Professor Althouse has become persuaded that the Air Farce One photos over Manhattan must needs have had ulterior motives, based on the comments of one of her readers:
It’s not easy to take pictures when you’re steering a fighter with your knees.
This speaks to the value of sticking to what you know. The F-16 has a sidestick controller. It’d be a pretty magical guy who could steer one of those with his knees. And yes, even those of us with center-mounted sticks try it anyway. Because we’re cool like that.
The picture shows classic canopy ghosting, which happens when a cameraman doesn’t place the lens up against the Plexiglas, and it’s rare to find the experienced cameraman with many hours in the trunk of an F-16.
One should never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence.
Then Lux, I thinks she’s saying taxpayers got really ripped off and NY unnecessarily petrified for that lousy, 3rd rate picture then. They plan on using a photograph that appears as if a 3 year old took it as their replacement file footage at a cost of almost 400 grand?
…I’m with Professor Althouse: release the passenger manifest now.
Mike
Daffy Duck Time. The President didn’t know? Anybody here
that doesn’t think the President–ANY President–doesn’t know when AF1 is on the move? The whole operation is run by a bunch of ex SAC/MAC types who don’t turn a wheel w.o. completing a checklist a mile long…after a month of planning …and in this case they’ve ALREADY admitted to THREE months of paperwork prep/coord., and nobody knew??
Daffy Duck time…”It is to Laff.”
I seriously doubt if they bother telling the president every time that plane leaves the hangar. Doesn’t he have LOTS more important things to sweat? I imagine the only time presidents think about that plane is when when they board it.
George P/
The President knows because, for starters, if for no other reason than the fact that AF1 is the primary escape and national command authority world-wide airborne command post in case of nuclear attack, the ready status of AF1 and it’s location and that of it’s back-up is briefed to the President during his daily morning intel brief each and every day 365 a year.
Say it with me… it’s NOT AF1 unless the president is on board. That means it’s just another run of the mill vc-25 (heh) I think there are a total of four. So even if that one was joyriding around Manhattan, there was another sitting on the tarmac ready to go, go, go…
Cro/
Erm, that was NOT my point. I was referring to the fact that the President is briefed daily on the status of ALL four–was only using AF1 as shorthand for the ac involved in incident in question here. Btw, it’s AF2 for, natch, VP; AF3 for Flag officer JCS types and/or their Flag officer staff designees when they exclusively use it, and I’m not fam if the designation AF4 has ever been used or who it would be used for.
Point is, the President HAD to know that aircraft was in NYC that day as would have been part of his normal morning brief on status and avail–let alone special projects.
I stand corrected. I didn’t realize the president was briefed in that much detail every morning. I figured the Secret Service, Air Force and others keep whatever assets they need available, like making sure the spare plane is handy, but don’t bother the president about it unless he actually needs them.
The briefing seems a bit much. To me, this would be like telling him his main bulletproof limo is out of service for an oil change. As long as they have a spare car, he doesn’t need to know or worry about it.
George P/
It’s really not that long or involved, no big deal, just a small square to fill in what is the standard daily am intel brief. Two reasons. 1) requirement Pres assured always has one primary & one spare avail in case of emergency no matter what the Pres is scheduled to do that day and 2) what the other birds are doing as America’s (and the Presidents) prestige is on the line every time the aircraft are seen in public–as was obviously the case in the NYC deal.
Actually it takes less time to tell the President the daily status than it does for me to type this. It’s very routine (but necessary) very, very small part of a much larger briefing–takes maybe 30sec to verbally note status update unless special problems/circumstances arise or foreign trip in planning stages. Might be as simple as: “no status change from yesterday” or, “Brig. Gen X on AF Chief of Staff’s staff is taking AF3 to the UK today to rtn Fri to coordinate “y” with CG 3rdAF” –then they’re on to other things. Point is, NO WAY–not a snowball’s chance in hell– Obama didn’t know one of HIS birds was up NYC way that day and for what reason.
