Steva's friends and commanders tell of an extraordinary pilot • How did he miss history and become "only" the F-16 pilot who shot down four fighter jets?
Ethan Steve
Photography:
Mark Neiman / GPO
"You have to understand - it's not just that two astronauts leave the 117th Squadron. It was the squadron that always absorbed the new planes, Ilan Ramon and Eitan Steve were among the best pilots and people I knew," Col. (Res.) Ze'ev Raz tells Israel Today. Commander of the 117th Squadron and one of the leaders in the Israeli attack on the Iraqi reactor, on the Israeli astronaut Eitan Stiva 19 years after his squadron member, Ilan Ramon, was killed in the Colombian crash, Stiva announced that he was on his way.
Steve enlisted in the pilot course in 1976 and served as a Skyhawk, Phantom pilot and finally as an F-16 pilot until the end of his military service.
Regularly and in the reserve, he served under Ilan Ramon as a squadron commander.
Upon his release from the IDF, Steve joined IAI's consulting team that worked on the development of Lavi aircraft systems and later formed a group of businessmen who, among other things, deployed Israeli air defense and naval defense systems in developing countries. On its board of directors.
GPO
During the first Lebanon war, Steve became an abortion champion, dropping four enemy planes in one raid.
To this day he is the only F-16 pilot in history to have shot down four aircraft in one takeoff.
It was June 11, when he took part in an air battle over the Lebanese Valley, in which four F-16s shot down nine enemy aircraft.
The planes that Steva shot down were - two Sukhoi 22s, a MiG 23 and a Gazelle fighter jet.
For his work he received in 2019 the model for the pilot, upon completion of his reserve service as a pilot.
"Eitan could have shot down five planes, but because of a procedure in the corps, he gave up the fifth plane," Raz notes.
"As commander I reacted to him in front of everyone. But then in the room I said to him: Too bad you did not shoot down the fifth you would have been shot down to be the first person in Air Force history to shoot down five planes a day. Now you are the third person in history to shoot down four." "third).
But he was and still is an amazing pilot. "
Col. (Res.) Kobi Richter, was Ilan Ramon's commander and later met Steve, in the business world. "I have known Eitan in recent years.
He is a businessman who establishes agricultural villages in Africa in the style of the kibbutzim of yesteryear with Israeli technology.
This is a project that exports the beautiful Israel to the world and that helps remote areas in Africa to operate. "
Richter says that together with Steva, the two adopted the squadron, which will become the F-35 squadron in 2021.
"I meet him quite a bit, appreciate him and help with him in the mention of all the fighters who fell in the squadron, among them of course Ilan Ramon." He was an amazing pilot, a talented commander and an unusually good and pleasant person.
His death is a great loss to the people of Israel. "
"These are two special people, those who were very far from the image of the haughty pilot, warm people, who built themselves over the years," says Raz.
"I would not have guessed when they were in the squadron that they would reach these successes."
"They are both so similar in that they built themselves modestly over the years, there was no gram of condescension in them. I am also not surprised that they both came out of the same cycles of 1981-1980," Raz adds.
"It was a time of war in Lebanon and also the bombing of the Iranian reactor, there were heavy demands then from the squadron that was stationed in the north and coordinated the corps' fighting in the area.
