Beginning with a harrowing, record setting flight in Howard Hughes' final aircraft design, the author relates his life as a test pilot. He couples episodes bordering on catastrophic to comical; rising from a fatherless street kid to become Chief Experimental Test Pilot and Supervisor of Flight Test for a major U.S. turbine engine company. Escapades of military flight school, fighters, bombers, transports, helicopters, air/sea rescue, marriage, barnstorming, test operations in dozens of aircraft models from Ephesus to Australia ... and 295 failures to the ground, land him an early understanding that spiritual matters are of major importance in survival.