The Obama administration has made a lot of blunders already. But it is implausible that those responsible for this “photo shoot” would be THAT incompetent to rely on an amateur photographer taking a photo from an F-16. Compare the photo to the one taken in front of Mt. Rushmore, which was of far, far superior quality. I really don’t believe that Caldera said, “hey, let’s update our AF1 PR photos like the Bush administration did. We’ll send up Joe Bob in an F-16 with a $200 camera. I know he’s not a photographer, but he’ll do fine up there with no preparation.” Look, it was a fiasco, but I wasn’t born yesterday . . .
No, Tom, I’m betting that the photo that was released was just one of the personal snapshots of the event taken by one of the F-16 pilots. No doubt pried loose sometime after the kerfuffle started.
There has been enough bungling in this administrations early phase to suggest that, yes, they did screw up in planning the photo shoot with proper skills and equipment.
They certainly didn’t think it through when sending AF1 buzzing downtown Manhattan.
Of course, we could send Mulder and Scully to further investigate.
I paid $350,000 and all I got was that lousy photo? It doesn’t even have Manhatten in the background…
I have told my husband that I have to moderate the paranoia as it seems that WE have not won a single Federal lottery in the last 110 days. In fact, we are the taxpayers providing the pay out but, what the heck went on here???
Spook over at In from the Cold has presented some details that only raise more questions.
Chase jets from the Alabama NG – why, who chose that unit, but reported confirmed
a military photographer from the 1st Combat Camera Squadron at Charleston AFB, South Carolina – No source but it’s the only unit in the Air Force and the photographer would take hundreds of stills and also, video in the time of the mission.
He outlines it all in an Examiner article
http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-6448-Norfolk-Military-Affairs-Examiner~y2009m5d10-NYC-FlyBy-More-Complex-Expensive-than-Indicated
2 things:
1) there are F-16s with centerstick, at least it’s an option when ordering them (not quite sure if anyone actually ordered them though, the USAF certainly didn’t).
2) B and D models, put the photographer in the back seat and lock the controls there so he can’t accidentally crash the bird. Not sure if one of those was in the air that day though.
Photo doesn’t look too bad. Bit of retouching and exposure control and you have something quite nice for Obsama to throw darts at.
http://www.hornet.demon.nl/tmp/AF1_photo1.jpg
Note: didn’t try to correct the shadow and ghosting, didn’t have time for that.
The photo is crap because it is the only photo they had. It is the only photo they had because it was taken as a personal momento by the F-16 pilot or his backseater if he had one. This is because it was not a photo mission.
Does Obama have the privilege as President to fly a photo-op, or even a donor-jaunt… yes he does. But with exercising that privilege comes the obligation to accept responsibility for it if it hurts anyone. It went seriously bad because of tone-deafness on the part of his staff (for which he sets the tone), and then instead of doing what comes naturally to a leader and owning up to it, he did what comes naturally to a demagogue, and lied about it.
Some F16s have more than one seat (trainers for instance). I’ve seen some very nice photos taken by photographers/guests receiving incentive rides in the back of an F16. Heck, I’ve sat in the back of an F16! (just to taxi though)
….But even so I’d think the gymnastics required to maneuver a piddle pack during flight would be more difficult than taking a picture.
Could I ask what the big deal is with this? The cost? Flying low over the city? Did they take some windows out or something? I don’t think the cost was great at all…the flight hours are probably chalked up as training time just as they are when pilots give rides to distinguished visitors/incentive rides to non-flyers. That’s very common.
The big deal is that just under eight years ago two airliners flew low over manhattan and killed two buildings and a lot of people working in those buildings. Airliners don’t usually circle Manhattan and never with a military escort, so people on the ground thought they saw a fighter chasing a highjacked airliner. Would tend to scare you if you lived through 9/11.
And to me, this wasn’t so bad as a singular incident, but taken with all the other amateur errors by this administration it just looks scary.
Liz, since you do not think that $300K is a big deal, please pay it yourself and save the rest of of us taxpayers from having to dig deeper into our pocket. As in another unneccesary expense.
Flying planes low over NYC without widespread, public awareness being assured? Sure, no big deal.
