CMDR Van Lovett named squadron commander

Cmdr. Van Lovett, a Chipley native, has been named executive officer of the United States Naval Reserve VT-4 Squadron Augmentation Unit. The Change-of-Command Ceremony took place Aug. 20 at the Naval Museum in Pensacola.

Lovett is a 1989 graduate of Chipley High School and a 1994 graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy. He served two years as a transportation officer in the Air Force before an inter-service transfer into the Navy. He began his flight training at Pensacola and earned his wings in 1997. His Navy career has carried him in deployments to Signoella, Italy, and Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico.  He earned the Air Medal for flights as a Mission Commander over Bosnia and Kosovo. Cmdr. Lovett returned to NAS Pensacola in 2002 and volunteered to support Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom and served in the Coalition Coordination Center at USCENTCOM Headquarters.

Cmdr. Lovett left active duty in May 2005 and joined the VT-4 Squadron Augmentation Unit where he served as Reserve Operations Officer and Executive Officer. In addition to his duties in Pensacola, Cmdr. Lovett has completed numerous combined/joint exercises, most recently serving as the U.S. Africa Command Joint Reconnaissance Center chief during a six-month activation period in Stuttgart, Germany.

Cmdr. Lovett is a First Officer with Delta Air Lines and resides in Tallahassee, Florida with his wife, the former Grace Potter, also a Chipley native. He has two children, Jack and Abby. Cmdr. Lovett is the son of Howard and Penny Lovett, of Panama City, and the grandson of Frances Lovett and the late Joel Lovett, of Port St. Joe.