Coolest traffic you've seen in person

ebykowsky

ebykowsky

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goalstop
Criteria: both you and the traffic had to be in the air at the time; not plane spotting from the ground or seeing aircraft on the ground from above.

Mine would have to be the Goodyear blimp 5 nm away and a c130 that flew 1000ft directly overhead on my second solo xc. I'm sure you guys have way better though!
 
On short final, a hawk appeared at 2:00 and about 100 feet away. He was being attacked by a crow. The hawk rolled over on his back and fought off the crow with his talons, still on his back! Then he rolled over and dove away. Absolutely awesome to watch!!

Second place would be watching STS-95 launch (with John Glenn on board) from the air, right outside of the KSC airspace.
 
Shared the pattern with an A-26 at North Las Vegas about 20 years ago, could hear him rumble by from inside the 172 I was doing three slam-bangs in for a quick rental checkout, it was awesome.
 
I had a Lancair cut me off in the pattern the other day without making any radio calls. He thought he was pretty amazing. ;)
 
"Cessna 9ZL make left traffic, cleared #2 for 28L, follow Fortress, caution wake turbulence."

Yup, I followed a B-17 into KHWD for a pattern lesson. Real beauty, too, and it's no longer with us. It was the Liberty Belle giving rides. Burned up some 6 months later in an Illinois field.

Before Airship Ventures went out of business, spotting a dirigible over Bay Area airspace was really common. I once got a traffic report passing KNUQ: "Cardinal 6WG traffic 3 o'clock 3 miles your altitude, airship." 3 miles might as well be in the next state for that thing. It's S L O W.
 
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U-2 coming home to Beal. Went right by us within a few hundred feet. :yikes:
 
I loved watching NASA's U2 come and go at Eielson AFB, but I wasn't flying so I didn't really make this post. Please disregard!!! TYVM
 
I learned to fly in the 50s. I was over the LA Basin in a Champ and spotted 4 Navy Blimps in formation over the Santa Monica beach. I snapped a picture which I managed to lose over the years.
Paul
Salome, AZ
 
During flight training in Apple Valley CA, I heard "Curtiss, flight of two, on a 3 mile 45 for runway 26" after taking off from the calm wind runway 18 wondering what Curtiss could mean. Jenny? Probably too slow...what else cou---

I was cut off by an absolutely beautiful pass by two P-40 Warhawks on downwind in front of my upwind (the runways cross in a T). They were down before I even got halfway down the runway. Turns out they were arriving from Planes of Fame in Chino, CA for the movie Valkyrie. Fliming and sound recording at the airport.

I was also in the traffic pattern at Palmdale with an F-117 in front of us on the downwind leg.

//edit

A lot of U-2 spotters! Here's my U-2 spot...
https://scontent-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn1/q71/s720x720/1378720_10201516976919617_472352186_n.jpg

And on the ground, I saw a B-2 on approach maybe 500 feet off the deck at dawn going into Edwards AFB from the road. Too cool.
 
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A couple cool ones. On flight following into Meadow Lake in the Colorado Springs area. About to switch to CTAF and COS approach says no traffic observed between you and the field. We switch and a C-130 comes blasting through between us and the field. I guess it is hard to see a large four engine turboprop on radar :)

The second was flying with my wife into KABQ. On landing they called the 737 in front of us and that was clearly visible but when the called the V-22 Osprey landing. That is a cool looking plane from the perspective of a bubble canopied plane.

Carl
 
SportPilotCO said:
A couple cool ones. On flight following into Meadow Lake in the Colorado Springs area. About to switch to CTAF and COS approach says no traffic observed between you and the field. We switch and a C-130 comes blasting through between us and the field. I guess it is hard to see a large four engine turboprop on radar :)
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Seems to be a problem with COS approach. I called a 130 off my right wing once. They eventually acknowledged the traffic...
 
Flying out of KTOA, the Goodyear blimp is a pretty regular occurrence. We have a small fleet of Nanchang CJ-6's that I've shared the sky with a few times.
 
