Hacker

Wow, I missed that one the first time I read it. Anyone who thinks that UPT bases have washout rates to maintain are really smoking something strong.

The Rock Island Tactical 1911 is in the same ballpark as the Taurus with respect to features, and lists for around $500. I'm a huge fan of Rock's customer service, and although this pistol is an Armscor product from the Phillipines (Which traditionally hasn't been all that good), the Rock Island line seems to have broken that mold. If you check the 1911 forums, the Rock gets extremely good WOM reviews and as I mentioned, the customer service is the best I've personally seen in the firearms industry -- seriously. You won't go wrong with either weapon, but don't pay more than $600 for the Taurus.

Isn't keeping the C model fleet grounded also doing wonders for fuel conservation? <snicker>

I just traveled on the Eurostar and TGV trains this weekend. Never had the chance to travel much by train, but I will say that the travelling experience was SOOOOO EASY compared to all of that TSA airline sh*t. Plus, trains that go 150 mph are pretty cool.

Here's an idea -- spend a day or two shadowing your SMO. Then you'll know. Go ahead and sit in on the OG standup every day and face the man to explain every NMC/PMC tail number, for every ETIC, for every GAB, for every MND. Spend some time up in the Ops Officer's neck of the woods working on flying hour contracts, and turn patterns, and configurations, and ASDs. Instead of making an ignorant statement like that...go find out. Hacker...the previous MX officer.

Nobody gives a rat's @ss where you were commissioned starting the day you show up at your first active duty station. We're all punk Lieutenants and equally worthless on that day. To think otherwise is ignorant and egotistical.

Well, to be honest, with airframes that were approaching and exceeding 15,000 hours when I was flying 'em in 98 (who knows how many hours they've got today), the Tweets needed to be put to pasture. Who knows how many times those tired things were rebuilt and SLEPd and the like...and as we all know the people who flew 'em over all those hours weren't exactly easy on them. None of this invalidates what a great trainer the Tweet is/was. The P-51 is an awesome airplane, too, but not all the avionics and engine upgrades in the world would make it a viable fighter today (a'la Piper PA-48). It is just time to let the Tweety go -- she's served us well. I'm actually a fan of the T-6...I think it's a great little airplane and probably does a great job teaching students. Certainly the fuel economy and range are a boon, too.

Still not following you. Although it's been many years since I flew the Tweet and had to think about the jet's ejection mins, there's some stuff I DO remember. The minimum ejection altitude with the zero delay lanyard attached was something like 100' AGL. I'd have to dig out my "Road To Wings' book to get the details, but as I remember there have been numerous pattern altitude ejections that have been successful. Sink rate and bank angle were always a big issue with the Tweet seat, and IIRC there was a "halfway around the final turn" rule of thumb -- that before halfway through the final turn (700-ish feet and 1500 fpm descent in 30 degree bank angle) you could punch out. After that, it was better to stick with the airplane. So, given the scenario of a midair at pattern altitude, I still don't see how you're predicting 4 morts simply based on the capabilities of the seat.

I've been issued knives by both of my fighter squadrons when deployed. Benchmades both times.

This statement is completely talking out your ass. You say this as if there weren't all ready several successful Tweet ejections that were a result of midairs. I can think of two in the last 5 years that were both midairs and both resulted in successful ejections of both crew. On the other hand I can think of zero unsuccessful ejections. So, what exactly was it about this midair and ejection that was within the capabilities of the T-6 seat but outside the capabilities of the Tweet seat? I don't get how people these days are thinking of the Tweet as some flying deathtrap that was about to kill you if you looked at it wrong. The Tweet is arguably the most successful pilot trainer in history...before you start making sweeping generalizations about how safe it was, ask yourself why it was kept in service 40+ years and trained something on the order of 100,000 pilots worldwide.

If only there were this thing called "visual lookout" and this technique called "see and avoid" that could supplant the NACWS as a method of keeping airplanes from having a midair.

Let's see...outside of the one at Randolph on 13 Aug 2000 and the one in Savannah on 3 April 2004...yes.

Wow. Thought those days were long gone!

Is there a particular one from that concessionaire that you are looking for? There are tons of great prints available online if you know what it is you're wanting.

Based on the e-mail chain, the original Cosmo dude's callsign is "Dollar" (see the post at the very bottom, which is the first one in the chain). Mr Mayor, point of order.....replot!

