When you’re in overhead holding, or proceeding back to the ship for recovery, you check in through Marshall control and on to Tower, where the Air Boss awaits, ruling his airspace. If he wants you to come into the break and land, he’ll call “Charlie” on the radio – it’s the signal to buster into the pattern, break to downwind, configure for the approach – landing checklist complete – and put her down in the spaghetti.
“Charlie” is the radio phonetic for the letter “c.” One piece of apocrypha says that the word “Charlie,” when attached to carrier aviation, comes from the signature C-shaped wake of the carrier turning into the wind for recovery. True or not, when the Boss calls “Charlie” on the radio, the next words out of his mouth will be directed to the personnel on the flight deck, and will very often be “Head’s up on the flight deck, turning starboard, heel to port.” At about the same time, the bridge watch will sound one short blast on the ship’s whistle – starboard turn.
Everyone on the flight deck knows what that means: We’re about to get busy. And it’s about to get dangerous.
I’d never heard that origin of the term “Charlie” before but it makes perfect sense. The only thing missing in the image is the thunderstorm…. Nevermind, the ship must be turning toward it which would place it behind the photographer. It’s there somewhere. Has to be.
Hi lex,
This is off-topic but it seems the Navy team for Project VALOUR-IT doesn’t have a leader. Smash’s site seems to be AWOL again. How about you?
We can’t let Army beat us this year!!
Oh, I think Curt has the lead. Damn good thing too, as I’ve got far too much on my plate lately to do the task any justice.
That’s a relief! The team join-up site is still not showing a leader for the Navy team. I was just remembering last year!
Woot! pseudo-Plane Pron. OK, so I know it’s not REAL pron, but it’s the illusion of the pron – planes on deck, Lex’s story…a girl can daydream for a minute, right?
Lex – thanx for the link to the Valour-IT sponsor site. I was wondering about that myself – though Smash’s site is up and running now, he’s too busy bashing baby boomers right now…
Capt’n, it is obvious you never had a ships tour in the old days of C1′s and pro flying, the only thing they heard when inbound was “Signal Delta” and watch out for Angel. These COD crews did serve an important historical need though, the COD crews provided many of the fine photo’s we see of real aircraft doing their thing on and around the deck.
Gee Lex,
Pretty light deck multiple, small crowd, CQ maybe? Not enough knots on, or deck crowd for a flyoff. Very steady deck, daytime, variable (and thin) scattered to broken layer, a piece of cake if not a big enough challenge for those in light attack….thanks for all the reverie.
Sandman
Q: Does anyone know why the Navy doesn’t paint the hull number on the flight decks of CVN’s the way they did with the CV’s and CVA’s?
Surely they can’t be concerned with space recon platforms; after all we only have 12 Oops! – 11 carriers to keep track of.
Bomber Guy – I’m guessing the deal is that if you don’t know what ship it is, we don’t want to tell you…
Sandman – FRS CQ as a matter of fact. Good eye.
Lex,
If so, how come they’re still painted on both sides of the island and lighted at night (in Reagan’s case in red, white and blue lights?
1. Maintainability — it is painted, just in outline form rather than filled in (which, btw, makes for a slicker deck, at the bow, which when spinning around, at night, on a pitching deck, you wouldn’t want to do, slip that is).
2. Island lights are only lit when at anchor as per international rules of the road.
-SJS
SJS,
Thanx! Makes sense about the paint on the non-skid (having slipped once or six times on a wet centerline). I guess that these tired old eyes couldn’t pick out the outlined numbers on the bow.
Found me a new background sir!
Also, didn’t know about the “Charlie.” Learn something new every day! Thanks!
Personal computers? In Bancroft Hall?
You mean you don’t have to go down to the computer lab to load your punch cards and run your FORTRAN programs?
My word, what will the world come to next? All these innovations.
…of course there is the tale (true) of the F-14′s that couldn’t tell the difference between the big 64 vs 69 on the island (and at that time, fully filled in on the bow) and trapped on the wrong ship (as revealed here: http://steeljawscribe.blogspot.com/2006/08/saturday-comics-ii-of-wayward-dogs.html)
-SJS
SJS,
Would loved to have heard the IC conversation; if ever there was a time to pray for a bolter..
FORTRAN, ugh! Computer Lab… double ugh.
Remember that clamy, slimy feeling you would get in the computer lab due to the HVAC needed to keep the beast machine cool? Sitting there, trying to figure out what one keystroke out of thousands was causing your program not to run. And run it better by 10 AM the next day or the Civil Engineering instructor was going to have a piece of you. That’s why the computer lab was open 24/7…
I just remember submitting my punch card deck offering like some lost/forlorn pilgrim to the monks on the otherside of the door, praying that the @#%$&*(@*!^@(!#^$% thing would run this time…progress, a beautiful thing to behold, eh?
-SJS
SJS,
…and hoping the monks on the other side didn’t drop the card deck.