Our spirit is not represented by individual pilots, particular airplanes or specific routines. Instead, we are always looking up, searching the skies for life's next adventure.
RIGHT WING
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Dan Friedkin is the founder of Pursuit Aviation and chairman and CEO of The Friedkin Group, a privately held and diverse consortium of businesses and investments in the entertainment, automotive, hospitality, golf and adventure industries that includes Pursuit Aviation.
Aviation has been a passion of Dan’s since an early age, when he first took to the skies developing his skills on gliders and a variety of tail wheel aircraft and helicopters. Today, Dan has a focus and passion for warbirds and actively flies the T‐6, P‐51 Mustang, F‐86 Sabre, F6F, F8F, F4U‐4, Hawker Hurricane and various models of the Spitfire. Dan uses his unparalleled experience and enthusiasm for flight in the film industry; over the past five years he has directed and coordinated more than 1,000 hours of helicopter air‐to‐air, ground‐to‐air and in‐cockpit footage with Spitfires, Mustangs, Sabres, Corsairs, Lightnings, Hellcats and Bearcats.
Most recently Dan acted as an aerial unit coordinator, lead spitfire pilot and helicopter camera pilot in Christopher Nolan’s epic IMAX film, “Dunkirk.” The stunt team won the Best Specialty Stunt award at the 2018 Taurus World Stunt Awards. His work on “The Horsemen Cometh” was nominated for an Emmy in cinematography, and he has served as director/DP, aerial coordinator and principal pilot for numerous feature films, documentaries and commercial projects.
Dan is also founder and chairman of the Air Force Heritage Flight Foundation and one of ten civilian Heritage Flight pilots qualified to fly in formation with U.S. Air Force single‐ship demonstration teams. He participates in air shows throughout North America and Europe, flying right wing for the Horsemen Flight Team, the world’s only P‐51 formation aerobatic team. He also serves as the aerial coordinator for the Air Force Heritage Flight training course, and in 2012 was the recipient of the USAF Civilian Pilot of the Year Award.
LEAD
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Jim Beasley, Jr. is a founding member of the Horsemen Flight Team, serving as lead pilot in the world’s only P-51 Mustang aerobatic team. Jim has flown in hundreds of Heritage Flights across the United States, Canada and the U.K., accumulating thousands of hours in aircraft, such as his P-51 Mustang Bald Eagle and Supermarine Spitfire. In 2006, Beasley was voted “Civilian Heritage Flight Pilot of the Year.” He is an attorney and trial lawyer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and runs The Beasley Firm, LLC, a complex litigation law firm. In addition to his role with Horsemen Flight Team, Beasley is a founding member of the Air Force Heritage Flight program, having performed the first dissimilar formation with the West Coast F-15 Eagle demonstration team at Shaw AFB in 1996
LEFT WING
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Ed Shipley's air show career began with the Six of Diamond T-6 formation aerobatic team, where he flew right wing and lead. He is a founding member of The Horsemen Flight Team.
Ed was a 747 pilot for Atlas Air and has flown air shows for over 20 years in the T-6, P-51, F4U, F8F, and F-86. He has piloted a Mustang across the Atlantic and flown a F4U Corsair off of a nuclear aircraft carrier. Ed was a board member of the International Council of Air Shows and currently is an ICAS Ace evaluator for warbirds and jets.
He also flew as a Spitfire pilot in Christopher Nolan's acclaimed 2017 film Dunkirk, which tells the dramatic story of one of WWII's most important battles.