Harlan Kirgan
Bryant Fontenot graduated in 1980 from St. Edmund High School with the desire to become a pilot and not just any kind of aviator.
Fontenot, 56, remembers getting hooked on the helicopter scenes in the classic Vietnam War movie, “Apocalypse Now” at the Liberty Theater.
The son of Virgil and Eve Fontenot of Eunice was working after school when an Army recruiter called his house. His mother answered and told the recruiter her son was not interested in the Army because he wanted to fly.
“We can put him in flight school,” the recruiter said.
Next there was an Army flight school test in New Orleans that he failed.
“I was about to get on the bus and go back to Eunice for the rest of my life,” Fontenot said in a phone call from Fort Hood, Texas.
A sergeant at the testing center asked his score and declared it was passing. “They changed the score two weeks ago.”
That also possibly changed his life.
Fontenot said it is an example of the “Lord’s hand on my life.”
And prayers from his mother.
Fontenot’s service career is a storied one, according to his boss, Col. Ron Ells, commanding officer of the 166th Aviation Brigade at Fort Hood. Ells wrote The Eunice News about Fontenot in August.
“I am writing to you, seeking your support in honoring a truly great American ...” Ells stated.
Calling Fontenot a “true American hero,” Ells said he has been the warrant officer’s commander twice.
The colonel detailed Fontenot’s family history: married to the former Pauline Bollich, daughter of Greg “Honeybee” and Pat Bollich; and his sister is Lisa Fontenot Aguillard, a Century 21 agent in Eunice.
A chief warrant officer is the highest ranking non-commissioned officer in the Army and Fontenot is at the top rank of the warrant officers.
Here’s a portion of the colonel’s story about Fontenot.
“From his earliest recollections to those gathered from his family, all he ever wanted to be was a soldier; and what a soldier he became, and remains.
“Bryant began this distinguished career going from “high school to flight school.” That is a literal statement; a novel program by the Army in 1980, Bryant passed all accessions actions right out of your high school. When he graduated U.S. Army flight training, as the Distinguished Aeroscout Graduate, he was appointed as an officer, a warrant officer, at the age of 19. By all record reviews at that time, he was the youngest Army aviator since WWII.
“To date, all of Bryant’s advancements, promotions, schooling, have been earned well ahead of his peers. There is no way to know the near-countless number of U.S. Army and Allied aviators he has trained, evaluated, validated; the same can be said to those he provided the same opportunities, leveraging his reputation and endorsement to them so that they too could live his same dream as an Army aviator.
“Bryant is now a CW5; these CW5s are affectionately known as ‘The Light Sabers,’ and ‘The Unicorns,’ because they are so discernible and formidable, and equally rare.
“You should know that Bryant has been at this CW5 rank for 19 years now; that record, of sorts, is unlikely to ever be broken. He is the highest ranking aviation warrant officer and longest serving Master Army Aviator and Standardization Instructor Pilot in our great Army.
“He is assigned to the First U.S. Army, Division West as the Command Chief Warrant Officer and Senior Aviation Advisor to the Division West Commanding General.
“Selected from an exceptionally gifted group of Master Army Aviators to be the principal advisor to our Commanding General, he will be an integral part in leading the establishment of the preeminent Army Aviation training and validation center as our fighting combat aviation brigades go into combat abroad. His years of hard combat experience, mastery of his aviation craft, trustworthy counsel, and unmatched command of U.S. Army tactics and doctrine gives and will continue to give these deploying aviation commanders the battle-proven lethality needed to protect our great Nation.
“Recently, because of his sage military intellect and highly developed war-fighting skills, Bryant was sent by our Commanding General to attend the Forces Command (FORSCOM) Senior Leaders Orientation. This event, at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, is the starting block for every single fighting formation of our great American Army. Bryant was one of but two warrant officers selected to attend.
“To emphasize the significance of this: every commanding general of every fighting division of our Army attends in order to hear, in first person, directly from the Commanding General of Forces Command (a 4-Star General) General Michael Garrett, the vision of how our Army will assess, train Soldiers to prepare them to defeat our enemies. Bryant was brought there because he knows how to fight, and win, and save our sons and daughters.
“Bryant is indeed a household name in Army Aviation; we can attend no professional event, no matter the forum and no matter the locale, where Bryant will not be recognized by subordinates, peers, and the highest ranking Army Aviation officers; and you must know that a resounding “thank you” is so often in their greeting.
“Seven deployments, into areas of imminent danger and close combat, he has commanded U.S. Special Forces (Green Berets) in combat, and has seen it all from the windshield of his aircraft or from behind the sights of his rifle ... and at the end of every day, there were only two things he kept clean: his weapon ... and his integrity.
“Bryant is rated in five different Army helicopters as well as our multiengine airplane, and has amassed more than 12,000 accident and incident free flight hours.”
Fontenot, who is on active duty at Fort Hood, lives in Ozark, Alabama, with his wife of 37 years. Ozark is near Fort Rucker, Alabama, where the Army trains its pilots.
After serving nine years on active duty at the beginning of his career, he became a civilian instructor at Fort Rucker, but also served in the Alabama National Guard.
He has been the senior aviation standardization pilot for the Alabama National Guard and admits it might be easier for him to name what helicopters he hasn’t flown rather than the ones he has piloted. And, Fontenot flies fixed-wing aircraft.
Fontenot said the National Guard and Reserves represent 52% of Army aviation and the Army designs it that way.
“Those reserve components are very good at preserving sophisticated systems,” he said.
Often Fontenot calls himself a “soldier.”
“I get up every morning and I feel like the same solider I was 40 years ago. Proud to put on the uniform,”
Fontenot said that desire to be soldier is nothing new to him.
“All I ever wanted to be was a soldier and apparently I have been pretty good at it,” he said.