15 Quotes by Shane Osborn

We decided to read our emails out loud to the group in order to share the warmth and optimism the messages contained. One of the most heartwarming was from the father of Petty Officer Rodney "RaRa" Young of Katy, Texas. His dad got right to the point: "You'd better come home because you promised to help me put up a fence, and I could really use that help." Everyone laughed because the words took us back to the normal world and out of the anxious monotony of our detention.

We did it right, ... No apologies necessary on our part.

He would come up, close, ... The third time his closure rate was too far. He attempted to turn and pitch up, but his vertical stabilizer impacted my number one propeller, basically pretty much tearing his aircraft apart.

I want to thank America, the administration and everyone involved in getting us home so quickly, ... It was a surprise and we're all glad to be back. We can all be proud of this crew.

The aircraft made two close approaches, (with the pilot) making gestures, ... And then, on the third one, his closure rate was too high, and he impacted the number-one propeller, which caused a violent shaking in the aircraft. And then, his nose impacted our nose, and our nose cone flew off, and the airplane immediately snap-rolled to about 130 degrees in low bank and became uncontrollable.

We're definitely glad to be back, ... On behalf of Combat Reconnaissance Crew One, I'd like to thank you once again, and God bless America.

We knew that this was an unusual type of intercept,

Once we re-opened, the big pressure was to retain our two-star Michelin rating.

Definitely, I thought on the initial impact that he just killed us. And, obviously, there's 24 people on board . . . I care about every single one of them very much, and I wasn't happy with the aggressive nature of the intercept.