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2 of 3 Premium Clicks used this month SUBSCRIBE Print + Online Subscriber Activation | Register x Forgot Password | Need an Account? e-edition | subscribe | newsletter | deals Home News Latest Stories North Medford High School principal to retire in June Neighbors support Phoenix lion sanctuary Cameras approved again for Gold Hill City Hall Missing Medford man found dead near Willow Lake Low snowpack limits Crater Lake outings Crime, Courts and Emergency Services Missing Medford man found dead near Willow Lake DUII driver loses license for life after offering bribe Mentally ill man dies in volley of gunfire with Medford police VIDEO: Shots fired in west Medford standoff with police Emergency Services, March 17 Politics and Elections Arthur I. Cyr: South Korea represents long-term triumph – for them and for US Special election: Jackson County voters OK marijuana tax Ex-Merkley aide chosen as Oregon secretary of state Ashland: Budget increase, swimming pool funding discussion on council agenda Judge upholds Phoenix's moratorium on medical marijuana dispensaries Education North Medford High School principal to retire in June Southern Oregon University's building boom adds up to $130 million South Medford, Ashland, St. Mary's students building video game Ashland High principal receives national award Work your body to save your braaaaains Environment Herptilian haven Proposed new rules for Oregon critter catchers would require the killing of nuisance animals Jacksonville requests extension on reservoir dam-notching permit Blooms coming too early for Rogue Valley's bees Low snow closes Mt. Ashland bunny hill chairlift State News House OKs bill banning gay conversion therapy Oso, Wash., to remember deadly mudslide HIllsboro jail worker sentenced to four years for inmate liaisons Portland man sentenced to 6 months for aiming lasers at planes Oregon is first state to adopt automatic voter registration Nation - World Obituaries Geneva Rosel Canty Shiela R. Ettlich Karen June Shaw Keo Jean Sedenius Death Notices Weather Photo Galleries Since You Asked Videos Web Cams Mail Tribune 100 Shareable Bank of America is predicting a massive Tesla collapse Mars One attracts science fiction geeks and people who hate society Sports Latest Stories Three players stabbed in fight at Morgan State Cowboys, Ducks have had their ups and downs Beavers expect better finish than last season Crater falls short in softball season opener Wade leads Heat win over Cavs Varsity 541 College Sports Three players stabbed in fight at Morgan State Cowboys, Ducks have had their ups and downs Beavers expect better finish than last season OSU to serve as NCAA tourney host Familiar tourney foes in line for Ducks Pro Sports Wade leads Heat win over Cavs Blazers' rally falls short Spartans’ season comes to end Aldridge scores 24 points, Blazers beat Raptors Spieth proves clutch at Valspar Community Sports Business Latest Stories Test Drive: 2015 Subaru Outback Limited Silvio Calabi: 2015 Cherokee is a modern Jeep Oregon winemaking emerges as mighty agricultural force Rogue Disposal plans natural gas fueling site Blog: Are You Superstitious? Real Estate News East McAndrews Road sees a resurgence in commercial projects Business briefs: March 7 New construction prices jump 18.2 percent in Jackson County People In Business People in Business: Feb. 28 People in Business Transportation Rogue Disposal plans natural gas fueling site Alaska, United Express boost Medford airport to record February CEO Rieder leaving Erickson March 31 Lodging gains bode well for travel industries Agriculture Harry & David announces new president Warm winter has fruit growers poised for action Briefcase: Business briefs for Feb. 21 Opinion Latest Landgren cartoon: Sunshine Week Michael Gerson: Tom Cotton letter to Iran: The roughest of drafts Letters to the Editor, March 17 Granlund cartoon: March madness and other madness Letters to the Editor, March 16 Editorials Our View: Keeping the light trained on government Other Views: State must rein in medical marijuana Our View: Daylight saving bill another waste of time Our View: Medford native Dave Frohnmayer leaves legacy of distinguished service Our View: Medford council shouldn't over-regulate backyard pot gardens Letters to the Editor Letters to the Editor, March 17 Letters to the Editor, March 16 Letters to the Editor, March 15 Letters to the Editor, March 14 Letters to the Editor, March 13 Columns Michael Gerson: Tom Cotton letter to Iran: The roughest of drafts Guest