US Military aircraft and picture stories

[ROBERT CROSS]

Here is one...guess which one is me?
Hint...It's not the 'Mustang' who ended up a Major in the USAR.

Bob
🇺🇸

[guskmg]

Black Aces, Post #11: That picture brings back lots of memories of the "Cold War." It was great airplane to fly. If Boeing had not designed and built it I wonder where aviation would be today? All the jet airliner were/are designed around its platform. Just imagine over 2000 built. Mine was the third from the last one built, SN 53-1969. I put the first 100 hours on it and my Radar Nav would not let the armenant and electronics techs any where near the radar, its MA-1A bombed so tightly (closely).
guskmg

[GCinSC2]

Hiram C. Cross

A member of The Greatest Generation.

[Streamracer]

Wow, keep the pictures coming. My dad and former airstreamer served in AF, Army, and Coast Guard. Was stationed on a private island doing radar during WW2. Retired from Boeing after working on several different planes with the B52 my fav. He worked on the Saturns to the moon, skylab with GE, and the space station that is still up now. He will be turning 93 next month and can tell some interesting stories.

[GCinSC2]

Can’t post a pic but this is a story I have the pic proving it.

My Dad served in the US Army, WWII but with only sight in one eye he served support roles. My dads brother Uncle Fred however became a pilot with the USMC. A short story about him.

Years ago I visited Uncle Fred and we went thru many boxes of memories and such from his time with the USMC.

He flew the Corsair in Korea and of course had the pilots log book showing all the usual details including the sign off on the flight records. He said when you were still in the air and could read Hamilton Standard thru the cockpit windshield it was gonna be a bad day. But he had a pretty unique sign off on one page and decades later it was signed again at a book signing by:

John Glenn

Yes I have the pic of the page signed twice in my records.

Fred later became about #400 or so trained in jets, records exist proving this. I have a desk model of one jet he flew the Fury Jet FJ-3 and later retired as a flight instructor for United. His LSO uniform is on display at the Museum of America, Polson MT.

Thanks to ALL that served.

[BlackAces]

Originally Posted by SVTOTEM

Can the Army play?

Everything I flew in my 32 years is in the museum now. Here are my two favorite.
Attachment 371174
Attachment 371175
Ft Rucker, AL has an excellent museum, and campground for those eligible.

I wasn't kidding when I said I have pictures from many aviation museums. When RVing to the north out of FL we often used US-231 in AL. One time we stopped for a few days at the Ozark KOA primarily to visit the Fort Rucker Army Aviation Museum.

He are a few of my pictures taken there.

[BlackAces]

Originally Posted by Boxite

The last bomber lost in Europe, Germany, April ‘45, Richard Farrington crew, B-24 Liberator.
466th Bomb Group, Based at Attlebridge, East Anglia/Norwich
My Dad, flight engineer/top-turret gunner in the same bomb group, served with and knew this crew. The US Post Office issued this stamp, illustrating that particular B-24 sixty years after the loss.
Ironically, the nose-art and name of the plane: Black Cat
It came-apart from flak. Only two survived.
A book written by a descendant who discovered his deceased uncle’s diary is “Wings of Morning”, tells the story of the days leading up to the mission and the aftermath, and his search for and discovery of the site, including the German treatment of the wreckage site and crew remains. An excellent read.

One time while meandering around in ND, we visited some yard sales. At one of them I found a box of old postcards. Those on the top were used and most had 1 & 3 cent stamps with legible post marks. When we got back to the trailer we discovered a packet in the bottom of the box that had some unused colorized postcards of WWII aircraft. I scanned both sides and put them in my computers picture files and later transferred them to disks.

There were a couple of the B-24 and here they are.

[Steamguy]

Following this.

Always loved the look of the Connie. Saw a documentary about flying in the last surviving one, it was amazing. Showed how the Flight Engineer was the busiest guy on the flight deck!

We're now beginning to see some great oral history being captured from The Greatest Generation. As an example, there's a good series out, called The Things Our Fathers Saw, by Matthew Rozell.

Speaking of which, I worked for a guy (LCol) who flew gliders in WWII. Three trips, made it back each time, alone. He qualified on four engines and had what we now call a 'bucket list' of flying everything US from one to four engines. Told how one of the last fighters on his list (wouldn't it just have to be a P-51) was on base for maintenance. He chatted up the mechanic and asked if it "needed" a test hop. Nope, just run it up to speed, come back. Well of course he pulled back on the stick with enough speed to just get it airborne. That qualified! But he never had done them all, until... One afternoon in the mid-1970s, the Goodyear blimp was moored at our little municipal airport. (It was the only place between Seattle and Portland where there was enough 'swing' for the blimp.) He found out that they were giving rides, and he was out there early in the morning to get in line. He talked his way into the left seat, and they let him have it for five minutes. He came back that afternoon and was the nicest guy for a whole week afterward.

[WhereStream]

That first plane, what is that on top of the fuselage?

[ROBERT CROSS]

Radar dome...

Bob
🇺🇸

[SVTOTEM]

Speaking of nice museums, while in Mesa, AZ for Veterans Day I saw this beauty at the Consolidated Air Force museum. They also have a flyable B-24.


