BANGOR – Trey Clukey’s mother easily remembers the day her son, then 18, learned that former U.S. Sen. William S. Cohen had nominated him to attend the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md.

“I’m in,” he shouted jubilantly, she recalled.

The call cemented his decision to follow his dream of flying planes for the Navy.

On the same day Fran Clukey told that story, just two years ago, she stopped and looked to the sky. “That’s Trey,” she said with a grin, as her only son flew his F/A-18 Hornet overhead at the Maine Air National Guard Base in Bangor. “Moms know their sons’ planes.”

Monday evening, 15 years after their son had received that exciting news from Cohen’s office, Fran Clukey and her husband, Dr. Robert Clukey Jr., received another call, a call they had prayed would never come.

Twenty-four hours after learning their 33-year-old son’s plane had crashed in the middle of the Adriatic Sea during a routine training mission, two uniformed Navy officers arrived on the family’s doorstep and informed them Clukey was presumed dead.

“When they told us at about 5:30 [p.m.], they said that given the temperature of the water no one could have survived,” his father said Monday evening.

The average temperature of the Adriatic Sea is about 60 degrees Fahrenheit and the winter temperature drops to about 44 degrees. Navy officials called off the search for Clukey on Monday night.

Lt. Cmdr. Clukey, a Navy Top Gun pilot, had taken off from the USS George Washington aircraft carrier for a routine training mission over the Adriatic Sea when his plane dropped off the radar screen about 6 p.m. local time, or noon EST, on Sunday.

The Clukeys’ phone rang about 6:30 p.m. Sunday as they were entertaining friends for dinner. Officials said the plane crashed about 97 miles north of Bari, Italy.

On Monday morning barely any information was being released as helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft from the carrier combed the sea looking for a sign of Clukey. By Monday evening the situation was growing more grim.

Robert Clukey Jr. said neither the Navy nor the Pentagon gave any indication of what may have caused his son’s plane to plunge into the cold waters of the Adriatic Sea.

“All indications were that it was a normal flight,” the former Bangor dentist said Monday night.

Trey Clukey, whose given name is Robert Clukey III, graduated from Orono High School in 1987 and from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1991. From there he went to flight school in Texas and then to a West Coast flight squadron for a couple of years before being selected to become a prestigious Top Gun pilot for the Navy.

It fulfilled a lifelong dream bolstered by the Tom Cruise movie “Top Gun.”

Clukey was the third man in his family who had experienced combat. His grandfather, Robert Clukey of Bangor, served in World War II. His father served in the Vietnam War. Trey Clukey flew missions in Iraqi no-fly zones.

For the past three years he was stationed at Oceania Naval Air Station at Virginia Beach, Va., assigned to the USS George Washington. The carrier left port June 23 and is due back just two days before Christmas, Dr. Clukey said Monday.

In May 2000, Clukey returned to Bangor to participate in the Air Guard’s show that featured the Blue Angels. Clukey flew in on his beloved F/A-18 Hornet and was greeted by his family at the Air National Guard base. His role in the show, as a tactical instructor, was to show the plane to spectators on the ground and answer questions about the high-tech gear on board.

That weekend friends and family members gathered for a welcome-home barbecue and Clukey talked to a local reporter about his plane.

“There’s nothing the Hornet doesn’t do,” he said then. “It’s still on the cutting edge. It’s so advanced that after you fly it for two or three hundred hours, it becomes part of you. It’s so well-designed ergonomically that you feel like you’re one with the plane.”

At that time, Clukey admitted he didn’t feel “particularly brave” while flying combat missions, but said there was so much going on that “you don’t have time to think about it. But sometimes after landing on the boat on a dark night, you sit down in a chair and start shaking.”

“Ever since he was quite young, Trey wanted to be a flier,” his aunt Dee Virtue said Monday. “He had a couple of uncles involved in aviation, and by gory, he wanted to go to the Naval Academy and be a pilot. He buckled down and did it and he’s been very happy. He’s always loved to fly and loves his job.”

Back in May 2000, his love of flying was clear.

Before returning to his family barbecue that Friday afternoon, Clukey said, “Really, any kind of flight is amazing. The day goes 200 percent better if you’re in the air at least once.”

A death notice appears in the NEWS today and a complete obituary will appear Wednesday. Services, with full military honors, will be held at a date to be announced at St. John’s Episcopal Church on French Street in Bangor. A memorial plaque will be laid at the family plot at Mount Hope Cemetery.