Michael V. Taylor killed in helicopter crash

Michael V. Taylor had worked with the Veteran’s Administration for 10 years as an information technology specialist before resigning to go full-time with the Arkansas Army National Guard as a helicopter pilot. He was flying the Blackhawk last Saturday when it went down.

Randy Harville of Lonoke worked with Taylor at the Veterans Administration and said he was a tall, attractive young man with an outstanding personality.

“He would literally light up a room with his smile, a big, big beautiful smile,” said Harville. “We worked on IT [information technology] issues together but what he really loved to do was fly.

“By his cheerful demeanor, he would totally eliminate stress in a very stressful environment with all the issues we deal with,” Harville said. “The world is just a little bit worse off without him in it, but he was doing what he loved.”

North Little Rock resident Chuck Breedlove worked with Taylor both at the VA and in the Guard. He said that Taylor started out as an enlisted man and attended Officer Candidate School at Camp Robinson.

“But when our unit got its first Blackhawk helicopter, Mike fell in love with it,” Breedlove recalled. “He took a leave of absence from his job here at the VA to attend flight school at Ft. Rucker, Ala., and he loved flying because he totally understood the computer world and that’s what aircrafts are based upon today.”

And being “head and shoulders above” most people in his chosen field of computers gave Taylor a leg up in flight school, said Breedlove.

“He had a great mind, even a superb mind. He was a truly great individual,” said Breedlove. “But it was those birds that he fell in love with and that’s why he left VA to go full-time with the Guard as a pilot. I flew with him several times before I retired from the Guard and he was a very good pilot. Many of his troops felt like he walked on water.”

Taylor’s former boss at the VA, Dave Chagnon, said Taylor had been as close as a son to him.

“He was a really good guy whom I was grooming to take my job, but he loved flying and that’s why he left us to become a full-time pilot,” said Chagnon. “We traveled together often on business, and once we were down in Biloxi, Miss., and he showed me where he lived when he was stationed in the U.S. Air Force at Keesler Air Force Base there. That’s where he first fell in love with flying.

“Look, we’re all going to die and there are good ways of dying and bad ways,” he said. “Mike died quickly, doing something that he loved.”

Taylor is survived by his wife, Wendy, and children Justin , 11, and Meredith, 5.

From the Patriot