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Simple truths

By lex, on July 7th, 2007

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July 7th, 2007 | Category: Military

7 comments to Simple truths

  • J.M. Heinrichs
    July 7, 2007 at 7:24 pm

    So, that “No of Landings = No of Takeoffs” thing; is that a necessity, or just a good idea?

    Cheers

  • sandman
    July 8, 2007 at 6:09 am

    As a shooter, that was only one thing you delivered every time. Perfectly. Hats off to all the shooters and AB’s that do the flightdecks so well day and night, all weather, somewhere, everyday. 10-15 excess, if it was gonna be less, I’d tell ya, sure. Not your fault those things on the wing racks have the drag coefficient of a 55 gallon drum. No sir!

  • yak
    July 8, 2007 at 9:04 am

    Saw a less than perfect one in the wayback – Cat 2 on the Sara Maru wasn’t quite there (shuttle breakage or some such), depositing a perfectly good F-4 into the Atlantic. RIO was out before they even got to the pointy end, but the Phantom had disappeared from sight below the bow before we saw the pilot come rocketing up over the end of the roof.

    He had pulled both handles, to no effect, and was back to trying to fly the jet when the grenade blew him out of the cockpit. Something about time delation…

    They figured the jet was already wet when he got out…

    Since this was my second Tower Flower watch and we had lost an A-6 off of Cat 1 on the first one – the Boss kicked me out of the Tower for the rest of the cruise during flight ops.

    The A-6 loss was due to the pilot’s “Mickey Mouse” display (think TV sized display) not being bolted back in correctly after some maintenance. It came flying back into the pilot’s lap during the shot, pinning the stick in the full aft (nose up) position. The pilot might have weighed 135 pounds, soaking wet, after Thanksgiving dinner, but didn’t the strength to move that TV display (about 50 pounds or so, IIRC) off the stick – what with all of those extra G’s and all.

    The BUFF went severe nose up right off the end of the cat, and both guys went swimming, to be picked up by the plane guard small boy.

    The Boss’s prohibition didn’t keep me off the CATC or IWO watch list, though, (heavy sigh).

  • bullnav
    July 8, 2007 at 4:19 pm

    I keep meaning to go to that website. Seeing as how I have literally dozens of Blue Angel pics after the last seven days, perhaps I can come up with something…

  • Byron Audler
    July 8, 2007 at 4:55 pm

    Yak, Stephen Coonts wrote in “The Intruders” about that very thing happening to an A-6 that had just gotten a lot of work done on it (hard landing, pilot was doing a bit of deck spotting) and the next aviator (a nugget) didn’t reach down and shake the VIDS(?) like an old head would. Same result, too.

  • Bill C
    July 8, 2007 at 5:50 pm

    Back in the day, onboard the mighty Midway; I found myself spotted on the Starboard cat. My A4E had a good combat load, about 22,500 lbs worth of cat shot. It was a very hot and still day, we were making our own wind over the deck.
    I was the first bird of a big launch, an ALFA strike. The first word I heard after my radio powered up was, “Lawcase 325, we can give you 2 knots excess, will you accept?.
    Hey, better die than look bad, I think I answered, “Thats two more than I need”.
    What a dumbshit I was….

  • yak
    July 8, 2007 at 9:08 pm

    Sure wish they would have asked us that question while we were sitting there on Cat 4 in our trusty War Hoover, eagerly awaiting our nightly downwind 300 foot race for life…
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