Hacker

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.

If he can show us his UPT class patch, and then tell us what FTU class he was in at Luke, maybe that might nail it down. If he can't tall you that info right off the bat, he's a poser.

Yes, that is correct. He did not go back to being a Lawyer.

Yes, he was all ready a JAG officer who decided to go to SUPT. The biggest thing to realize here is that JAG officers are not LINE officers -- they are an entirely different portion of the officer corps. So, this guy I knew had to petition to leave the JAG corps and become a line officer in order to go to pilot training. It's not a simple process, and not one that just happens overnight. I doubt the story that the Vette Forum guy is peddling...but the people who think this type of career change is only in the mind of Harmon J Rabb are wrong -- I know a lawyer-turned-F-16 pilot.

This is the best thing that dude at the Corvette Forums has posted....this is a f*cking riot: EDIT: Sorry, I guess it DOES get more funny! Will some actual Viper dude please shut this a$$-clown down?

FWIW, I personally know a USAF JAG officer who went to SUPT and ended up flying a Viper, and is currently a Major. I was one class behind him at Columbus and flew AT-38s with him at Moody. Of course, he's significantly older than 26! It's obviously not the same guy, but just proof that such a career path is indeed possible.

Do you think that's why there was such an uproar in the UK over the A-10 incident? Transparency? I thought that SkyNews camping out on the guy's doorstep in Idaho was taking things a little far.

Boom, what "Dude" was that in your photo? I have a couple cool shots I took yesterday of Shell 96 "extending" Whistler 87 (although I labeled the photos "hot barely-legal XXX tanker-on-tanker action" because both the pilots were female and the KC-10 was a 1985 model)

Yeah, yeah, I know. I have been bracing for your verbal beratement of my camera choice ever since I decided to go for a Nikon! For me, the reality for me as a non-pro photographer is that the whole Nikon/Canon debate is the same as Ford vs Chevy, ketchup vs mustard, Pepsi vs Coke, you name it. They're both excellent cameras, and as you've mentioned, each of them have strengths and weaknesses. Honestly for me it went like this: There is a Crew Chief in the squadron with the EOS Rebel XTi and another pilot who as a D80. I took them both flying with me and tested them out. The one I liked better in terms of how easy it was to use with my flight gloves on, ease to grip, balance, weight, etc, was the Nikon. They both were good quality cameras at close to the same price point, so it came down to ease of use for me. Steve, I'm still more than happy to take some of your Canon stuff with me TDY -- I'm not a snob. :)

I just purchased a Nikon D80 and have been very happy with it. It is my first DSLR, and it was quite a bit more expensive than any P&S camera. BUT, the title of this thread is "aviation photography". You're never going to really enter into that sport with a $300 camera.

At every assignment I've had in the fighter community (including one in AETC), there have been phases where singing was okay, and phases when the OG or WG/CC felt like he needed to cut it off. I think it's completely misguided and ignorant to cut off the singing in an attempt to not offend people or be more professional or whatnot. The USAF will spend millions contemplating a new f*cking "heritage uniform", but when it comes to the REAL heritage of fraternity between warrior brothers, the AF only cares if it fits the "warrior monk" image they want.

I'm in the same boat as you are, Rainman. Don't misconstrue my comments to mean that I was somehow against an accusation of pilot error. My point WAS that regardless of who you are or what you have done, shit happens in high performance aviaton. Nobody is immune to that.

That's a great briefing item, but you and I both know that midairs have and continue to happen during formation flying regardless of the skill and experience of the pilots involved. Rules are the rules, true, but without knowing the situation it's impossible to pass such simple judgment. We don't know if the flight controls on the P-51A jammed at just the wrong time...or perhaps there was a wind gust...or any number of other factors outside your implication that it was pure pilot error. Even if it was pure pilot error...what, then? I've seen mid-airs during formation work with highly trained and experienced pilots, too. Howzabout the Thunderbird midair last year or the year before in Chicago where #4's right missile rail came off? Ever seen the movie "Threshold", which shows the 1971 Blue Angels in training at El Centro in F-4s and there's a wingtip bent up because #2 and #3 hit each other? These are just examples that happen to be caught on film... So, you can have all the training rules, training, experience, and detailed briefings you want and things like this can still happen.

One great man lost in the Mustang crash, too. A pretty ugly scene.