Air Force: Pilot yields wings after low flyover

[xaarman]

Let's remember what used to be acceptable in the Air Force:

https://www.airspacemag.com/multimedia/videos/Jetting-Through-the-Grand-Canyon.html

Wonder what would happen if someone tried this now??

[BQZip01]

...ask your mom, she has.

Didn't she shoot your sorry ass down in Red Flag...

...twice?

[Guest CAVEMAN]

Never thought Humber Bridge will ever come up in a conversation on baseops. Hull is freaking cold. Rainman, what were you doing in that part of the UK? I can imagine folks going to work in the morning on the train looking out their windows and seeing an A-10 fly under the bridge. Bloody Yankees!

[Spoo]

That was too easy.

[Guest Winning]

and the only shots your mom gets involved with are the ones on the receiving end of an epic bukakke.

:thumbsup:

[Guest]

Rainman, what were you doing in that part of the UK?

LATN and a little SAT/Maverick work on the A-15 and Boothferry roundabouts west of Hessle, after hitting Wainfleet with LALD, LABP, LVLB and LAS.

To put things in perspective those were the Iron Ass Reagan Cold War days. We trained a little differently because the threat was different.

No MOA required, SAT anywhere you wanted on anything you wanted unless it was owned or occupied by a royal (huge no-no, worse than flying under the Humber). Min alt of 1000' w/in 2000' was totally NA. Min Alt = nominal 100-250' AGL, deviations are authorized, so as not to touch down.

We were pretty sure there was going to be a nulcear war but at least we were going to have a ragefest in the Fulda Gap before it started. Most guys were going to get shot down once the balloon went up. That was a fact. Maverick/Gun was the only legit SCL. There was no such thing as CSAR. Get out your compass and start trotting 270. Every squadron and detachment had an overpressurized and hardened SOC with full decon facilities where we expected to live once the balloon went up (don't ask what was going to happen to our families). When you stepped to the jet you went to a HAS. We never flew above 250'AGL unless we were going cross country, climbing up to initial or had an emergency. You could attack any military airfield in Europe, you just had to call them two minutes out. It could turn into a furball if they had traffic in the pattern since those guys would break out and come after you. You didn't even have to call them if you scheduled it before you took off, tower provided the deconfliction with the pattern traffic. It was auto fight's on with anyone you saw anywhere and you could squawk appropriately if you wanted to be embellished. The Brits would let you down "VFR" through the wx to 100'AGL if you asked them to.

Guys were down low constantly. We had lots of airplanes (not just A-10s) hit the dirt back then (and not just in Europe). It was considered the cost of doing business based on the threat we were facing. We hauled Snap's car out to Donna Nook range and strafed it after he augered in out in Wales...something I'm sure would be frowned upon today.

I'm not bragging about it, it's just the way things were.

Now, it still wasn't OK to do shit like fly under the Humber. I wasn't special...I was one of proably a thousand guys who did it. I got caught and paid for it, but not with my wings.

I just used it as an example.

I can imagine folks going to work in the morning on the train looking out their windows and seeing an A-10 fly under the bridge. Bloody Yankees!

Not an A-10, four A-10s...led by the weapons officer.

This may all seem unbelievable and extreme to some of you guys but just wait 'til you're crusty old bastards and the young guys in the bar are freaking out about how you used to actually physically fly INSIDE the airplane. It'll blow their minds.

[Prosuper]

LATN and a little SAT/Maverick work on the A-15 and Boothferry roundabouts west of Hessle, after hitting Wainfleet with LALD, LABP, LVLB and LAS.

To put things in perspective those were the Iron Ass Reagan Cold War days. We trained a little differently because the threat was different.

No MOA required, SAT anywhere you wanted on anything you wanted unless it was owned or occupied by a royal (huge no-no, worse than flying under the Humber). Min alt of 1000' w/in 2000' was totally NA. Min Alt = nominal 100-250' AGL, deviations are authorized, so as not to touch down.

We were pretty sure there was going to be a nulcear war but at least we were going to have a ragefest in the Fulda Gap before it started. Most guys were going to get shot down once the balloon went up. That was a fact. Maverick/Gun was the only legit SCL. There was no such thing as CSAR. Get out your compass and start trotting 270. Every squadron and detachment had an overpressurized and hardened SOC with full decon facilities where we expected to live once the balloon went up (don't ask what was going to happen to our families). When you stepped to the jet you went to a HAS. We never flew above 250'AGL unless we were going cross country, climbing up to initial or had an emergency. You could attack any military airfield in Europe, you just had to call them two minutes out. It could turn into a furball if they had traffic in the pattern since those guys would break out and come after you. You didn't even have to call them if you scheduled it before you took off, tower provided the deconfliction with the pattern traffic. It was auto fight's on with anyone you saw anywhere and you could squawk appropriately if you wanted to be embellished. The Brits would let you down "VFR" through the wx to 100'AGL if you asked them to.