Descending out of altitude, southbound over Florida,
a B1 descends under us. Made us look like we had stopped,(we were @ .80)
the Gulf of Mexico was in the background with the setting sun. Wish I had a camera.
Dave
 
As I approached the Leesburg Airport (JYO) about twenty years ago, I was perplexed by what seemed to be a large, multiengine aircraft moving at about the speed of a Cessna 152.

It turned out to be the the Lufthansa (ex-Martin Caiden) Junkers 52, in town as part of a commemoration of the Marshall Plan. I got to look inside. It was a beautiful restoration with modern IFR avionics as the sole concession to present day flying conditions.
 
Shared the pattern at KLEE with a Catalina just before my check ride in 2006.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Coming into land at FFZ and have 2 AH-64 Apache helicopters just hovering of my left hand side...... Or doing pattern work with a Southwest 737
 
On approach to Salisbury Md. Had a c5 go by on an instrument approach,did a 360 ,got to see the c5 up close and personal. Also was flying in Fla when a space shuttle went up,was within ten miles of launch.
 
Only at Oshkosh....
On downwind to Rwy 27 on Saturday before, "Cherokee on downwind, you're clear to land behind the Mustang on short final. Short approach without delay for the B-17 on three mile final" (it was FIFI).
Also at OSH, taking off after a Spitfire, with a B-24 coming in behind me.

At Front Range I was in the pattern with Aluminum Overcast, it was flying over from Centennial.
 
Opposite direction traffic below me when I was at 3500 - A B1 apparently hiding behind a ridgeline between Russellville and Clinton, AR. At first, I thought that it was the shadow of a cloud, then I saw it fly through the shadow of a cloud.
 
My memorable Traffic Moments:

Navy 737 @ KAFW doing practice laps on 16L while I was doing pre-solo TnG's on 16R in a DA20. Twice the timing allowed us to appear as if we were nose to Nose.

Pacific Prowler (B25) at KAFW. Gunny Purdue was doing an SIC course for someone and I got a few chances to be behind him and once out to the side.

SWA 737 near Aero Country (T31, North of Addison). Taking a "curious about flying" friend out past McKinney. Had just finished the "Help me look for traffic speech" when he said, "Like that 737 about to land on top of us?". I looked up and left and there was a SWA 737 within 0.5 miles horizontal and breaking 1000 feet vertical. We were in the usual BYP to KDAL approach corridor, but that aircraft was easily lower than they are supposed to be at that point.

Navy C130 near ADS. We were returning from San Angelo on FF when the approach controller reported the traffic. We had seen the black smoke from that C130's engine's 90-seconds ago and were tracking it. So our response of "55WB has the smoking whale in sight" got a laugh from both the controller and the C130 pilot.

T38's and F-18's departing KAFW. Boy those guys get out of dodge fast.
 
Flying in the soup north of Dallas, ATC calls traffic 12 o'clock opposite direction 1,000' above us. We were between layers for a bit and saw it. It was a DC3. Thought that was pretty cool to see a DC3 doing it's thing in the soup - not just sitting on the ground at an airshow somewhere.
 
The battle of Britain Memorial Flight has flown under me twice. Pretty cool.

BBMF_-_Duxford_2004_(2619946219).jpg
 
I was heading back to Long Beach from Vegas coming up on Edwards AFB just at that crack of dawn where there is an orange line on the eastern horizon and the western sky is a deep violet. Edwards approach calls me up, "04Y, traffic at your 12 o'clock opposite direction descending out 120,000', the Space Shuttle" I looked up and there it was glowing.
 
Henning said:
I was heading back to Long Beach from Vegas coming up on Edwards AFB just at that crack of dawn where there is an orange line on the eastern horizon and the western sky is a deep violet. Edwards approach calls me up, "04Y, traffic at your 12 o'clock opposite direction descending out 120,000', the Space Shuttle" I looked up and there it was glowing.
Click to expand...

That's awesome.
 
