contraildash

There's a funny LPA 'Capt. Morgan' pose/picture with all the WIC booty they took floating around.

I just had a talk with my flight doc about my waivers, I needed one for retained hardware on my arm to get into the AF, however once I got in there was no need for a waiver to fly. As long as your broken bones weren't in a joint AND said joint has full range of movement, you'll be just fine. It's really not a big deal, even if you have a metal plate stuck in your arm like me. :)

LPA held out and called their bluff, supposedly going to get some flights (in real airplanes!)

"the chair is against the wall, the chair is against the wall"

Came across this on LiveLeak, pretty cool. Wild Weasel Vietnam mission recordings

FWIW I lived off base and loved it. Most of my class did as well. As with anywhere, housing is hit or miss, but most of the folks had some sweet places. And while my apartment wasn't the greatest out there, management was good, we had a pool 30 feet from my door (and you could drink at it! try that at the base pool) and I made money off my BAH. Friends were more apt to visit off base due to the fact that none of us wanted to drink and party on base (thanks for sucking SF). Plus I didn't have a T-6 flying over my house every 30 seconds, the train in the middle of the night, or that damn giant voice. It's not that I hate the "sound of freedom", I just like it quiet when I'm trying to sleep (a commodity in UPT)

I've been upgraded once, but I wasn't in the military at the time. FC is nice.... Going across the pond, Lufthansa coach is pretty legit. I can only imagine how much better BC or FC is. I have yet to travel in uniform though.

I've heard it before, but I have no idea if there is some reg/rule on this. The guy was doing everything but actually saying "give me an upgrade because I'm in the military".

I flew home recently for the weekend and there was a Army E-1 fresh out of boot on my flight, at the gate they called him to the counter and gave him a first class ticket. The look on this young kids face was priceless. He was caught way off guard, and didn't quite know what to do. I thought it was pretty cool of the airline folks to do that. Then on the first part of my return trip from my TDY I had an AF O-6 in ABUs trying to pull the upgrade thing both at the counter and then again at the gate. He was a space guy 'going back home' from ABQ - LAX. I just sat there in line a few people back and listening to this Col. schmooze some line on the airline folks about his service and how he's never been in first class. It just disgusted me. Flight was full, no first class open! lol

Saw that a few days after it happened, although not that particular video. There's a bunch of different angles on it, almost hit some folks in the field. Rough stuff. At first glance, its very reminiscent of the T-Bird at Mountain Home. Godspeed edit: taking out speculation

no, but can I have my lightning back? At least the search function nazis didn't get to you first!

See post #22 above.

I love these races, looking forward to my first one in person this year. Anyways, seen a few pylons clipped, canopies come undone, ect. But this guy takes first prize in the crash your plane into the water race. Lucky SOB! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaJEDl7HwII

I doubt this incident was even in the same ball park as this near miss.

(in total bad taste..but this guy lives)

I got to sit jump while he flew us back from one of his trips recently (not a bad deal for flying Generals). Really nice guy, good pilot too. After we landed he hung around and cracked a few jokes while his aide got the car.

Looked up my friend's Navy SQ on wiki, got a good laugh:

Air Refueling? That sounds novel. How about standing around in 'sideways rain' refueling? Or freezing my nuts off in Poland refueling? Then there's always smelly Arab guy spraying JetA all over you and the jet refueling...

hence:

BIRDS!!! (thought these were appropriate)

I just watched "Beer Wars" on Netflix. I really enjoyed it, highly recommend it to any and all beer lovers out there. The blind taste test was pretty funny, and very true. Sam from Dogfish Head brewery is a hell of a due (and brews some awesome beer). Long and short of it, I don't think I will ever drink something from one of the "big three" ever again...support your micro-brews!!!

Food for thought....what happens to all these dudes in a few years when there isn't a need for all those orbits anymore? It'll be interesting to see what happens to that community on a whole when things start to get slow. Just because they won't be needed in UAVs (RPAs...whatever the term is these days) doesn't mean there necessarily will be room for them in other airframes, after all things will be slowing down across the board at some point. It'll be very interesting to see how things play out over the next few years.....

...it's like seeing a space guy walking around ETAR in a bag, leather jacket, scarf, but alas no flying wings... like you said, you just know.... On subject, there was some growing pains with the Combat Action Medal when it first came out. My cousin is a Tech in EOD, multiple tours in OEF and OIF, been shot at - shot back, ect. However, the AF didn't want to retroactively award the combat service medal to him or other members of his unit. (although it's retroactive to Sept 11, 2001) I think it had something to do with their being attached to the Army at the time. In the end he got it, but it took the better part of a year. His biggest complaint was that his folks didn't get the medal, but were outside the wire fighting, yet folks inside the wire were getting the AFCAM because they manned a "fighting position" while getting mortared. In the end it was all a moot point. While he did end up getting his retroactive medal approved, he deployed yet again and got another AFCAM. Personally, you can bash your head against the wall all day thinking about this kinda stuff, but in the end it's not really worth it. Undeserving people will get things, while others who really do won't. Story of life.

There's a book out called "the majestic twelve" about a rag-tag bunch of marines, soldiers, and airmen that start their own convoy protection. The Marine who wrote the book is rather scathing when it comes to the subject of the "fobbits" putting in dec packages for sitting around in some building all day, and while at the same time going out of their way to make sure that the convoy guys (whom they didn't like) had medals degraded or even rejected. Interesting read.