills me. There are a lot of oncology kids here, kids on dialysis, kids who deal with illnesses all day, and here you get half an hour of flying. Any kid over 9 from the hospital can enjoy the simulator.
"It's not trivial to vacate an entire hospital room for a dream, and that's what they did here. There's a division between us, I bring the volunteers and they bring the kids," he laughs.
"But I'm sure there's also a very strong mutual trust between me and the hospital and the association. Schneider was the main pioneers that allowed all this to happen.
"To this day, when I sit in this room, I do not believe it happened. For me it was just a bold idea, which became something very big. I recently launched a fundraising campaign for a similar project at Dana Children's Hospital in Ichilov, where the money was raised very quickly, in less than two weeks. .
"In the end, it's not easy to be in a children's hospital. The thought of a chronically ill child is heartbreaking. But there is something very encouraging about knowing that a child who did not want to come to the hospital because he was tired of tests and treatments, agrees to come because he knows he is going to fly." "For me, that means we succeeded."
batchene@gmail.com
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