Guys were down low constantly. We had lots of airplanes (not just A-10s) hit the dirt back then (and not just in Europe). It was considered the cost of doing business based on the threat we were facing. We hauled Snap's car out to Donna Nook range and strafed it after he augered in out in Wales...something I'm sure would be frowned upon today.

I'm not bragging about it, it's just the way things were.

Now, it still wasn't OK to do shit like fly under the Humber. I wasn't special...I was one of proably a thousand guys who did it. I got caught and paid for it, but not with my wings.

I just used it as an example.

Not an A-10, four A-10s...led by the weapons officer.

This may all seem unbelievable and extreme to some of you guys but just wait 'til you're crusty old bastards and the young guys in the bar are freaking out about how you used to actually physically fly INSIDE the airplane. It'll blow their minds.

I always loved how they indexed those Salty Nation exercises, your base gets killed by a nuke and the inspector is asking why you are not donning your gas mask after the impact was less than a 100 yards from your position. You or your buddys probably strafed me a couple of times at EGUN between 84 to 86 along with the odd F-111.

[Hacker]

No MOA required, SAT anywhere you wanted on anything you wanted unless it was owned or occupied by a royal (huge no-no, worse than flying under the Humber).

This is still standard UK low fly.

It was auto fight's on with anyone you saw anywhere and you could squawk appropriately if you wanted to be embellished.

Still standard, 'Fighting Edge' rules. Squawk 11 and check six.

The Brits would let you down "VFR" through the wx to 100'AGL if you asked them to.

Also standard UK act....Radar Information Service.....

This may all seem unbelievable and extreme to some of you guys but just wait 'til you're crusty old bastards and the young guys in the bar are freaking out about how you used to actually physically fly INSIDE the airplane. It'll blow their minds.

That's the point I was getting at in my post further up the page. We're not all THAT far separated from the days you're talking about, but we're at least 3/4 to one complete career-span from it. It's far enough back that O-4s and O-5s who are considered 'old craniums' in their ops units weren't flying when stuff like you're talking about happened, which leads guys younger than that to think it was ANCIENT history when that shit was occurring.

I'm not old enough to have done any of that firsthand, but certainly guys who were O-4s and O-5s when I was a Lieutenant, and even up into my first fighter squadron did it, and those kinds of stories got dragged out at the bar.

[Guest Winning]

bring back the 80's

[Guest]

This is still standard UK low fly.

Still standard, 'Fighting Edge' rules. Squawk 11 and check six.

Also standard UK act....Radar Information Service.....

Unfortunately, we brought home most of the airplanes from Europe.

One squadron of Hogs in Germany representing what was once SIX squadrons in England...none of which deployed to some stinkystan.

[bfargin]

I'll add one of my stories of getting jumped by 2 F-111s when returning to England from a short TDY to Denmark back in 1990. I was flying the KC-135 and as soon as the controllers passed us off to British control I asked for clearance down to a lower level (we were at about 4K feet at the time we crossed the Danish coast) and was immediately cleared pilots discretion to the surface. English controllers were awesome back then (might still be) and pretty much gave any thing you asked for as long as they felt it safe. So we descended down to about 300 feet and accelerated to 300 knots. My nav was a little concerned but the rest of the crew was psyched. So anyway we saw an oil platform coming up so I went on down to about 100 feet and flew by just off the edge of it. About that time a streak went by my window and I saw an F-111 in full burner blow by the left side of my airplane. A couple seconds later his wingman blew by the co-'s side even closer to us (probably 20 feet from the co-s window). My boom got a picture of the second jet once he was out in front of us a little bit (he grabbed the camera after the first jet went by and had it at the ready).

We were approaching the coast and went ahead and started climbing at that point and then got a 1000' VFR tour of the cliffs of Dover. Like I said, the British controllers back then were awesome. As Rainman said different times and you could get away with more and if you got busted, it was handled by your commander usually and not elevated to the point where someone felt required to crucify you.

[Lawman]

Unfortunately, we brought home most of the airplanes from Europe.

One squadron of Hogs in Germany representing what was once SIX squadrons in England...none of which deployed to some stinkystan.

Your not missing much. The big game over here now is how far can we bend over backwards to get the Germans to stop complaining about the noise. Whats that? Som asshole is driving around the middle of nowhere video taping helicopters in an open HFCA landing in a designated landing site? Oh well guess we were in the wrong then... If these ######ers didnt want to have all that noise maybe their grandfather shouldnt have pussed out fighting my grandfather.

