Military, ex-military pilots here?

[maddog52]

I'm curious...(if you are allowed)...especially the B52 and B1B guys...what was your longest duration mission? Was it as hard as it sounds, or was the moment enough to keep you excited, alert, and on your game?...")

Longest B-52H augmented crew flight (extra pilot and nav) was 21.9 hours. Took off from KBAD, refueled over Canada with the Northern Lights framing the tanker, crossed the Atlantic, dropped low over the English Channel headed north then cruised west over Scotland to bomb it. Then picked up another tanker wes tbound and landed back at KBAD.

Longest B-52G flights were 16.6 hours with an unaugmented crew during Desert Storm. Left Moron AB. Spain, picked up tankers in the western Med. coasted in in the Eastern Med, crossed Saudi into Iraq, did our thing and came back out the same way. With the 4 hour mission planning/preflight and 2 hour postflight/debrief, this made it a 21 to 23 hour continous duty day. We flew every third day for three weeks straight. We were zombies after this time and had to sitdown for a few days because we had exceeded flight time limits. I knew we were tired when I woke up from a cat nap only to find everyone on the airplane asleep and the air to air tacan 20 nm from lead. That's when we decided to blow off the "only pilots in pilot seats" and "No Copilot AR" rules implemented by the deployed staff weenies.

 

[Tom-D]

We flew a standard mission of 18 hours in the modified versions, use in special operations in VN.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_EC-121_Warning_Star

modified to loiter on station 12 hours, crypto techs in the back, a small flight galley, and big fuel tanks. you won't find much written about the (comstar) there were only 5 converted and every one thought we were just another old black bird, 4 were destroyed at DMAFB, and one stayed in service until 1982.

And no, I wouldn't go back and do it again, unless you make me young again.

 

[poadeleted20]

And no, I wouldn't go back and do it again, unless you make me young again.

If I got the call tonight, I'd grab my helmet and g-suit and be there first thing in the morning.

Really.

 

[Tom-D]

If I got the call tonight, I'd grab my helmet and g-suit and be there first thing in the morning.

Really.

Your not over 70 either.

I would like to see my old buddies again. I've lost track of all but 1.

 

[Threefingeredjack]

If I got the call tonight, I'd grab my helmet and g-suit and be there first thing in the morning.

Really.

Me too. The only caveat would be no promotions. When I made Commander it was painfully clear that my flying days were coming to an end, so I took all the slack out of the cord I could, then pulled the plug.

 

[Tom-D]

Me too. The only caveat would be no promotions. When I made Commander it was painfully clear that my flying days were coming to an end, so I took all the slack out of the cord I could, then pulled the plug.

I know what you mean, There came a day when there was no more fun stuff to do.

Yet you have too much time invested to quit.

 

[raider]

finally got back to you threefingeredjack

 

[edmeis3]

Flight Tech/Intercept Controller on the E-2 Hawkeye so all my military flight time was (officially logged as) aircrew, and all my pilot time is civilian. Got my flight training started with Navy Memphis Flying Club in '77 .

Did the same Millington gig in '76 (A-FUN "P" is not "a fun school," said the retired Gunny,) joined the aero club, grabbed a few P-2V hops with VP-67 (last squadron flying them, I think.)

Finished my PPL at Moffett Field, where I was a P-3C UII WST (not an IFT.) We lost a plane off Russia in '78---hats off the USCG OP, they were key players in an international mid-ocean rescue of survivors.

Lockheed forget to add a tailhook when they converted the L-188 to the P-3, so I was never deployed onboard ship---bummer

 

[Red Air Rambo]

Just finished up 22 years with ANG flying A-7's and F-16's. Paid for my training with 7 trips to Iraq.

 

[Seanaldinho]

Just finished 12 years on active duty flying F-15C's. Now I'm in the ANG full time, still in the Eagle.

The 15 is my Dream Plane.

 

[Velocity173]

Just finished up 22 years with ANG flying A-7's and F-16's. Paid for my training with 7 trips to Iraq.

Love the SLUF! wish someone would restore one and get it on the air show circuit.

I just finished 20 yrs of service. 8 yrs USMC ATC and 12 yrs Army UH-60 pilot. Currently helicopter EMS stuff. While others in USMC were using their paychecks to buy beer I was using my E-3 pay to get my pilots license...and a little for beer. Got picked up in the Army because I was getting too old and only had 2 yrs of college. Used my year flying in Iraq money to buy my Glasair and used my year in Afghanistan money to buy my Velocity. Love GA and try to fly-in to air shows as much as possible.

