Nothing could knock this man down so easily.
He fought in the Second World War, became a hero of the Berlin Airlift after its end as a “Candy Bomber” and was later stationed several times in Germany as a colonel.
From there he also received numerous congratulations on his 100th birthday in October 2020 - and fell ill with Covid-19 a few weeks later.
But Gail Halvorsen didn't let the corona virus get her down either.
Or at least not very much.
Peter Badenhop
Editor in the Rhein-Main-Zeitung.
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Because, as his daughter Denise Williams reported a few months later, the legendary pilot, who once dropped sweets for children on self-made parachutes over the enclosed West Berlin and was cared for by his family at home after the infection, passed away in January last year largely recovered from the disease.
"Course of History Changed"
But at some point the moment of farewell also comes for a legend: Halvorsen died peacefully with his family at the age of 101, as the director of his foundation in the state of Utah, James Stewart, announced on Thursday in Washington.
"The life of Gail Halvorsen truly shows how one person who does something as simple as sharing a piece of gum can change the course of human history," Stewart said.
The "raisin bomber" was in contact with people who had experienced the Berlin blockade as children in Germany.
Until a few years ago, Halvorsen regularly visited Frankfurt, where there is a monument to the airlift at the airport.
At that time, the machines flew from the former Rhein-Main base to Berlin in the southern air corridor.