Hollywood superstar Tom Cruise was recently spotted flying an aircraft out of the Naples Airport in Florida. Turns out, it is the same P-51 Mustang viewers saw in his movie, Top Gun: Maverick.
Cruise, who is a licensed pilot, owns this magnificent fighter-bomber. This came up via reports, and it ignited a beautiful and tender connection between Cruise and his love for aviation, as we see in the Top Gun movies, that we were previously unaware of.
Tom Cruise flew his own P-51 Mustang in the ending sequence of Top Gun: Maverick
The 2022 movie Top Gun: Maverick was a long pending sequel to the 1986 movie Top Gun. Tom Cruise returned to Top Gun school, this time as an instructor, taking the story forward from where Top Gun left.
It’s no secret how Cruise insists on doing his stunts, making his skills one of the main attraction points of his movies. While the actor is big on embodying the antics he gets to perform as a hero, he is a hero in real life as well. The P-51 Mustang that Tom Cruise flies in the last sequence of Top-Gun: Maverick, along with Jennifer Connelly’s character Penny, actually belongs to Cruise.
Tom Cruise’s P-51 Mustang as seen in Top Gun Maverick
The actor was recently caught flying off on the Mustang, as he left for the production of the upcoming Mission: Impossible movie, Dead Reckoning Part Two. This is the same aircraft that we saw in Top Gun: Maverick. In fact, it was Tom Cruise himself who was reportedly flying the Mustang in the movie.
Cruise, who is said to have gained his love for aviation after the first Top Gun movie, got his pilot’s license in 1994. Since then, he has this Mustang, along with two other planes, in his collection. As for the Mustang, The Sun reports that while these P-51 Mustangs were used as fighter-bombers during World War II, Tom Cruise’s aircraft is “believed to have been built in 1946.” Furthermore, Cruise had reportedly even named the Mustang “Kiss Me Kate” after his ex-wife Katie Holmes. However, following Cruise’s separation with Katie Holmes, the name has since then been removed.
Regardless, we just got to see one more instance of Tom Cruise being a movie hero in real life, or should we say, Captain “Maverick” Mitchell?