This article was recently posted in the Northwest Indiana Times. 

Lt. Robert P. Stochel, currently stationed in Atsugi, Japan with the VAW-115 Liberty Bells, completed another five-month deployment aboard USS George Washington in November 2009.

While deployed to the Western Pacific Ocean, he earned rare, back-to-back awards as the CVW-5 individual “Top Hook,” a fierce competition based on landing grades between the more than 60 pilots on the aircraft carrier.

He flies the Northrop Grumman E-2C Hawkeye 2000.

Stochel, known as “Shooter,” graduated from Andrean High School in 2000 and is a 2004 U.S. Naval Academy graduate who was commissioned as an ensign after earning his bachelor’s degree in history at Annapolis, Md. The son of Bob and Jill Stochel, of Crown Point, he received more than a year of flight training before he received his wings as a naval aviator.