CW5 Jones, over his 30 year stellar aviation career, turned theory tactics and a prescient view of the future into state-of-the-art techniques, and procedures that enabled the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne) to execute its National mission with precision.

            CW5 Jones has contributed to Army Aviation during peace and war and always asserted war fighting in the vertical dimension. He has served with honor and valor in combat to include Vietnam, Panama, Saudi Arabia, and Somalia where his heroism earned him the Silver Star, Distinguished Flying Cross and the Purple Heart. He embodies the “warrior ethic” and is the most admired aviator in the Special Operations Community because of his penchant for bringing out the best in people.

            A Joint Mission Planner, Senior Flight Lead, Instrument Flight Examiner, and S.I.P. (Standardization Instructor Pilot), CW5 Jones has 9,120 hours of accident free military flight time, to include 1,100 combat hours and over 3,000 using Night Vision Goggles (NVGs). A true pioneer in NVG flying, he flew the first single pilot NVG mission, the first over water NVG combat operation during Prime Chance, and also the first night combat mission to an urban area under NVGs during Just Cause.

            He was promoted to CW5 below the zone by the Army’s first CW5 promotion board. His contributions to improve the entire aviation community will only be fully realized as the numerous aviators he has trained and standards he has set are fully dispersed and implemented throughout the military community.

            This consummate professional aviator‘s trail blazing career embodies precisely what our branch envisioned as the model for our young aviators to emulate. He has served with distinction in every key position to which only the very finest are accepted. In 1992 he was selected as the AAAA “Aviator of the Year.” He has set the standard by which all fellow aviators are judged. "Night Stalkers Don't Quit". "Six Guns Don't Miss".

           24 November 1998 saw the end of a military career of one of the legends of army aviation when CW5 Randy Jones retired from the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne), Fort Campbell, Kentucky.  A "plank holder" with Task Force 160 who joined the army in 1970, Randy is a 1,200 combat hour veteran of;  Urgent Fury, Prime Chance, Just Cause, Desert Storm, Gothic Serpent and Uphold Democracy. He has logged more than 9,200 hours of accident free flying, over 3,000 of which was under night vision goggles.