:goofy:
Henning said:
I was heading back to Long Beach from Vegas coming up on Edwards AFB just at that crack of dawn where there is an orange line on the eastern horizon and the western sky is a deep violet. Edwards approach calls me up, "04Y, traffic at your 12 o'clock opposite direction descending out 120,000', the Space Shuttle" I looked up and there it was glowing.
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Did you respond "Traffic in Sight"? :rofl:
 
Henning said:
I was heading back to Long Beach from Vegas coming up on Edwards AFB just at that crack of dawn where there is an orange line on the eastern horizon and the western sky is a deep violet. Edwards approach calls me up, "04Y, traffic at your 12 o'clock opposite direction descending out 120,000', the Space Shuttle" I looked up and there it was glowing.
Click to expand...

I think we can stop now...if somebody can top that I'd be kinda shocked.
 
I was in a rental C172 flying out of North Las Vegas when ATC informed me there were a pair of Raptors 500 feet below and to the right. They were on final at Nellis.
Second best was holding short while a flight of four A10s departed Barnes. "Hold short alpha for departing A10s. Delay will be 5 minutes for wake turbulence."
 
Henning said:
I was heading back to Long Beach from Vegas coming up on Edwards AFB just at that crack of dawn where there is an orange line on the eastern horizon and the western sky is a deep violet. Edwards approach calls me up, "04Y, traffic at your 12 o'clock opposite direction descending out 120,000', the Space Shuttle" I looked up and there it was glowing.
Click to expand...

R-2515 wasn't "hot" when the space shuttle was landing?

Sounds like someone screwed up.
 
I was in the landing pattern one day, and saw traffic to the North. I couldn't ID it, but it looked interesting.

I aborted my landing and chased down the bogey. Turned out to be a B-17 - almost certainly the Liberty Bell, which used to be based locally during the winter. A picture I made and some additional details are at the bottom of this page:

http://eaa268.org/Member photography/member Photography.html
 
How about these guys?
I caught them with my DSLR while transitioning Alliance in Ft. Worth.

When they asked if I had traffic in sight it took everything I had not to respond: "I have the bogie in sight"


f161.jpg


f162.jpg



f163.jpg
 
MAKG1 said:
R-2515 wasn't "hot" when the space shuttle was landing?

Sounds like someone screwed up.
Click to expand...

He was on the ground long before I got up there, but I used to fly that route twice a week for a while and I can't recall ever being denied.
 
Henning said:
He was on the ground long before I got up there, but I used to fly that route twice a week for a while and I can't recall ever being denied.
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We were denied during the transition in the one flight I did in the 747. Which was unusual; we are supposed to have blanket access to R-2515 and R-2508. And since this was at 4AM, I have a strong suspicion something, umm, "nonexistent" was going on at North Base.

If he was on the ground, long before you got there, what was the traffic advisory about?
 
MAKG1 said:
We were denied during the transition in the one flight I did in the 747. Which was unusual; we are supposed to have blanket access to R-2515 and R-2508. And since this was at 4AM, I have a strong suspicion something, umm, "nonexistent" was going on at North Base.

If he was on the ground, long before you got there, what was the traffic advisory about?
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Just to make sure I looked up and got to see it. I gave him a "Contact traffic, and thanks, pretty cool." "Yeah, thought you'd like it"
 
Training right next to Whiteman AFB I have seen quite a bit of fun toys: Flying alongside B-2s and Blackhawks were a weekly occurrence, with the odd C-130 and C-5 thrown in there; Was in the pattern with a B-1 "Bone"; Was on approach into K15 over the lake and two A-10s shot under me. They were about 100agl and I was 600agl. And they had to be doing about 400kts; Departed the north runway at KSUS as 4 Blue Angels F18s and Fat Albert departed from the south side.
 
ebykowsky said:
Criteria: both you and the traffic had to be in the air at the time; not plane spotting from the ground or seeing aircraft on the ground from above.

Mine would have to be the Goodyear blimp 5 nm away and a c130 that flew 1000ft directly overhead on my second solo xc. I'm sure you guys have way better though!
Click to expand...

Blimp? Like this?

GEDC0274.JPG
 
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