Last week, as many as 500 public and private school students climbed aboard a mammoth, silver Air Force aircraft and met a home-grown superstar, Capt. Orchydia Sackey, pilot of the KC-135 Stratotanker. She landed on St. Croix with her crew the night before. The crew was on a recruiting mission.
The main function of the KC-135 is refueling F-16 fighter jets in mid-air. It is 136 feet long and has a wingspan of 130 feet. Standing more than 41 feet tall, the plane travels at 530 miles per hour at 30,000 feet.
Sackey, born on St. Croix, graduated from St. Croix Educational Complex and then the Air Force Academy in 2018.
Her family has been a huge support, she said, and the community also helped her along her way. In fourth, fifth and sixth grades, her teacher encouraged her as she plodded through accelerated classes, and later a speech teacher helped her work through her shyness and learn to speak comfortably in public.
The commander in training took her first ride on a plane when she was in second grade, traveling to Orlando with her family.
“I spent the rest of my young years figuring out how to do that,” she said.
Her first experience was so exciting she spent the rest of her childhood advancing towards her goal in every way she could. At her first opportunity, she joined the V.I. Chapter of the Tuskegee Airman’s Youth Aviation Club, which helps students learn about hundreds of careers in aviation they can take to follow their dreams.
Sakey also used the internet to learn what is the “cheapest way to become a pilot.” Finding that military aviation was the answer, she set her sights in that direction. She applied to and was accepted into the Air Force Academy, where she studied behavioral sciences.
“This journey has been one of happenstance and luck, hard work and dedication and the village that I talked about.”
After flight school, where she trained in several aircraft, she chose and was approved for the KC-135 at MacDill AFB in Tampa, Florida, with the 6th Air Refueling Wing.
Sackey likes being an inspiration when people ask her incredulously if she is a pilot. She tells her story – raised on a small island with few resources and no pilots in her family to pave her way. She wants people to know it is possible and not that far out of reach.
Sackey committed to 10 years to the Air Force for pilot training, and after pledging five, she has served for attending the Academy. She said she “loves” the KC-135, but she’d also like to fly the C-5, the biggest aircraft in the Air Force inventory.
“There’s so many opportunities in the Air Force – to fly to not fly,” she said. “The world is kind of mine for the next seven years.”
Sackey said the boom operator is the coolest job on the plane. Flying at 30,000 feet altitude and 316 miles per hour, the boom operator lays on his stomach in the back of the aircraft. He communicates with the fighter pilot who needs fuel. When that plane is within 50 feet, he lowers the boom and visually connects the long tube to the gas tank on the other aircraft.
The advice she gives others who want to fly, especially children, is to “stick to it.” She recommends reaching out to mentors, researching options and creating connections with those who encourage them.
