Well, a lot of it is technical stuff about how missile and gun systems work and how to defeat those systems, so there's not a lot say that would be a cool story there.

I can tell you about a mission we flew at Red Flag once where we nearly crashed. We were flying "low-level" which for us was approximately 300 feet off the ground and we flew through a small mountain pass, or notch, and once we were through it the plane started falling out of the sky. (we believe that it was a case of mountain wave turbulence which is a rare phenomenon.) When you're only at 300 feet, it doesn't take long to impact the ground. The pilot had the yoke pulled all the way back and we were still going down. I was standing up in the cockpit, but we were at zero G and my feet were not really in contact with the cockpit floor.

After a short bit we evidently flew out of the downdraft and since the pilot had the yoke all the back, the plane immediately went nose high and climbing rapidly. That slammed me down to the floor. He pushed the yoke forward rapidly which brought me up off the floor just as quickly and hitting the ceiling of the cockpit.

We steadied out from there with everyone wide-eyed and asking WTF was that?!? We had a couple observers on board and sitting on the bunk in the back of the cockpit. One was an A-10 pilot and he puked.

Fun stuff on a hot day in the desert.

LMAO good Lord what a harrowing ordeal... slammed to the ceiling, floor, and went weightless despite all the power in that big bird

Thanks for sharing, Red

Low margin of error flying over mountains is a goddamned horror show.

Man I always loved the F14 Tomcat Lockheed A 12 and the SR 71 blackbird. Both designed by legendary Kelly Johnson or Lockheed Martin.

My Dads a Navy WWII pacific Pilot and TWA'er loved the Lockheed Constellation. Dreamed up by Howard Hughes and chief designer Kelly Johnson. The Martin 404 and Dc 10 were pretty special to him also. He graduated top five in his class in some sort of Naval Aviator school it was somewhere in NY where they train officers leading up to the war. After his college, he worked for 4 years at Fairfax airport in KCK as a line mechanic. They didn't wear hearing protection it kinda damaged his ears. He wasn't allowed on to fighter school. They needed pilots to ferry airplanes. He was a line mechanic and a pilot The Navy needed Mechanics plus he was a pilot he could fly anything. So he would help get shot-up planes airworthy from a Navy maintenance ship. Once they could get it flyable its was transferred back to a carrier and flown to an island base to get it back to service. Fitting new skin engines whatever to get it back into war. Much of this he never spoke of I had to get into his trunk in the attic and we read all his flight books. The Navy couldn't spare pilots is was all unescorted. One logbook he met up with a couple of Jap fighters got shot up they abruptly banked and dogged out he concluded they were running dry he had no weapons no defense was dead to rights. He limped on in barely any control and engine belching smoke. He crash landed short of the runway conked his head on something woke in a base hospital with a concussion. They suspected they were going to need to put a steel plate in his head and nixed that. Later in life, he had male pattern baldness could see about a 2 1/2 inch concave spot on his upper forehead that was kinda soft when you felt it. I asked him about it once all he said is "I crashed a plane, I don't recommend it."

I long winded this and got off topic my apologies. I am pretty proud my late father.

After the war Dad went back to TWA as a mechanic and became an expert on everything in the fleet. He was promoted to inspector wrote job procedures for overhaul of 707 through L1011 he retired as lead inspection supervisor at the KC Overhaul base.

Dad was a Charles E Taylor Master AMT Mechanic award winner very prestigious and one of the first if not the first. TWA boasted 14 of them. This is My Dad in front of his beloved Lockheed Constellation restoration he is the bow-legged guy front second from right in red checkerd shirt and member mark jacket. He really wasn't bow-legged his knees work out crawling around airplanes and walking those concrete floors. He couldn't get replacements because of a heart defect they discovered later in life with a valve.
http://www.amtausa.com/honor21.jpg

http://www.amtausa.com/honor2.html

My dad was an inspector as well. I'm sure they knew each other. He then went on to Instructor. L-1011 was his know it all. As well as the 707 as those were basically TWA's entire fleet. Then to Saudi Arabia where it was purely L-1011 instruction. Probably utilizing the procedures your dad developed. He used to go down to shoot the shit, as airplane guys do, with the Constellation team. I never had an interest in going because endless boring hours at Roosterville airport was horrendous. Wish I had.