Oh and no going off post with a uniform on thanks to the little incident in Frankfurt.

[OverTQ]

Back in Apaches, I used to do lots of fly bys that were at 500' AGL and were perfectly legal. Now I am just trying to send one of or HH60's to do a static at Tropicana stadium for the Big Dill AFB birthday, and it takes involvement from every GO in the chain. One big event changed fly by's for big green. A fly by in downtown Houston. I had done that actually fly by for that even several times. The promoters would always try to get us to fly between the buildings. Me thinking that not such great idea, opted for 800' and clearing the buildings. When I left, they did it. 3 aircraft, 50' off of the deck between the high rises (even came around for a second pass). I was going through a aircraft quail at Rucker when it got splattered all over YouTube (damn those people). We ran over to see the videos and I was reading the post. It was then I recognized the Johnny Bravo language of one the pilots who posted the blog, as my own brother. That prompted a quick phone lessons in deniability. I phones and YouTube have changed a lot. You can't get away with anything anymore. And for buzzing the (fill in the blank), who hasn't. I want pilots to follow the rules sure, but I want them to be some ballsy bastards also.

[pawnman]

Back in Apaches, I used to do lots of fly bys that were at 500' AGL and were perfectly legal. Now I am just trying to send one of or HH60's to do a static at Tropicana stadium for the Big Dill AFB birthday, and it takes involvement from every GO in the chain. One big event changed fly by's for big green. A fly by in downtown Houston. I had done that actually fly by for that even several times. The promoters would always try to get us to fly between the buildings. Me thinking that not such great idea, opted for 800' and clearing the buildings. When I left, they did it. 3 aircraft, 50' off of the deck between the high rises (even came around for a second pass). I was going through a aircraft quail at Rucker when it got splattered all over YouTube (damn those people). We ran over to see the videos and I was reading the post. It was then I recognized the Johnny Bravo language of one the pilots who posted the blog, as my own brother. That prompted a quick phone lessons in deniability. I phones and YouTube have changed a lot. You can't get away with anything anymore. And for buzzing the (fill in the blank), who hasn't. I want pilots to follow the rules sure, but I want them to be some ballsy bastards also.

This. The problem is, when the USAF (or Army) reacts to something like this by taking a person's wings, or talking about court-martial, it does instill a sense of fear in everyone below you. And not just regarding fly-bys. It instills in the young pups in the squadron the idea that any move they make could be the one mistake or misstep that costs them their whole career. Then the young pups become afraid of making any decision while flying the jet and are constantly seeking higher guidance before routine training sorties...the culmination being, you end up developing a group of pilots who are great at following the regs but who have no initiative and no balls to execute a real-world mission without a PAR from the CAOC as to how to fly it.

[TAMInated]

Then the young pups become afraid of making any decision while flying the jet and are constantly seeking higher guidance before routine training sorties...the culmination being, you end up developing a group of pilots who are great at following the regs but who have no initiative and no balls to execute a real-world mission without a PAR from the CAOC as to how to fly it.

This problem is amplified in the drone world where the brass sees everything real-time.

[matmacwc]

This. The problem is, when the USAF (or Army) reacts to something like this by taking a person's wings, or talking about court-martial, it does instill a sense of fear in everyone below you. And not just regarding fly-bys. It instills in the young pups in the squadron the idea that any move they make could be the one mistake or misstep that costs them their whole career. Then the young pups become afraid of making any decision while flying the jet and are constantly seeking higher guidance before routine training sorties...the culmination being, you end up developing a group of pilots who are great at following the regs but who have no initiative and no balls to execute a real-world mission without a PAR from the CAOC as to how to fly it.

I agree with the above, but the dude knowingly broke the rules, I have no sympathy for that. If it was a mistake, then I'd be a bit more hesitant about wielding the hammer.

[Learjetter]

I agree with the above, but the dude knowingly broke the rules, I have no sympathy for that. If it was a mistake, then I'd be a bit more hesitant about wielding the hammer.

Knowingly breaking the rules (without justification) was exactly the "mistake" this guy made. IMHO, not a big enough of a judgment error to lose your wings...but big enough to earn a Q-3. Whole thing should've been handled within the command....not the press. But today's climate is to punish, harshly, even "mistakes" like this. GOs getting LORs, Navy Capts getting beached, etc etc...I guess it's all the rage now to publically crush folks for missteps. Darn shame we lack more leaders willing to create/foster/defend a culture of safe, aggressive, mission-focussed ops...vice mere timid, vacillating compliance.

ETA: That means it's up to us to be the kinds of leaders we're lacking.

