What, we weren’t speaking about that?
Anyway, item number one on things you’ll never hear said in a single-seat cockpit:
“I thought you were going to do it.”
Oops.
Looks like they got to walk away from it. Which, believe it or don’t, is not currently the accepted standard for a successful landing.
Note for the literal minded: I’ve no idea how this B-1 got to check out the least desirable min-rollout landing procedure down at D-Gar. I don’t have to know – it doesn’t have to be true that he left his wheels up accidentally. It only has to be plausible. And funny.
Which, if someone else’s pain isn’t funny, I’d like to know what is…
I remember reading in an aviation mag way back when Lex ???MAY??? have been in kindergarten that there were two types of pilots flying planes with retractable gear. Those who have tried landing without the gear down. And, those who still had that experience in their future.
Especially if its an Air Force guy driving the bus. You know they would have given to a Navy Pilot if it had happened to them. Maybe they were tired after a 12 hour hop sirciling over Afghanistan waiting for targets.
Reminds me of a certain C-2 mishap, “I wonder why the AOA indexer is not working……BAM!”
Checklist? We don’t need no stinking checklist!
Heard over the ICS just off the cat in an E2 somewhere in the IO back in the day…
Skipper (in left seat) – “good shot, positive rate of climb.”
Copilot (quit laughin’, Lex) – “Gear”
Skipper – “coming up” (listeners on ICS assume the gear handle is being raised at this point)”
Mission CDR (in middle seat back in the tube watching the airspeed climb past 200 kts with the gear still very visibly down – I seem to recall 220 was overspeed on the gear) – “uh, Skipper, the gear’s still down and we’re passing 200 kts”
Skipper – “Sonuvabitch!!!” (throttles back, gear suddenly comes up when the handle is really raised this time).
(Sh)It happens…difference between single-seat and other A/C is that that it takes less time for the single-seat crew to get the story straight about why they f’d up.
I always remember 190 knots for the gear, and 220 for the flaps…………….
Reason they are burned in my head was that I flew with a pilot who overstressed both….more than once, coming into a really “SH break”……
His callsign wasn’t “Cap,” was it Skip? Craziest E-2 pilot I ever met.
I almost hesitate to write this, closing in as it does on bragging over good luck, but I never made a gear up approach. I did leave the rollers down one time tho – departing out of NAS Key West in an F-16N as dash-1, a briefed 300 kt rendezvous (300 kt gearspeed, too), the wingie joins and asks politely, “What’s wrong with your gear?”
Turns out that an F-5 had called tower reporting an engine fire just as I’d lifted and reached for the gear handle. Went back to the throttle to call and see if I could be of any assistance, thought better of getting into his cockpit with him but forgot the gear entirely. Thought I was a little high on the power for 300 kts.
Only ever felt that feeling once after – first hop in an FA-18D after coming back from Key West. Took off in full grunt and just didn’t feel that normal accel – looked down and the gear were in fact up. Just like they were supposed to be.
Yeah. That’s how much more thrust, and how much slicker the Viper was, down low. Ah, well.
Honestly, this picture of a B-1B reminds me of a dog taking a nap with his chin on the floor. With the mobile aux lighting unit as the favorite chew toy….
Sit LANCER!
Stay!
Lie down!!
Good dog, I’ll go find you a BONE
(I can’t believe I’m about to do this)
In fairness to the BONE guys, they had a real gear problem (MLG wouldn’t extend) and ended up landing on the aux taxiway at D-Gar. I do this, not in the spirit of “jointness” but because the BONE guys I’ve worked with in the past were decent sorts. Now, had that been, oh, say, an F-15, heh, “Red and Free…”
SJS
Lex:
Craziest E-2 pilot I’ve flown with was Hubs (Skippy-san, you know him). Went out and flew a DACT mission vs an F-16 during one of our ey West dets — he wanted to test out the tactics in our TACMAN. I know because I was the pea rattling around inthe backend for that flight
SJS
Hope they can salvage the Bone so it will fly again.
Seems kinda unlikely from that location.
Eh!? A little duct tape, a little paint, it’ll be good as new.
Maybe his (or her) gear collapsed because he had a hyd or electrical fire he had to fight for 800 miles over bluewater. Notice the runway is wet. A DFC in the offing perhaps?…NAH..
One time one of my peers put raised the gear in the chocks somehow though it was assted the ACLS created EMI that blah, blah…NAH.
Sometimes you can have your gear down and bad things still happen. A couple years back I read about a Hornet Driver that had his gear down (good dog!), landed long on an unfamiliar runway, wasn’t prepared to read the remaining markers decided to go around, then decided not to (bad dog!) and ended up in a field of mud with a flock o’sheep. In a foreign country to boot!
The last time I was in DGAR, the USAF guys had gotten them selves in trouble so they could not go to “the village”……..I’d think after that landing they could use a beer at the Brit Club….
What purports to be internal correspondence from the XO at Diego Garcia re this incident has apparently leaked on to the web (no idea as to reliability):
http://www.sftt.us/cgi-bin/csNews/csNews.cgi?database=Unlisted%2edb&command=viewone&id=41
I know the guy who is the XO and its his style to the letter……….
Be interesting to see how CNFJ likes having their e-mails posted on the internet……….
“This is not going to end well…..”