 

[Red Air Rambo]

The SLUF was a great plane...we had a joke about how many A-7 pilots does it take to change a light bulb...3, one to change it and two to talk about how good the old one was.

 

[patrick wentworth]

B52G, D 1969 1972. home base Blytheville Ark. Nav/Electronics
warfare Officer
Flights out of U-Tapao 2-3 hours round trip to create divots in truck parks.
Flights out of Guam 12 hours in the air plus Prebrief and Debrief.
Fly -stand down 20 hours - fly -- Wash rinse and repeat for a year and a half.
Linebacker II and Last Buff out of the local turkey shoot.

Could not stand not being in the air so at 60 started PP so I could get the correct perspective on the world.

Wasn't cheap --but I was easy :wink2:

 

[35 AoA]

Active duty F/A-18C guy here. Standard orange and white aircraft prior to that. Nice to meet y'all

 

[rondebmar]

1958 Boot Camp, then Highly Classified & High Tech “A” School
Memphis TN (Electronics)
1959/60 Radar Tech & Operator on P-4, P-2, & WV-2Q A/C flying “ferret”
missions w/VQ-2 …based at Rota Spain, operated out of Incirlic
AFB Turkey E-5 Pro Pay Flight Skins
1961/62 NavCad program, Pensacola FL & Corpus Christi TX …T-34, T-28,
AD-6/7 (Later the A1H)
1962/65 Two Med cruises in USS Saratoga flying A-1H w/VA-35
1965/66 Jet Transition w/VA-127 (TF-9J) & VA-125 (A4C) Lemoore CA
1966 105 Missions over 'Nam w/VA-95 in USS Intrepid flying A4B
did it all ...CAS off Dixie Station, Rolling Thunder off Yankee
1967/68 A7 Flight Instructor Pilot w/VA-122, the West coast RAG ...
Among the first 100 tofly the A/C
1968/84 FE w/UAL ...727, DC-8, 727 in that order ...EWR, LGA, JFK, LGA,
MIA, SFO, MIA ...in that order

 

[Velocity173]

1958 Boot Camp, then Highly Classified & High Tech “A” School
Memphis TN (Electronics)
1959/60 Radar Tech & Operator on P-4, P-2, & WV-2Q A/C flying “ferret”
missions w/VQ-2 …based at Rota Spain, operated out of Incirlic
AFB Turkey E-5 Pro Pay Flight Skins
1961/62 NavCad program, Pensacola FL & Corpus Christi TX …T-34, T-28,
AD-6/7 (Later the A1H)
1962/65 Two Med cruises in USS Saratoga flying A-1H w/VA-35
1965/66 Jet Transition w/VA-127 (TF-9J) & VA-125 (A4C) Lemoore CA
1966 105 Missions over 'Nam w/VA-95 in USS Intrepid flying A4B
did it all ...CAS off Dixie Station, Rolling Thunder off Yankee
1967/68 A7 Flight Instructor Pilot w/VA-122, the West coast RAG ...
Among the first 100 tofly the A/C
1968/84 FE w/UAL ...727, DC-8, 727 in that order ...EWR, LGA, JFK, LGA,
MIA, SFO, MIA ...in that order

Just finished Rampant Raider the other day. Great book about great men flying a great aircraft. Thanks for your service!

 

[rondebmar]

Yep ...that one's in my library ...Stephen R. Gray

Scooter was a great airplane ...not a bad glider, either!!

http://a4skyhawk.org/?q=2d/tins/tins-glider_ron-marron.htm

 

[Red Air Rambo]

Active duty F/A-18C guy here. Standard orange and white aircraft prior to that. Nice to meet y'all

Does Oceana still let the local girls in on Friday nights?...That used to be the best O'Club in the US...IMHO.

 

[poadeleted20]

Does Oceana still let the local girls in on Friday nights?...That used to be the best O'Club in the US...IMHO.

Been there, and the W0X0F Room at Miramar was better.

 

[Red Air Rambo]

Been there, and the W0X0F Room at Miramar was better.

Sadly, I never made it to Miramar...or the animal house down in Panama...or the Phillipines...all legends.