Edited March 31, 2011 by Learjetter

[pawnman]

Knowingly breaking the rules (without justification) was exactly the "mistake" this guy made. IMHO, not a big enough of a judgment error to lose your wings...but big enough to earn a Q-3. Whole thing should've been handled within the command....not the press. But today's climate is to punish, harshly, even "mistakes" like this. GOs getting LORs, Navy Capts getting beached, etc etc...I guess it's all the rage now to publically crush folks for missteps. Darn shame we lack more leaders willing to create/foster/defend a culture of safe, aggressive, mission-focussed ops...vice mere timid, vacillating compliance.

ETA: That means it's up to us to be the kinds of leaders we're lacking.

I am also angered that this guy, who by all accounts from folks who know him personally is a great dude and great pilot, is getting hammered for a momentary lapse in judgement that resulted in no harm and no public outcry...yet I know of at least one FGO whose punishment for a DUI was a PCS and a school slot. It just seems so arbitrary to the rank and file. Flying low during your fini-flight? Who wouldn't be tempted by that, even if you don't actually do it. Driving home drunk, AFTER several sober squadron members attempted to give you a ride home, after all the damned briefings we get day in and day out? And then we punish the guy who is flying aggressively, threatening a court martial until he turns in his wings voluntarily after a career of dedicated service...and we reward the DB who drove home drunk and got busted by the cops.

Copy, it is worse to have a mistake in the aircraft than to break military and civilian law.

[Guest Sandlapper]

You know what they say...20 years of gear-down landings and bombs on target, but you fly over *one* scoreboard at 16' and you're forever remembered as "that guy". Q-3 fo' sho, but a public crucifixion? Ridiculous.

[Bronco130]

Still pisses me off that he can't frame the flyover picture that ended his career because of that asshat #4 out of position.

[Tank]

Still pisses me off that he can't frame the flyover picture that ended his career because of that asshat #4 out of position.

It's not stopping the University of Iowa though!!

[Guest CAVEMAN]

LATN and a little SAT/Maverick work on the A-15 and Boothferry roundabouts west of Hessle, after hitting Wainfleet with LALD, LABP, LVLB and LAS.

To put things in perspective those were the Iron Ass Reagan Cold War days. We trained a little differently because the threat was different.

No MOA required, SAT anywhere you wanted on anything you wanted unless it was owned or occupied by a royal (huge no-no, worse than flying under the Humber). Min alt of 1000' w/in 2000' was totally NA. Min Alt = nominal 100-250' AGL, deviations are authorized, so as not to touch down.

We were pretty sure there was going to be a nulcear war but at least we were going to have a ragefest in the Fulda Gap before it started. Most guys were going to get shot down once the balloon went up. That was a fact. Maverick/Gun was the only legit SCL. There was no such thing as CSAR. Get out your compass and start trotting 270. Every squadron and detachment had an overpressurized and hardened SOC with full decon facilities where we expected to live once the balloon went up (don't ask what was going to happen to our families). When you stepped to the jet you went to a HAS. We never flew above 250'AGL unless we were going cross country, climbing up to initial or had an emergency. You could attack any military airfield in Europe, you just had to call them two minutes out. It could turn into a furball if they had traffic in the pattern since those guys would break out and come after you. You didn't even have to call them if you scheduled it before you took off, tower provided the deconfliction with the pattern traffic. It was auto fight's on with anyone you saw anywhere and you could squawk appropriately if you wanted to be embellished. The Brits would let you down "VFR" through the wx to 100'AGL if you asked them to.

Guys were down low constantly. We had lots of airplanes (not just A-10s) hit the dirt back then (and not just in Europe). It was considered the cost of doing business based on the threat we were facing. We hauled Snap's car out to Donna Nook range and strafed it after he augered in out in Wales...something I'm sure would be frowned upon today.

I'm not bragging about it, it's just the way things were.

Now, it still wasn't OK to do shit like fly under the Humber. I wasn't special...I was one of proably a thousand guys who did it. I got caught and paid for it, but not with my wings.

I just used it as an example.

Not an A-10, four A-10s...led by the weapons officer.

This may all seem unbelievable and extreme to some of you guys but just wait 'til you're crusty old bastards and the young guys in the bar are freaking out about how you used to actually physically fly INSIDE the airplane. It'll blow their minds.

Is this making into your autobiography ? :)

[Buddy Spike]

Still pisses me off that he can't frame the flyover picture that ended his career because of that asshat #4 out of position.

Seriously? You mean the "asshat" that was strung out because of asshat #1 trying to drag him off on the scoreboard, overcooking it because he was late for the TOT?

[OverTQ]

In my example, nobody lost their wings.

I guess the AF doesn't need pilots as bad as the Army.

[Guest]

Is this making into your autobiography ? :)

Nope. Remember my point is that it wasn't special. It was standard.