Ask about his 20 years in the Air Force, and the stories tumble out of Dave Roebke. Ask about his 20-plus years of retirement, and the stories keep coming.
Dave Roebke, of Chase, has been interested in flight since he was a little kid making model airplanes with his dad at their home in Green Bay. He flew the models with the wind-up propellers in his backyard, then advanced to flying control line planes in the local park.
Since his Air Force days in Germany in 1980, he’s built and flown remote control airplanes and more recently, became an ultralight pilot and taught courses in drone flying.
At Saturday’s fly-in in Oconto, he will oversee the RC planes exhibit, a role he’s held since the first fly-in seven years ago. Open flying will take place from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., with a RC show team, the Northern Aces, performing from 2-3 p.m.
With today’s kits, a person can build a plane in 10-15 hours, but Roebke chooses to build virtually from scratch, spending 60-100 hours on a plane. The sense of accomplishment is what keeps him motivated.
“To me, that’s just absolutely amazing that something you put together from a bunch of pieces and parts … actually takes off and flies,” he said.
Roebke began his Air Force career in 1972 during the Vietnam War, beginning with radar operations training in Biloxi, Mississippi. Times have changed, and Roebke said the old analog radar he first used has since been decommissioned. Some of the equipment he worked with is now on display in museums.
“I’m glad they saved some of it,” he said.
Throughout his military career, Roebke was stationed stateside at Air Force bases in Petersburg, Virginia; Duluth, Minnesota; Clear, Alaska; Great Falls, Montana; and Riverside, California, and was stationed abroad in Germany and Korea.
He worked in air defense and trained for the threat of Soviet bombers during the Cold War.
“Exercises were large and involved, with hundreds of aircraft,” he recalled.
A highlight of his career was competing at and winning the William Tell air combat competition in 1982 as weapons director technician. His duties were to monitor radar hand-offs, file flight plans, reserve air space and coordinate plans with the Federal Aviation Administration for his squadron in the competition. He was a part of the winning control team for the F106, a nuclear-capable air defense fighter.
Looking back at his service during the Cold War, Roebke didn’t isolate one situation as the most dangerous.
“It was all intense,” he said.
While stationed in Germany, he said he could’ve been deployed to the front, if conditions had escalated between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. Though the protocol was in place to launch nuclear missiles, none were used.
“Thankfully, we won the Cold War. The Soviet Union dissolved, and the need for that went away,” he said.
Another event that sticks with Roebke occurred when he was stationed in the Republic of Korea from 1983-84, during one of the worst monsoon seasons recorded. He worked 12-hour shifts controlling the air space for helicopter rescues of civilians trapped by flood waters. During a two-week time span, he said 560 people were brought to safety.
It was in Korea that he was awarded an achievement medal for developing a simplified way for his commander to know the location and direction of flights during training exercises.
In Riverside California, his base from 1984-88, he earned a meritorious service medal for high performance for his work during a training exercise in which he designed targets and reserved air space.
“I didn’t expect it. I was just doing my job,” he said.
He also became well-known for developing standards for the Air Force, including a hijack checklist based on FAA regulations to be used in event an aircraft was hijacked.
“The inspector general said my checklists were the best they’d ever seen,” he said.
While he tells stories galore from his first 16 years in the Air Force, his final four years are off limits. From 1988-1992, Roebke was assigned to Air Force special operations. Although he can’t say much, he did mention one of his assignments was to control the air space for the Soviet-style aircraft flown by the United States.
“I can’t tell you where they took off from. I can’t tell you where I controlled them,” he said, cryptically.
In retirement, he’s earned a bachelor’s degree in education and a masters in aeronautical science. He is employed as a substitute teacher in the Gillett School District and is a professional writer.
He writes poetry, including “The Sorrow Store,” published through Amazon, about the grief he felt over losing his wife, Jean, to cancer five years ago. He also writes sci-fi/fantasy books and articles for the Cold War Museum. He also blogs about drone flying and other topics. He said he’s yet to write about his Air Force career.
He retired from the Air Force as a master sergeant E7 in 1992 but remains active in the Warbirds to help preserve the history of aviation. He also enjoys his RC plane hobby.
“It’s a lot of fun. For me, it’s very relaxing,” he said.
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