Opinion: Central Point Cemetery needs work and city action Charles Krauthammer: Early Onset Clinton Fatigue George Will: The prescience of Daniel Patrick Moynihan Dana Milbank: Jason Rezaian's detention a tragedy for Iran Guest Opinions Guest Opinion: Central Point Cemetery needs work and city action Guest Opinion: Return to clearcutting is wrong approach for counties Guest Opinion: Plan a Hawthorne playground for all children Guest Opinion: There is nothing uniform about the Uniform Crime Report GUEST OPINION: Police, community should work to prevent profiling Lifestyle Latest stories Blog: The prodigal Watterson Pam Stone: No binge benefits from ‘healthy’ snacks Garden Cameos: Now is the perfect time to spot wildflowers Paul Rogers: It’s time to assess the damage to yards Season Stepp: Tips to spice up your tacos Food Season Stepp: Tips to spice up your tacos Food for Thought: Where to splurge and save at the grocery store Prudence Hilburn: Loaded potatoes, Buffalo chicken call for Candied Bacon Bites for dessert Community blog: Top toast with smashing beet, cheese spread Gail Ciampa: Colcannon Soup with Parsley Pesto is a vegetarian alternative for St. Patrick’s Day Home and Garden Garden Cameos: Now is the perfect time to spot wildflowers Paul Rogers: It’s time to assess the damage to yards Home Help: This top garage trend keeps gaining momentum The delightful work of flowers Using universal design Health Community blog: Denial is Not a River in Egypt Health Watch: Living smart to protect your heart Community blog: Can Twentysomething Depression Be�Healed? Dr. Murray Feingold: What’s your excuse for being late? Community blog: The Future is Now Hiking Biking Faith Religion briefs: Friday, March 13 More religion events in the Rogue Valley Religion Briefs Religion briefs, Feb. 27 Religion briefs: Friday, Feb. 20 Milestones and Achievements Haga-Parks Exercise helps special-needs kids adjust to airport procedures Engagement: Workman-Wright Anniversary: Hofer Columnist for a Day Rogue Healthy Aging Tempo Latest stories Review: 'Same Time' after all these years Kites & Crows, Ryan Marchand and Mercy Duo face-off this weekend at Rising Stars music competition in Jacksonville City-rock band Shotgun Wedding performs at the Craterian Theater in Medford Randall Theatre presents playwright Bernard Slade's comedy Nitty Gritty Dirt Band co-founder John McEuen performs at the Unitarian Fellowship in Ashland Theater Review: Thanks for the Memories pulls off challenging 'Anastasia' Review: 'Same Time' after all these years Randall Theatre presents playwright Bernard Slade's comedy Thanks for the Memories presents 'Anastasia' TMTO's 'Bye Bye Birdie' takes flight Music Kites & Crows, Ryan Marchand and Mercy Duo face-off this weekend at Rising Stars music competition in Jacksonville Rogue Valley Chorale presents 'A Festival of Choirs' at the Craterian Theatre SOU's Chamber and Concert choirs present 'Songs of Passion' City-rock band Shotgun Wedding performs at the Craterian Theater in Medford Live Music in Local Clubs Community Events Ashland Independent Film Festival announces this year's lineup OSF Hip-Hop Poetry Open Mic Ashland's First Friday Art Walk showcases new exhibits by regional artists Jesse Lawson and Joe Moxley host 'Barkeeper' Third Fridays showcases local artists Dining Restaurant Inspections Agave offers gourmet tacos, tamales, ensaladas and more Serra storms Seattle Sakura Japanese Sushi Restaurant opens in new location Restaurant Inspections: Sunday, March 1 Tempo Videos Classifieds Jobs Autos Real Estate FEATURED » Obits Blogs TV Listings Movie Listings Oregon Outdoors Oregon Healthy Living Magazines/Special Sections Business Services NEWS NOW North Medford High School principal to retire in June ... Neighbors support Phoenix lion sanctuary ... Missing Medford man found dead near Willow Lake ... North Medford High School principal to retire in June ... Neighbors support Phoenix lion sanctuary ... Missing Medford man found dead near Willow Lake ... Pilot fights diabetes, returns to the air By SANNE SPECHT,Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By SANNE SPECHT,Mail Tribune Posted Sep. 12, 2004 at 2:00 AM Updated Feb 16, 2011 at 10:03 AM By SANNE SPECHT,Mail Tribune Posted Sep. 12, 2004 at 2:00 AM Updated Feb 16, 2011 at 10:03 AM » Social News The name jauntily painted near the nose of the small blue and white two-seat airplane reads Simply Magic. For pilot Bill Warren, back in the skies and flying solo again after disease nearly took his life eight years ago, that says it all. Diabetes