My Dad one night out of the blue received a call from an Arizona rich Philanthropist. He had a lifetime love of airplanes and had memories of his first commercial aircraft flight with his parents on the Connie. He bought a Constellation at a Mesa aircraft boneyard with the hope he could have it restored as a flying museum. He called around to Lockheed Martin and the FAA. They all recommended to Call the TWA overhaul base in KC. They recommended to call my dad he found a number in the phone listing. He explained what he wanted. Dad kept telling him he was retired he begged and dad relented with conditions. He would come out look at the plane and look over the maintenance records. Then he would determine if they could get it airworthy to fly back to KC where retirees with the knowledge could volunteer the time. Well, the man flew him out and they hit it off instantly but the plane was a mess its last two jobs were as a sprayer plane then a cattle carrier. He agreed to give it a try and Mesa man contacted a pilot friend and airline enthusiast who started a not-for-profit organization called Save A Connie. Dad came home and began the process of seeking old retirees he knew to fly out to Mesa all expenses paid to get airplane airworthy and permitted to fly to KC downtown airport and begin the restoration at a hanger that was donated to them. Those old guys got that plane airworthy and those old high-hours Pratt Whitney radials to turn over and fly. They found an old TWA pilot to fly it and did got the ferry permit. Dad served as the flight engineer and they limped it back to Kc and landed with local news at the location. The pilot got all the recommendations lol go figure. Dad secured newer Pratt and Whitney lower hour motors they overhauled them Me my brother and sis volunteer along with other TWA family members cleaning parts. Dad contacted TWA and secured the paint job with condition TWA colors TWA on the tail and Sac on the nose cone. Dad worked with FAA to get overhaul procedures and bt dam not only got it to be approved for flight but approved for commercial air flight. That plane flew to airshows all over the USA and overseas it was in high demand the airshows donated the fuel and people donated to fly in it. The Save A Connie was renamed and became the KC airline and history museum. Then the guys started dying off. When Dad died they tried to keep it flying but to many that knew how to work on passed away. It basically became static at Dads passing hasn't flown since.

https://live.staticflickr.com/2735/4...cc4fab54_b.jpg

Retired stewardesses still fitting in their uniforms.

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pr...4y1_aedlCyoTKw

https://s3.eu-west-2.amazonaws.com/a...5650-large.jpg

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/i...oIVnw&usqp=CAU

http://theairchive.net/wp-content/up...-1ST-CLASS.jpg

Hitched a ride on a 130 more than once.

I didn't realize there would me this much interest in my story. If anyone cares to look, you can look on Google maps at the spot where it happened.

N 37.988
W 115.816

We were flying southwest along the eastern side of the Quinn Canyon range and turned north through the notch in that range. The point of doing that was to use the mountains to block "enemy" radar from being able to acquire/target us.

ETA - This is very close to area 51. It is along the southern edge of the Red Flag range. We were all warned about extremely serious consequences for anyone that flew into the area 51 airspace.

Did you ever do this one?

https://chiefsplanet.com/BB/showpost...&postcount=499

I never did that. I wasn't even familiar with it. I'm just guessing here, but that looks like a training route or familiarization area developed for Iraq/Afghanistan. They always try to train people in an environment similar to what they will be flying in on deployment.

There are some other good videos like that taken of the mach loop in Wales. I never flew in that one either.

The 22 driver wasn’t messing around.

What happened to you, Coyote?

This guy was an EXTREMELY heavy hitter in the realm of all things military and political

Please come back!

I've been wondering about RandallFlagg.