Another example of BHO’s lack of judgement, or concern. Chavez/BHO, BHO/Chavez, hmm; becoming hard to tell the two of them apart.
It is not an unnecessary expense.
Pilots need MQT/CT time in their birds. Whether that bird is a single-engine fighter or a four-engine transport. Whether that gas gets burned over a military training route like IR-035 in South Carolina, or over NYC, doesn’t matter in a strictly economic sense. It is still required, and you are still going to pay for every 89AW and every 113FW pilot that needs currency to make those flights.
The only part of this story that matters is why didn’t FAA allow municipal authorities to release the information they’d been briefed on.
Chris, it was the photo op aspect (both in cost and judgement) that makes me angry. I’ve no problem at all, none, with paying whatever is needed (as in “needed”) for those that are manning the Thin Red Line.
Others on this site are experts as to what would be most appropriate for training; a photo op mission profile would not be the best I’m thinking.
The VC-25 pilots would require MQT/CT flight currencies (RNAV, PAR/ASR, formation, whatever) the same as any other pilot. It’s a long range jet. It is going to go decent distances. It also has enormous stock weight and four engines which is going to make it several times more expensive than flying anything much lighter. Ask the airlines.
The F-16s could have benefitted from flight leader currency (two formation takeoffs and landings, trail departure, trail recovery) etc.
Like I said, you are spending that money anyway. Throwing a combat cameraman in the back to snap pics while you’re doing your upgrades/currencies isn’t going to cost you any more.
It is not the ACM/BFM/SEAD stuff one might expect of 16′s, but sometimes you get the non-glamorous assignments like escorting trash haulers around. Still have to train for that, too.
RS: Wow, I’ve struck a nerve. I pay for it already…every time a plane goes up for training purposes. Pilots need hours, they don’t allot more airtime for events like these, the money is alloted beforehand. The same is true when the flight doc goes up in the back of an F16.
Sorry to try to fan your rant, you obviously very adamantly want to be offended so continue.
RS: Just reread the above again and your response wasn’t as strong as I read it the first time. I shouldn’t have responded that way. My apologies. It was before coffee….
I’ll shut up now.
Liz, no problemo. Sometimes even coffee doesn’t help me
Regards,
So clue me in here. Wouldn’t a gun camera taken a much better photo? I mean, with all the special effects coming out the rear of the target plane when the camera electronics ‘locked on’ , they would have a winner of a photo! All that pretty confetti and flares, it’d have been the fourth of July photo of the century… Just asking…..
Seemingly glossed over in all of the fallout from this flap, is this question: Was the decision to politicize the White House Military Office by the Obama administration a causal factor?
Since 2002, an active duty flag officer had been the director of the WHMO. I have to believe, in the fall out from this, and the review by SecDef, that you will once again see a flag in that office.
Having flown photo-chase in an A-37, I can tell you that while a small fighter-type aircraft provides excellent maneuverability and can get in close for detailed shots, as a photo platform they leave much to be desired. I would not think that an F-16 (even a 2 seater) would be the choice photo platform for a publicity shot. Handling photo equipment in a confined space (which also must be secured for take-off and landing) and shooting through curved, thick, polycarbonate all while wearing a helmet and mask is not conducive to high quality photos. Far more likely to be done from a biz-jet sized platform or larger. The presence of the red-tail F-16 from the Alabama Air Guard (can anyone confirm that ID?) is highly suggestive that the F-16 was to be IN the photos (the Tuskegee airmen connection is obvious) not taking them, if photos were the goal at all. I don’t claim to know the truth, I just think the official explanation doesn’t smell quite right.
On of the best photo platforms used by a lot of the pros for GA shots at Oshkosh, etc is the venerable AT-6/SNJ.
Slide open the glass and shoot unhindered by plexiglass distortion.
Best model are thos with the old gunnery training seat in the rear that could swivel backwards.
Kind of hard to maintain formation with a 747 or F-16 though.
But agree there seems to be more to the story than we are getting. Transparency my ass.