Tuskegee Airman Robert Friend, Who Flew 142 Combat Missions in World War II, Dead at 99

Lt. Col. Robert Friend, one of the last surviving members of the Tuskegee Airmen — a famed group of African-American military pilots who fought the Axis Powers in World War II — has died at the age of 99.

Friend was surrounded by family and friends when he died of sepsis on Friday at a hospital in Long Beach, California, according to CNN.

“We called the chaplain and we did a prayer,” Karen Crumlich, Friend’s daughter, told the outlet. “And during the prayer, right when we said amen, he took his last breath.”

The former military pilot flew 142 combat missions during World War II, after he was denied from learning to fly when he tried to enlist in the Army, according to a bio page of Friend on the CAF Red Tail Squadron website. Friend — who was born in Columbia, South Carolina, on February 29, 1920 — then enrolled in aviation lessons at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania and was ready to join when the Army lifted a ban on African-American pilots in 1941.

The Army would then form an all African-American squadron based in Tuskegee, Alabama, who would later be known as the Tuskegee Airmen. The squad was highly regarded during the war and “proved conclusively that African-Americans could fly and maintain sophisticated combat aircraft,” a description of on the Tuskegee Airmen page reads.

Throughout the war, Friend flew in P-47 and P-51 planes while providing support for heavy bombers, according to The Desert Sun.

After WWII, Friend would go on to serve in the Korean and Vietnam wars and graduated from the Air Force Institution of Technology. In all, he spent 28 years in the military.

“My dad was my hero. He was always there for me and at the end I wanted to be there for him,” Crumlich told The Desert Sun.

“He is truly a National Treasure who I will carry in my heart,” she continued. “I promise to keep his legacy alive by telling his story to anyone who wants to hear it.”

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In a 2017 interview with The Desert Sun, Friend reflected back on his time in World War II.

“I never felt that I was anything but an American doing a job,” he explained.

In 2012, Friend spoke out about his involvement in the Air Force’s 20-year study into UFOs, Project Blue Book, and told the Huffington Post that he vouched for more investigations into the events, even if he didn’t believe Earth had been visited by extraterrestrials.

“Do I believe that we have been visited? No, I don’t believe that,” he told the outlet. “And the reason I don’t believe it is because I can’t conceive of any of the ways in which we could overcome some of these things: How much food would you have to take with you on a trip for 22 years through space? How much fuel would you need? How much oxygen or other things to sustain life do you have to have?”

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But Friend didn’t exactly throw out the possibility that humanity isn’t alone in the universe.

“Yes, there were some people who had those opinions. I, for one, also believe that the probability of there being life elsewhere in this big cosmos is just absolutely out of this world — I think the probability is there,” he added.