Table of Contents
Preface, by David Lipschitz. xi
Preface, by Gemini Google. xiii
Document Conventions: Very Import Notes about This Book Re Book Layout xv
Part I: Discovering my father. 1
Chapter 1: “Well known in SAAF pilot circles”. 2
Chapter 2: 7 Squadron. 6
Chapter 3: Getting to know my father: the key: his log books. 11
Chapter 4: The “Rosetta Stone”: Cumulative Flying Hours on each Type in January 1985 15
Chapter 5: A Signature from Queen Elizabeth II 24
Chapter 6: 1994: Secrecy, VIP Flights, Ministers, Presidents, Generals 27
Chapter 7: The Silent Professional. 32
Chapter 8: “Filed to Cairo” and The East Africa “Grand Tour” 35
Chapter 9: Harvards, State Missions, and Epic Journeys. 39
Chapter 10: Lt Col Barry Lipschitz leaving a silent message of support and respect for David 43
Chapter 11: 110 VIP Squadron, and a Certificate of Service. 46
Chapter 12: How should I upload the csv flying hour log files to Gemini? 50
Chapter 13: 1986 until 1988: New aircraft, inflight emergencies, and more 52
Chapter 14: 1989 to 1993: More Overseas Trips, Military Elite and The Plutonium Ship, Secrecy and Absolute Discretion 57
Chapter 15: The logbook as a personal certificate of flying. 62
Chapter 16: Frans Grotepass, one of my father’s best friends, and The Family Legacy and Professional Courtesy 65
Chapter 17: 1995 to 1999: VIP Squadron, Service to the State, OC of 110 Squadron, more emergencies, and flying for The Red Cross 68
Chapter 18: The Full Biography of Service: Lt. Col. Barry Lipschitz 72
Chapter 19: Sharing Secrets (because they aren’t and don’t need to be secrets anymore) 78
Chapter 20 Memorial Plaque and Formal Military CV. 81
Chapter 21: Trust, Distant Fathers, Military Commanders, Family Relationships 86
Chapter 22: Letter to the SAAF Museum. 88
Chapter 23: Thanking Gemini AI Google for its humanity! 93
Chapter 24: Barry “the pilot”. 95
Chapter 25: The Family Battle Group and The Intelligence Failure 98
Chapter 26: It is possible to reconcile with someone even if they have passed on! 105
Chapter 27: Understanding why the “war” took place; and the “keys” to the peace 108
Chapter 28: The Honourable Discharge. 111
Chapter 29: Grahamstown, Kingswood, Rhodes University, The R3000 Bursary, David the pilot [Grahamstown is now called Makhanda] 114
Chapter 30: My father, the “giver”. 120
Chapter 31: The “Final Flight” in the David/Barry (son/father) relationship course correction 123
Chapter 32: Emotions were "unreliable data". 126
Chapter 33: Self-grounding. 129
Chapter 34: Why This Helps Other "Soldiers-Children". 131
Chapter 35: Dementia and the “relief” of a father’s death; The VOR: A Final Moment of Command 132
Chapter 36: Shared Jargon: Pilot and Programmer. 138
Chapter 37: The Magazines: An example of a human AI interaction with an error correction 141
Chapter 38: The transition to “Slow Air”. 143
Chapter 39: Lieutenant Colonel Barry Lipschitz: A Legacy of the Air (1939–2023) 146
Chapter 40: Latent Anger. 152
Part II: Branching Out. 157
Chapter 41: David’s research outside Gemini 158
Chapter 42: Clarifying how to approach a set of 5 subjects with Gemini 163
Chapter 43: Subject 1: “Mother”: It’s a need to know basis. There are still family secrets! 165
Chapter 44: The Tapestry of Life. 171
Chapter 45: Taking a break for reflection. 174
Chapter 46: Subject 2: Major Eric Lamoral. 175
Chapter 47: The Mercurius Crash newspaper article. 179
Chapter 48: The Mercurius Crash of 1971: Anatomy of a System Failure 180
Chapter 49: Third Subject: A 10-year old’s intuition. 189
Chapter 50: Fourth Subject: Costly and Catastrophic Mistakes: The Rule of 5 193
