Tonight’s guest of the Late Night History podcast is Merryl Tengesdal.
Merryl is a trailblazer in the world of aviation as she is, at this time, the only Black woman to ever fly the U-2 “Dragon Lady” spy plane. The U-2 spy plane has conducted high-altitude reconnaissance missions for the US since the 1950s and in the last 10-plus years has achieved a 97% mission success rate. The U-2 is unique in that it requires all pilots to wear specialized pressure suits to fly at altitude — which essentially makes them look more like astronauts than aviators in their single-seat cockpit.
We discuss Merryl’s life story from childhood to present day. Throughout the episode Merryl shares interesting anecdotes throughout her 13 years flying the U-2, including missions, often 8 hours or more, across five combat deployments.
She also tells us about the complicated nature of eating and drinking while in the cockpit. These meals come in toothpaste-like tubes and have some wild flavors like Zapplesauce, which is caffeinated, and even New England Clam Chowda — which as a Massachusetts guy, doesn’t sound too appetizing even for me.
Merryl is the author of her memoir Shatter The Sky and has many additional anecdotes within those pages, including more detail about the humorous story she shares on here about chauffeuring Steven Spielberg to observe a landing of the Dragon Lady for the movie Bridge of Spies.
You can reach out to Merryl by visiting her website: https://merryltengesdal.com/
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