The gentleman on the tail is Manny Quinn.

[BlackAces]

In late 1959 I was transferred from Hawaii to VP-9 at NAS Alameda. The reason was to finish my sea duty assignment. At that time duty in Hawaii was considered overseas sea duty with a maximum assignment time of 2 years. Then you had to go to an actual deploying sea duty squadron.

VP-9 aircraft were the newly modified P2V-7. I was assigned to the gaseous oxygen shop because I had qualified to test oxygen regulators to 43000’ while with AIRBARSRON2. The Navy had not yet converted their large land based aircraft to liquid oxygen systems.

In the tattered photo I’m seated far left.

NAS Jacksonville, FL has a restored P2V-7 in their aircraft display area just inside the main gate. In that picture there is a F-14 Tomcat with a VF-84 paint scheme they had while the movie; “The Final Countdown”, was filmed – in part - aboard the USS Nimitz (CVN-68) in 1978.


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[21Airstream]

I remember seeing those Neptunes at NAS-Dallas (adjacent to LTV) when I was a kid (Navy Brat). Once when they were running up the props on one, I walked by (behind it) and it about blew my clothes off.

[BlackAces]

Starting in early 1964 I got orders to report to my first “tail hook” squadron. For the next 24 years they were the only kind of aircraft I worked on or supported.

The first squadron was VF-41 at NAS Oceana, located at Virginia Beach, VA. The squadron’s nick name, Black Aces, is used as my avatar in this forum.

When assigned to VF-41 I was completing a sea tour and would be with the squadron for two years. I had been “ship’s company” on the old wooden deck aircraft carrier USS Boxer (LPH-4), converted to a helicopter carrier. While there I applied for and received orders to the Naval Aviation Training Center, Memphis, TN for advanced rating training. Of course I had to go back and finish my sea tour and they did personnel assignments based on needs rather than aircraft experiences.

My first stop on the way to the squadron was to a F4 phantom II familiarization training detachment at Oceana for four weeks.

I made one cruise with VF-41 aboard the USS Independence (CVA-62) out of NOB Norfolk, VA. It was a long one, 7 months to the warm and sunny waters of the South China Sea and back.

This picture is the cover for the squadron’s adventures depicted in the Indy’s 1965 cruise book. It centers on a VF-41 aircraft burner launch from an Indy waste cat.


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Note: In this pix, the shirt colors identify;
White: Aircraft troubleshooter
Green: Ship & Squadron maintenance workers
Yellow: Aircraft handlers
Red: Ship & Squadron ordnance techs
Brown: Squadron plane captains (other services crew chiefs)
Blue: Chain & chock walkers

[Thalweg]

Here's one from the late 80's or early 90's. Here we're entering the dome of an E-3 Sentry (AWACS) to do radar calibration work. This aircraft was the replacement for some of the Connies that we saw earlier in this thread. I'm the skinny guy in the yellow hard hat.

[kb0zke]

I wondered if a picture of a B-47 would show up. Back in the 1960's Lincoln AFB had them and I'd often run out of the house to see one taking off or landing. Unfortunately, LAFB and Lincoln Municipal Airport were on the same property, so when the B-47 was eliminated so was the AFB side. Now the Air National Guard flies tankers there. Of course, that two-mile long, really thick runway is still there, so LNK was an emergency landing site for the shuttle.


Anyone ever work on/fly a B-58?

[BlackAces]

Being retired military we always took advantage of using military RV Parks/CGs, especially when they were located on our current avenue of travel.

On this trip we were traveling west on US-2 from MI and would stay on it until heading south down to Dickenson, ND.

When entering ND on US-2 you can’t miss the Grand Forks AFB. They have a great FHU FAMCAMP and the base has full commissary and PX facilities. We stayed there 10 days and did side trips to all the area attractions.

Like all other military installations that have something to do with aircraft operations, Grand Forks AFB, being in support of USAF heavy aircraft tankers, there is one at the main gate.

[ROBERT CROSS]

Bob
🇺🇸

MCAS El Toro CA..1966...Tustin CA 1966...My "Dog of War" shuttle to NAHA AF, Okinawa base every morning for 6wks. A matter of the Corps helping the AF during the South East Asia War Games.

[eagletoo]

Reading the stories/backgrounds and the pictures just gives me chills every time I read them.

What an experience for all who served our great country.

Thank you BlackAces for starting this “look back”.

[brad1]

Speaking of Barbers Point NAS, did you know that there is an excellent surf spot off the end of the runway? I was an Air Force brat serving our country in a support role for 18 years and my Dads last assignment was to Hickman AFB. My military dependents ID card could get me and a carload of friends onto Barbers Point where the surf spot, known as Swabbie Land served us as a sort of private surf spot. There’s another semi off limits surf spot at North Beach on MCAS Kaneohe on Oahu. My Dad trained glider pilots early in WWII, and in a variety in other aircraft before finally getting his chance to get into “the real war” with the 505th Bomb Group in the Pacific in B29s. After the war he flew transports. As a reward for “being a god boy”, he says, they let him train for and fly a C5A. Pretty good for a guy who remembers going to town in a horse drawn wagon with his farmer grandfather.