 

[Tom-D]

1958 Boot Camp, then Highly Classified & High Tech “A” School
Memphis TN (Electronics)
1959/60 Radar Tech & Operator on P-4, P-2, & WV-2Q A/C flying “ferret”
missions w/VQ-2 …based at Rota Spain, operated out of Incirlic
AFB Turkey E-5 Pro Pay Flight Skins
1961/62 NavCad program, Pensacola FL & Corpus Christi TX …T-34, T-28,
AD-6/7 (Later the A1H)
1962/65 Two Med cruises in USS Saratoga flying A-1H w/VA-35
1965/66 Jet Transition w/VA-127 (TF-9J) & VA-125 (A4C) Lemoore CA
1966 105 Missions over 'Nam w/VA-95 in USS Intrepid flying A4B
did it all ...CAS off Dixie Station, Rolling Thunder off Yankee
1967/68 A7 Flight Instructor Pilot w/VA-122, the West coast RAG ...
Among the first 100 tofly the A/C
1968/84 FE w/UAL ...727, DC-8, 727 in that order ...EWR, LGA, JFK, LGA,
MIA, SFO, MIA ...in that order

Impressive,, ! I have one of those patches too.

 

[35 AoA]

Been there, and the W0X0F Room at Miramar was better.

Miramar is still much better, even if not up to the standards that the old guys tell tales of. Went through VMFAT-101 there, so I spent plenty of nights there and there is no comparison to the Oceana club. The Oceana club isn't bad, but it is wed and fri only for all intents and purposes, isn't happening very late, and is a very closed crowd.....ie not many of the fairer sex that don't happen to also wear a flight suit for a living.

 

[poadeleted20]

not many of the fairer sex that don't happen to also wear a flight suit for a living.

We only had six who did when I was flying in the Navy; I went through preflight with them.

 

[35 AoA]

We only had six who did when I was flying in the Navy; I went through preflight with them.

There still aren't many on the VFA side.......decent amount of female Rhino WSO's, but for the single anchor crowd, not as much. Lots in helos and P-3's however.

 

[poadeleted20]

There still aren't many on the VFA side.......decent amount of female Rhino WSO's...

I'd sure love to put my Intruder/Phantom/Aardvark BN/WSO experience in the back seat of one of those F-models for even just one flight off the boat low level to a range and back...those are lucky girls to be riding that jet.

 

[35 AoA]

I'd love to hear about the Aardvark (or Intruder/Phantom for that matter).....always seemed like such a cool airplane. Exchange/PEP tour?

 

[poadeleted20]

I'd love to hear about the Aardvark (or Intruder/Phantom for that matter).....always seemed like such a cool airplane. Exchange/PEP tour?

Started Navy (A-6), then went Naval Reserve (10 months black shoe job), Air Guard (RF-4C), and Air Force (F-111), in that order. Lots of fun (14 years and 2000 hours in tac jet cockpits, never a desk except those 10 months), but not career enhancing. Since you're near by (I'm just up Route 13 in Salisbury MD), maybe we can meet at a fly-in some time and trade tales of the old and the new.

 

[35 AoA]

Started Navy (A-6), then went Naval Reserve (10 months black shoe job), Air Guard (RF-4C), and Air Force (F-111), in that order. Lots of fun (14 years and 2000 hours in tac jet cockpits, never a desk except those 10 months), but not career enhancing. Since you're near by (I'm just up Route 13 in Salisbury MD), maybe we can meet at a fly-in some time and trade tales of the old and the new.

Absolutely, I'd be down for some fly-in, though I might scare myself actually doing the flying in part......been a while since I've flared to land if you know what I mean

 

[comanchepilot]

Well, it was only concrete practice bombs...and there were only bears, not pigs, where we dropped.

I always wondered by we dropped bombs on Qadaffi, Kadaffi, Khadaffi, or whatever. We should have just loaded pigs and dropped them all over his compound. . . . I think bombing Mooslems with pigs is better than bombs - imagine their horror when pig guts and blood are all over everything. . . . its a WMD that is a renewable resource . . .

and yeah

 

[poadeleted20]

I always wondered by we dropped bombs on Qadaffi, Kadaffi, Khadaffi, or whatever. We should have just loaded pigs and dropped them all over his compound. . . . I think bombing Mooslems with pigs is better than bombs - imagine their horror when pig guts and blood are all over everything. . . . its a WMD that is a renewable resource . . .

Wasn't there a scene in an action movie with Schwartzenegger or Stallone or the like where at the end the Islamic terrorist is lying there bleeding to death and the good guy shoves a pork chop in his mouth and says, "Now you'll meet Allah with pork in you and you'll never get to Paradise"?