Here's the text of the original message, although the reply chain is more funny than the original email. Doesn't rank as high as the infamous "Lt MonkeySex" email in my book (and the chick was pretty hot, too), but still worth a chuckle.

That's nothing compared to B-1s, A-10s, and F-15Es out there trolling around doing "Air Effects" or XCAS in Afghanistan for hours and hours on end, only to be called in to drop a $20,000 bomb on that same guy with an AK or an RPG.

Hate to say it, but he's correct. The Piper Enforcer had very little engine torque on takeoff thanks to a yaw-SAS system. Here's a quote from one of only two USAF pilots to ever fly the Enforcer...an ex Raven FAC who also had significant flight time in F-100s, A-1s, and O-1s. He flew the Enforcer in the USAF's "Pave COIN" competition in 1971: There are actually a lot more issues with the PA-48 Enforcer design's adaptability to the current COIN role than you guys are thinking. It's a rugged, well built airplane, and the design has a LOT of potential. However, the primary problem the airplane had...and has...is that the nose was so long that it was not possible to see the target you were bombing at the time you had to release the bomb. The sight depression put the pipper squarely in the middle of the cowling, so it significantly complicated the bombing problem. It basically eliminated all of the progress that has been made in the last 40 years for computed bombing and took the art/science back to the Korean war! There were also literally pages of major stuff that did not meet USAF spec, even back in the 1980s. After the tests in the early 1980s -- and after the USAF said they didn't want to have anything to do with it -- Piper and the aircraft's original designer made some significant changes to the airplane for a production specification which would have corrected a lot of the problems. To bring the PA-48 back to life would take an incredible amount of time, money, and effort because it would be more than just blowing the dust off the design...it would mean completing the re-design and tooling up for a completely new aircraft. This is why taking an off-the-shelf aircraft like the T-6 and converting it into a killer is a better idea financially and practically. I've been writing a book on the Piper Enforcer for about the last 5 years, hence the interview quote. Really neat airplane...wish the AF would have bought it when it was ORIGINALLY built in the 1970s because it would have really kicked butt...but very much past it's prime today.

Just bought it from CDBaby...but will probably take forever to make it to the UK via APO.

Be VERY CAREFUL toting firearms through the gate, visible, concealed, or otherwise. Most bases I have been to have firearms on the PROHIBITED list, regardless of if you have an ID card, line badge, or what have you. The minimum that will happen if you get popped for a random search is that you'll be eating pavement and be delayed a while while the skycops/rentacops sort things out. BAD IDEA to take them in and out of the gate if you don't have to. If you have one of the permission forms signed by your CC to store them in base housing, have that form with you when you are going through the gate after shooting, otherwise the gate guards will kindly escort you to the armory to drop off your toys until you can produce the form. I have been caught going through the gate at Moody carrying concealed -- I was in civvies and had the GA firearms permit, AND as soon as they told me to pull over for the search I told them I was carrying. Didn't matter. The skycops over-reacted bigtime, naturally, AND my CC had to come out and help straighten things out. Overall, this is just not a fate that you want to tempt. Way too many agate guards are DREAMING of the day they find a gun, much less on an officer. Don't give them a reason to go berserker on you.

His "Big Eye", "College Eye", and "Crown" callsigns were all EC-121s, not EC-130s. Hence my post.

EC-121, maybe? Connie, Herk...what's the diff. PLEASE don't lock this thread. This is Baseops.net history in the making right here...one of the best in a long time.

Cool how his phone number for booking L-39 flights is "215.887.NAVY". If Smith has been outed recently, it's sure taking a while for his cover-up to catch-up. He still has the Lieutenants bars on the flight suits and "LT Allen H Smith" on the canopy rail of both his L-39 and his T-34. His "testimonial" writeup says: He seems to think that the L-39 is a "combat jet". This stuff from Google is hilarious!!! The best part is that on the POW Network there's a link to his ACTUAL service record, in which he was apparently in the Naval Reserve from '68 to '71 in Willow Grove and Pensacola. I would love to read the article referenced on POW Network in which he talks about being shot down over NVN. Got no patience for a guy like that....he may have accomplished a lot as a civilian pilot, but trying to fake being a military pilot sends all that down the sh*tter, as far as I'm concerned.

Cracka, please. Don't pitch your nose into a fight without SA. Unless you were intentionally being the high/fast flyer "detonator" with this post.

Tragic they locked the thread. That was just getting interesting. I need to go tell all my Viper buds that they're in the minority in their community for using that name.