got the best of me for awhile, says Warren, 57, of Gold Hill. There were even a couple doctors saying 'we don't know if you're going to be around much longer.' But Warren wasn't willing to accept the fate doctors predicted. Not for his health ' or his passion. See this? he asks, sliding out a tattered card from his wallet. This is a pilot's license. They don't pull this from you unless you do something pretty heinous. But, he says, sliding another card across the table in the hangar at Medford Air Service. A pilot's license is not valid without one of these ' a current medical certificate. Generally, a diagnosis of diabetes is a death sentence to life as an aviator. But not for Warren, whose long life in the sky has included crop dusting, ferrying medical patients, flying corporate air shuttles, performing in air shows and piloting Hollywood stunt planes. He persevered, and today he is flying again ' back home. Warren's fascination with flying began before conscious memory. Sky Billy grew up on a farm outside Port Angeles, Wash. The boy who dreamed each night of flying got airborne in 1950 when he was only 4 years old. A & 36;5 ticket bought him a ride on a DC-3 at a Port Angeles air show. My dad bought me the ride, he says. It blew me away. The experience deepened the desire to fly. Warren rode his bike to the airport each day after school. I'd stand around looking forlorn, he said. If there was an empty seat, somebody would take me up. Once in awhile one of them would let me fly. Warren bought his first plane when he was 17. The two-seat, high-wing cabin monoplane was a 1946 Taylorcraft BC-12D ' the same year, make and model of Simply Magic. As he flew, his skills grew. He joined his first air show at age 19. His own air show followed, featuring a bevy of wing-walking beauties, The Daring Damsels. His name landed on the ears of Hollywood producers. It was Warren flying under overpasses and freeway signs in the Kevin Costner movie Fandango. And he doubled for Charles Grodin in Midnight Run, flying the biplane with Robert DeNiro's stunt man hanging from the struts. Earlier, there were less glamorous but equally exciting assignments in Medford. In the summer Warren often worked as a crop duster. In the winter, he'd get calls to fog seed. We'd sprinkle dry ice on fog to raise visibility so airliners could land, he says. We'd go out in 0-0 (zero visibility and zero ceiling). Essentially we'd find the end of the runway. the time we'd push the throttle forward, we were on instruments. But the life Warren knew and loved stalled once diabetes took away his medical certificate in 1997. The Federal Aviation Administration's medical advisers did not allow any leeway if a pilot was insulin dependent. He eventually got the disease under control. But he still wasn't able to fly solo. For awhile, he tried to find another passion. Nothing fit. I fumbled around, Warren says. Sometimes Warren's pilot pals would take him up and hand him the controls, he says. It was perfectly legal for me to fly as long as there was another licensed pilot in the plane, he says. But, I didn't have a mission. It's not good for an aviator not to have a mission. While Warren struggled to gain control of life on the ground, the FAA was making changes in the sky. The FAA made a special provision that insulin-using diabetics could receive ' if all health standards were met ' a special issuance medical certificate, he says. Warren met all the federal agency's stringent requirements and testing procedures. I jumped through all the hoops, he says. Two years ago he passed and regained his medical certificate, which meant he could fly solo again. Things quickly began looking so positive that he renewed his flight instructor's license. Sky Billy was back. And he had a new mission. He'd take his lifetime of studying what makes the difference between a great pilot and a not-so-great pilot and teach those secrets to anyone interested in learning. The best kind of mission is to have someone who wants to hire me to teach them to fly, says Warren. If you have something exciting you want to share, and a guy walks in like a dry sponge, I'm pumped. One of Warren's students is Stefanie Conner, the granddaughter of the man who used to give Warren crop-dusting gigs. Conner, 24, of Medford, has known Warren since the day I was born. Like Warren, Conner has always wanted to fly. In fact, Conner hopes to co-pilot for her father once she gets licensed. But, unlike Warren, Conner has had to overcome a pretty serious case of nerves to chase her dream. On one of the