 

[Gucci Pilot]

Found this thread searching "military". Currently a KC-10 pilot living the dream. Did my flight training in high school not thinking I was going to do the military route. Love every minute of it so far! Longest flight so far has been 16 hours and that was on one tank of gas(no air refueling). Shortest flight so far has been 4.5 hours. Typical flights in the desert are around 10 hours.

 

[Warlock]

Army/ARNG 1983-2004 UH-1H, OH-58A/C's, AH-1 S/MODS/F 's and last 14 years AH-64A...

 

[35 AoA]

Found this thread searching "military". Currently a KC-10 pilot living the dream. Did my flight training in high school not thinking I was going to do the military route. Love every minute of it so far! Longest flight so far has been 16 hours and that was on one tank of gas(no air refueling). Shortest flight so far has been 4.5 hours. Typical flights in the desert are around 10 hours.

Let me tell you, seeing a soft basket/KC-10 or KC-135MPRS on the ATO for my event really raised morale. We loved you guys. Nothing worse than plugging the maiden for 6 hours straight in country.....especially when 50% of the time they were auto pilot off and it was bumpy.....FML. I do remember we had a couple guys get an all female KC-10 crew at one point. That story became a ready room legend when they got back from the flight. "Dude we have a confirmed blonde in the left seat"

 

[35 AoA]

Although a blackshoe when I was in the Navy, best O-club hands down was NAS Cubi Point, Phillipines. They actually disassembled the bar and other assorted accoutrements and moved them to the Naval Air Museum at NAS Pensacola.

Yeah, my old man has some good stories from Cubi back in the Vietnam era. I've only been to the P-cola one, but judging by the stories, it falls a little short of recreating the atmosphere of the original

 

[Gucci Pilot]

Let me tell you, seeing a soft basket/KC-10 or KC-135MPRS on the ATO for my event really raised morale. We loved you guys.

Our only goal in country...to be better than the 135

 

[35 AoA]

Our only goal in country...to be better than the 135

That bar is pretty low so maybe not the best goal?

Seriously though, all of you guys did a good job, regardless of type. I had a whole slew of fuel related emergencies (all being my wingman incidentally) in AFG and IRQ and I never heard anyone say "no" to our crazy annoying needs. I can't speak for AF types, for for your Navy/USMC receivers, just remember that pointing at us very rarely helps the problem of joining. We are going to set an offset of a few miles either side at range on the radar, and then will make it happen to be in port obs/left rejoin. The most annoying thing any tanker did was hot nose me the entire time off TCAS......to the point (it was widespread) that I would immediately secure mode III when I checked in on boom. It probably sounds counter intuitive, but I want to be flying a max range profile the whole way with auto throttles and then use geometry to make the rejoin happen, rather than have a high aspect merge happen and then have to use a bunch of gas/burner to turn hard and get back next to you. If that makes sense.

 

[Velocity173]

Just noticed 3 Finger hasn't posted in almost a year. Used to be a regular.

 

[Gucci Pilot]

That bar is pretty low so maybe not the best goal?

Seriously though, all of you guys did a good job, regardless of type. I had a whole slew of fuel related emergencies (all being my wingman incidentally) in AFG and IRQ and I never heard anyone say "no" to our crazy annoying needs. I can't speak for AF types, for for your Navy/USMC receivers, just remember that pointing at us very rarely helps the problem of joining. We are going to set an offset of a few miles either side at range on the radar, and then will make it happen to be in port obs/left rejoin. The most annoying thing any tanker did was hot nose me the entire time off TCAS......to the point (it was widespread) that I would immediately secure mode III when I checked in on boom. It probably sounds counter intuitive, but I want to be flying a max range profile the whole way with auto throttles and then use geometry to make the rejoin happen, rather than have a high aspect merge happen and then have to use a bunch of gas/burner to turn hard and get back next to you. If that makes sense.

True, I'll set a new one for next deployment. Yeah you fighter guys are the easiest to deal with. Had a pilot start turning into our F-16 receivers. I said, "roll out...they will come to us"

 

[35 AoA]

True, I'll set a new one for next deployment. Yeah you fighter guys are the easiest to deal with. Had a pilot start turning into our F-16 receivers. I said, "roll out...they will come to us"

You got it!

 

[kayoh190]

Just stopping by to say that you guys are the friggin' tits. All of you.

Thanks.