Ken Kalstad reported to the U.S Naval Academy in 1968 with the dream of a Naval Aviation career of his own. He graduated in 1972 and served aboard a destroyer before entering flight training. Ken earned his navy wings in 1974 and was immediately selected for duty as a flight instructor, followed by a myriad of diverse and challenging aviation assignments.
In his naval career, Ken achieved over 600 carrier landings on several carriers and nearly 4000 hours in tactical and training jet aircraft, including the T-2, TA-4J, A-4KU(Kuwait), A-7 Corsair II, and F/A-18 Hornet. In the competitive arena of naval aviation, he was consistently recognized for weapons delivery excellence and culminated his final carrier operations as “Top Hook” for best carrier landing performance from among the approximately seventy five pilots in the USS Saratoga air-wing.
After leaving active naval service, Ken had a stint as the Naval Science Instructor at Santa Fe High School before heading to Palmdale, California to join Lockheed Martin (Skunkworks) as a flight instructor and system evaluation pilot on a tactical aircraft program. Since returning to Santa Fe in 1998, Ken has enjoyed thousands of flight hours in FAR parts 135 and 91 piston, turbo-prop and jet operations, particularly enjoying work with the forest service, and the incredible opportunity to step back in time to fly tail wheel and antique aircraft, like the Lockheed 10E (of Amelia Earhart fame), the PBY-5A, (amphibious version of the PBY-5 seaplane flown by his father), and of course, the SNJ. Ken has over eight thousand accident/ violation free flight hours.
Click here to see Ken's complete resume |