first flights, I got so freaked out by the bumps (turbulence) that I wanted to walk home ' from the plane, she says. Anyone else would not have wanted to fly with me. But he is so patient. Warren says flying ain't no thinkin' thing. He believes we all have instinctual knowledge of flight. The key, he says, is to tap into that knowledge. I don't teach by instruments, he says. the time the instruments have registered, you're behind the airplane. In addition to his fly by feel method of training, his years of aerobatics flying have made Warren a much-sought-after teacher of spin training. Hardly any pilots still teach the maneuver that sends pilot and plane hurtling toward the ground in a controlled corkscrew spin. But Warren says once the FAA stopped requiring spin training, the stall-spin accident became the number one killer of pilots. The first spin I was ever in was accidental and I was unprepared to handle it, says Warren. Once I became an instructor, I just felt nobody should be flying around in an airplane that will do something that they can't recover from. Conner says after hours of standard flight instruction, Warren insisted she learn how to save herself in the event of just such an emergency before she could solo. I don't think we even did one revolution before I reached over, grabbed his leg and screamed, Oh my God! We're going to die! she says. Warren says most fears are based on false perception. Your fears are telling you it's all going to hell in a handbasket, he says. But the truth of the matter is another. Conner says Warren didn't flinch at her death-grip on his leg. Just calmly ended the spin and offered some comfort. I cried for a good 20 minutes. I just knew we were going to die, says Conner. But he kept me safe. Unlike Conner, Jim Haran, 43, sought Warren out precisely to learn spin-training. Taking an aircraft to 4,000 feet and spiraling toward earth can be dangerous. Haran says he wanted to learn from someone with a lot of experience ' and in a dual-controlled plane that could handle the move. Haran, of Jacksonville, says there are many cases where pilots are slowed down in landing patterns and the plane is in a dangerous position. I'm not interested in the thrill factor, says Haran. Bill has talent and experience beyond belief. He teaches how to recover and get it back to level. Under sunny skies on the tarmac at Medford Air Service, Warren does his preflight walk-through in preparation for his next lesson. He looks at the plane's other decoration ' a decal of Merlin the Magician and smiles at the small purple wizard. It's always good to have a man around who can wave a magic stick when you go flyin', says Warren. Celebrating Flight ' A History of Aviation in Southern Oregon. You can watch film of pilot Bill Warren flying for television and for his own enjoyment at the Southern Oregon Historical Society's year-long exhibit Celebrating Flight ' A History of Aviation in Southern Oregon. In one clip, Warren and the Daring Damsels perform in his air show, Bill Warren and The Great American Flying Circus. Warren pilots his biplane while the two damsels perform the only simultaneous wingwalking act known to exist. In another 16-minute clip, a 30-year-old Warren appears in the TV show Breakaway with William Shatner. Warren lands his plane on top of a car driven by Shatner at 60 mph. The clip closes with Warren enjoying his own brand of cross-country flying ' dipping his plane's wingtips into the Rogue River, performing aerial maneuvers over Table Rock and more. SOHS is at 106 N. Central Ave., Medford. The exhibit will remain until December. Call 773-6536 for hours. . By SANNE SPECHT,Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By SANNE SPECHT,Mail Tribune Posted Sep. 12, 2004 at 2:00 AM Updated Feb 16, 2011 at 10:03 AM » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. calendar Connect with MailTribune.com Facebook Twitter RSS Back to top Reader Services Reader Services Home Subscriptions Subscriber controls Contact us Submissions Photos Events Letters to the editor Corrections Announcements Obituaries Story ideas Since you asked Alerts Email Alerts RSS Feeds Text Alerts Advertise Media Kit Home Products and services Ad rates Advertising contacts Mail Tribune Daily Tidings The Nickel Shop Our Valley Blogs Stay Informed Email newsletter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Your privacy is important, read our privacy policy. © Copyright 2015 Local Media Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 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