More detail on this person: Robert Greeno 87,
helicopter pilot, of Broomfield, CO passed away
Sat., 8-8-15. He is survived by his wife Tinnie of
61 years, 4 adult children.
Published in DenverPost.com on Aug. 16, 2015
Robert Greeno: Longtime Broomfield resident
Greeno recalled as a hero at the chopper's
controls
Memorial service
A celebration of life for Robert Greeno is set for
10 a.m. Sunday at Veterans of Foreign Wars Post
9565, 11700 Wadsworth Blvd.
Greeno is survived by his wife Tinnie Greeno,
children Janet Sund, Tom Greeno, Jeanie Brophy
and James Greeno, seven grandchildren and nine
great-grandchildren.
A Sunday memorial is set for longtime Broomfield
resident Robert Greeno, remembered for his love
for aviation and several heroic rescues, and a
drive to implement helicopters in agencies around
the state.
Greeno, 86, died Aug. 8. He had called Broomfield
home since 1961.
Greeno, an Army veteran, developed a passion for
planes as a child, and took his first solo trip
out of Denver's former Stapleton Airport in a
Piper J-3 Cub aircraft when he was 16.
Greeno paid $8 an hour to receive flying lessons,
though he was only making 35 cents an hour at odd
jobs in Denver, but it was enough - he got his
private and commercial pilot's licenses in 1944
and 1945 and crop dusted fields, ferried planes
for several aircraft sales companies and performed
in air shows.
Daughter Janet Sund said Greeno was grounded by
a heart attack at 57, otherwise he would have
stayed in the skies.
Greeno joined the Army and served during the
Korean War in the 1950s, performing medical
evacuations for soldiers on the front lines. When
he returned to civilian life, he flew for several
aviation companies, including his own business
Rocky Mountain Helicopters, and contracting with
the Colorado Park Service and U.S. Geological
Service.
Greeno was later hired by Public Service Company
of Colorado, when he used the company chopper to
make a daring rescue in January 1967 that drew
national and international attention. A chartered
twin-engine Cessna carrying five people had gone
down on Mount Sherman near Leadville, but
hazardous blizzard conditions forced authorities
to halt the search.
Sund said her father couldn't stand by and let the
passengers die, and while reports said Greeno and
a fellow employee had simply flown by the area at
the right time, his daughter recalled it
differently.
"I was 6 and we were in the kitchen," Sund said.
"My dad told my mom, 'I know I can get them.' He
was always looking out for other people," Sund
said, remembering she'd asked her mother if he
was going to die. "My mom said, 'no, he's not
going to die up there, he'll be home for dinner.'"
And Greeno was - but not before he was swarmed
by media crews at Stapleton Airport wanting to
know the details of the rescue. Greeno never let
on that he initiated his own search or
deliberately bypassed asking to use the company
helicopter for the mission, Sund said.
She recalled her older brother, Tom, was in class
at Emerald Elementary the day of the rescue, and
after returning to school from his lunch break at
home, spread the news to his classmates.
Arizona retiree Chuck Budde was one of five
rescued that day, 21 years old at the time. He
will pay his respects Sunday to the pilot who
saved his life decades ago.
Budde recalled the day the Cessna crashed into the
peak that was mostly hidden with cloud cover,
hitting a downdraft and crashing.
"We couldn't have been any higher than we were on
that mountain," he said.
The group of five spent the night on the mountain,
worried they might not make it off the peak alive
- until Greeno made his appearance the next
morning with his chopper.
Greeno took two separate trips to get the group
off the mountain, though they had to coax Budde
into the helicopter, sine he was terrified to get
in another aircraft after the crash.
Greeno's eyes on the skies, Budde kept asking
when and how the pilot would know if it was safe
to take off.
"Next thing I knew we were airborne and (Greeno)
said, 'it's time.' He shot down and I must have
been a loose cannon, because I kept saying, 'the
blades are going to hit the side of the mountain,'
and he said, 'no they aren't.' And sure enough we
were fine," Budde said.
That was the only time Budde ever saw Greeno, but
he occasionally called the pilot, especially
around the January anniversary of the crash.
"I was happy I had been able to talk to him this
year and thank him again," he said.
A year later, Greeno helped Denver police chase an
armed robbery suspect for 250 miles. As police
officers' vehicles ran out of gas, Greeno tracked
the fleeing car in his Hiller SL-4 chopper until
he, too, nearly ran out of fuel.
Greeno made a split decision and landed in the
middle of the highway in front of the suspect's
car, stopping him in his tracks and allowing
police to capture him, Sund said.
Those weren't the first of Greeno's daring rescues
- in the 1960s he performed rescue missions and
firefighting missions for handfuls of agencies who
knew of his precision flying.
"Due to the dramatic rescues ... he was
instrumental in getting the Denver Police and the
Jefferson County Sheriff's Office set up with
getting their own helicopters and worked with them
on a program that would make the aircraft work
financially," Sund said, adding that Greeno was
instrumental in getting air ambulance service
established in Colorado, having encouraged the
right people to move the process along.
Greeno received numerous commendations during
his life, including a commendation from the
Metropolitan Law Enforcement Association and the
Federal Aviation Adminstration's Gold Medal Award
for the Mount Sherman rescue.
Greeno also participated in the international
Third World Helicopter Championships in Russia in
1978, in which his U.S. civilian team placed
second, and his flight suit hangs in the
Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum.
While his feats were remarkable, Sund said,
Greeno's family will honor him for the mark he
left on their lives as a father, grandfather and
husband.
"He's done some heroic things ... but he was this
unassuming guy, he was so quiet and so charming;
he was such a gentleman," Sund said. "He'd get
done with all these heroic deeds and he'd say,
'OK, I have to get to my job.'"
Photographs of Greeno's experience in Korea are
part of a permanent display at the Broomfield
Veterans Memorial Museum, as well as a
temporarily running video featuring nearly 30
slides of Greeno's life. An online video of an
interview with Greeno can be accessed via a QR
code at the museum.
"He was a great guy, there's no question about it.
He was an inspiration to all of us," said museum
board member Ed Miccio, adding that Greeno was
a frequent visitor. "It was not what he could do
for us, but we could do for him."
This information was last updated 08/15/2018
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