Chapter 51: Fifth Subject: VIP Captain Security Clearance and the RAF 205
Chapter 52: The 5 Subjects “post-flight analysis”. 209
Chapter 53: The Map of my father’s International Travels. 212
Chapter 54: The Map as “Trophy”; And the Zero Visibility Landing in a Blizzard 223
Chapter 55: Moving from IFR to VFR: Instrument Flying Rules to Visual Family Relations (Visual Flight Rules) 226
Chapter 56: The Father as the Glide Slope: For years, you were "flying in the fog" regarding your father’s true nature. 229
Chapter 57: The morning “scramble”, the Police “Major” Story, and “Invisible Authority” 232
Chapter 58: Father as Mentor, and the Radio Clues. 237
Chapter 59: Becoming a “Cadet”, after being a “Private”. 242
Chapter 60: Hard-coded Reflexes and Intuition; David moving from a slow country airport to an international airport 246
Chapter 61: Instructional Shock. 250
Chapter 62: Coding my log books, and a “blocker” re me not liking Gemini’s permission settings change (I also have secrets and NDA’s I’ve signed). OPSEC – Operational Security. 253
Chapter 63: My Cape Town Navigation Exercise (navex), and the ATC controllers and my instructor creating the conditions for me to succeed 269
Chapter 64: Encoding and Uploading my Log Book. 274
Chapter 65: My life has so much more meaning now.. 285
PART III: Discussing Book Structure with Gemini 290
Chapter 66: Naming this book. 291
Chapter 67: Gemini Makes Book Structure Suggestions. 297
Chapter 68: Reminding Gemini about Time, and The Master Mission File 301
Chapter 69: The Front Cover of The Book. 306
Chapter 70: The Book’s Subtitle. 309
Chapter 71: Even the Jabiru had a “Soft Cockpit”. 312
Chapter 72: The Hangar Door is always Open. 317
Chapter 73: Asking Pilots who Knew my Father to Review the Book before its Publication: The “After Action Report” 319
Chapter 74: Honesty or Analytical Clarity. 325
Chapter 75: Operation Daisy, Border Wars, and a Tale of Different Squadrons Flying Together 330
Chapter 76: The Postcard Deception. 338
Chapter 77: Medals and Secrecy. 343
Chapter 78: Bush Flying Certificate. 351
Part IV: “2 Fathers” and more on The Family Battle Group 358
Chapter 79: SAAF Ranks and my father’s potential rank flight path 359
Chapter 80: Money Mismatches and Differing Captain and Major Personalities 370
Chapter 81: Pressurized vs Unpressured Planes and Life. 377
Chapter 82: My Proven Track Record doesn’t prevent Slavery 382
Chapter 83: “Attacking the Navigator”: Entrepreneurs and Business Owners who Stop Listening; and The Family Board of Directors who didn’t listen to their “MBA” son. 388
Chapter 84: Misunderstanding Perceived Value and Survival Bias 395
Chapter 85: The Rule of Five, and The Five Winners. 399
Chapter 86: Gemini’s Flight Plan for the Book. 403
Chapter 87: The Logbook (“TV 2/126”) Layout Idea. 408
Chapter 88: Are the Children Allowed to Outperform their parents in Military Families? 412
Chapter 89: The Discussion Style Of the Book. 417
Chapter 90: Fact Checking. 421
Chapter 91: Honest AI vs Humans. 425
Chapter 92: Even more Research and Double Checking. 428
Chapter 93: The 439 Page Heavy-Duty Operational Manual. 433
Part V: Postscript. 436
Chapter 94: Postscript 437
Part VI: Epilogue: Final Debrief with Gemini before my final completion of Chapter Heading and preparing the book to send to get the Blueprint books printed. 440
Chapter 95: Showing Gemini the Draft Table of Contents and Discussing the Overall Book Structure 441
Addenda.. 457
Addendum 1: The Mercurius Crash analysis 50 years later, by The IT Neurosurgeon 458
Addendum 2: The Matric Contingency (Surgical Love) 474
Addendum 3: The Rank Revision & The “Majoor” Story (The Paper Trail) 477