Tom Cruise honored with prestigious aviation award in France

At this point in his career, it’s almost odd to think of Tom Cruise on the ground. And even when he is, he’s only doing it so he can run somewhere or leap off of a mountain. In other words, the dude is almost always airborne. And it’s not just Mission: Impossible fans that have recognized it over the years, but now he has been honored by one of the leading aviation organizations in the world.

Cited “for his significant contribution to the history of aviation and inspiring future pilots,” Tom Cruise was awarded the Grand Medaille of the Aero-Club de France, described on its official website as the first aeronautical institution and which dates back to the late 19th century. Videos posted online show Cruise receiving the award and greeting others.

Just to give you an idea of who the Grand Medaille has been awarded to, we’re looking at names like the Wright Brothers, Charles Lindbergh, the Apollo 9 astronauts (Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins), the Apollo 13 astronauts (Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert and Fred Haise), and Chuck Yeager, the first man to break the speed of sound. That Tom Cruise is now among these men as showing tremendous contributions to the world of aviation truly shows what he has accomplished.

But that doesn’t come without some battle scars and nearly life-ending stunts. We could spend all day discussing the various stunts that Tom Cruise has done himself, but the most recent one for Mission: Impossible – Final Reckoning found him hanging from a biplane at a height of close to two miles in the air. And yes, he was risking his life for the sake of the art. “When you stick your face out, going over 120 to 130 miles an hour, you’re not getting oxygen. So I had to train myself how to breathe. There were times I would pass out physically; I was unable to get back into the cockpit.”

I think we can all agree that receiving the  Grand Medaille of the Aero-Club de France is a well-deserved honor. Cruise has practically been a celebrity figurehead for aviation since he broke out, with Top Gun often getting credit for an increase in enlistments for naval aviation.

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