Chris Rounds's Lockheed T-33 Silver Star "The Red Knight"

Chris Rounds is the owner and operator of this Lockheed T-33 Silver Star "The Red Knight" which is available for airshows, flybys, film and for a 10-15 minute jet aerobatic airshow routine throughout the USA and Canada. Chris is also a Certified Instructor and provides formation instruction and T-6 checkouts at the Rounds Aviation facility in Tullahoma, Tennessee.

The dawn of the jet age in the late 1940's heralded the need to train pilots for jet aircraft. Jets flew faster, higher and their power plants operated far differently than their piston engine predecessors.

Lockheed took an existing jet, the F-80C Shooting Star, and lengthened the fuselage to accommodate a second seat and controls. The two-seat trainer was first called the TF-80C, a designation that was later dropped and the aircraft simply became the T-33A or T-Bird. Lockheed produced over 5,690 T-33's that were powered by the Allison J-33 engine and produced 4,600 pounds of thrust. An additional 210 T-33's were assembled in Japan, and Canada built another 656 that were designated the Silver Star. The Silver Star was powered by the Rolls Royce Nene 10 engine and produced 5,100 pounds of thrust.

The US Navy also had a version they called the TV-2 which was the first operational jet trainer designed to train pilots both for sea-baed aircraft carriers and land bases. The T-33 has served with more than 30 different air forces worldwide, including the United Sates, Canada, Turkey and Thailand.

At the beginning of the 1980s, the T-33 was being retired from several air forces, including the USAF. Some were transferred directly to the U.S. civil register. In 1987, almost 40 years after their introduction, a number of T-33s were still in service. Some have natural metal finish and others are painted Air Force gray with the latest Navy gray paint specification.

Chris has been performing in airshows in T-34's, T-28's and T-6's since the early 1980's. Chris wanted something faster and more exciting to fly as an aerobatics performer when he heard about the availability of the Red Knight in the fall of 2002. He was familiar with the airplane and its history because it had been performing in the US since 1990. In particular, the Red Knight had been the pace plane for the National Championship Air Races held every September in Reno, Nevada during the early 1990's. However, the jet had not flown since the untimely death in 1993 of its owner and pilot, the late Rick Brickert. Anne Brickert, Rick's widow, had kept the T-33 stored in a hangar in Houston, Texas for almost a decade when Chris called to ask her about it. After several months of negotiations, Red Knight Airshows, LLC took delivery of the Red Knight in June of 2003, and it was returned to the airshow circuit for the 2004 season.

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