Maj. Stephen Del Bagno, 34, was killed Wednesday when his F-16 Fighting Falcon known as Thunderbird 4 crashed in the vast Nevada Test and Training Range north of Nellis Air Force Base outside Las Vegas.
His Thunderbirds biography said Del Bagno was also a corporate pilot and skywriter who graduated in 2005 from Utah Valley State University and was commissioned two years later from Officer Training School at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama.
He was in his first season with the Thunderbirds flight demonstration team, after serving with the 58th Fighter Squadron at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida as an F-35A stealth jet evaluation pilot.