Same, hopefully he's just neck deep in writing his book

Russia is unveiling their newest fighter jet at an airshow on Tuesday, even under wraps it looks suspiciously like an F35... China must've given them some of our stolen specs

https://www.defenseworld.net/news/30...0#.YPSDlMSSldg

https://theaviationist.com/2021/07/15/russia-checkmate/

Why are all the videos on the front page of this thread deleted? You all on some kind of watch list now?

Nah, I've seen it happen in various threads on numerous subjects

But it IS kinda weird that a few remain, yet others were pulled down years ago

How about the story of a human weapon?

A sailor has become the first woman to join the Navy SEAL ranks, she must be one bad bitch...

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/a-...cid=uxbndlbing

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...kpumpe_V-3.jpg

V-3 cannon prototype.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...ranate4481.jpg

Two US Army soldiers with a captured Sprenggranate 4481 projectile, which would have been fired from the V-3 at a rate of one every 6 seconds.

Man those Nazis sure knew how to build war tech

Waaay ahead of the game in rocketry, jet engines and even stealth

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Who knows where the Spitfire's famous wing design came from?

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That climb out must have freaked out the pilots the first time, considering the other aircraft of the day.

No clue at all, but if your answer is the Heinkel... the Brit engineers say it isn't so

https://www.liquisearch.com/spitfire...al_wing_design

Compared to the Horton or ME 262, thats an ugly little sucker that should be sent back to the drawing board

Yep. Beverly Shenstone. He was the alleged spy who went to work in Germany.

Probably Q. Don't care:

https://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/Po...-05-105801-333

I actually cried when I saw one for the first time in Dayton.

LMAO

That V-3 launcher looks like it could be devastating, especially if the range on those projectiles were as they seem they could be. But, it doesn't appear to be very practical in terms of assembly, possibly even making it a hinderance.

The hell is this thing? Looks like some military grade Concorde.

XB-70 bomber. Mach 3 strategic bomber prototype. Designed in the late 1950s.

I forget the name, but that was one of Dongs first entries in this thread way back in the early pages that got deleted by youtube, iirc

Still kinda sexy even by modern standards IMO

Not military but:

https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/f...15846_full.jpg

XB 70 Valkyrie

Tacit Blue:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._in_flight.jpg

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...Blue_Whale.jpg

I have several books on the XB-70.

The most remarkable bomber developed IMO.

That thing looks like a test pilot nightmare

Definitely NOT sexy

I wanna see the AF new 6th gen stealth fighter, and I wanna see it NOW!

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Looks like a cruise missile from Minecraft…

Maybe you already have...

:)

Russias new Checkmate Fighter is kinda sorta slick looking, but I'm honestly not all that impressed overall... there just something kinda clunky, and not so stealthy looking about its overall design

Mostly its that big square air induction, it kinda comes up alongside the fuselage instead of being seamlessly blended into it, but those stubby wings also don't inspire me, looks like a tough plane to control IMO

For all of its software/internal problems, the F35 is still the more well thought out looking, seamless, purpose built design by far

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It doesnt have the same sex appeal of an Su-57, or even a Mig-35 if you ask me...

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Russia: Stealth Doesn't Work.
Also Russia: Checkmate!

How does firing a cannon from inside a Specter not totally destabilize it while in flight?

The recoil of the gun is pretty insignificant compared to the power generated by the engines and the force of lift.

B-21 Raider Rollout - Live in 58 minutes

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Did I read it correctly that there are only three built and ready for service right now?

I have no idea...

:)

Heh

Genius move.

The Indians would have killed and scalped the settlers otherwise. They also enjoyed smashing babies' heads against trees.

Great bump, thanks Dong

Been waiting for this since the unveil was announced last week, but got home after work and started looking for pics... with none to be found

It basically looks like a ufo straight on, loving the even more seamless unibody look with smaller slit induction ports and windows

And thats just superficial looks, the real magic is internal

You're in some deep dive territory on this thread lol

Few alive today could even fathom how brutal and harsh life was back then, but there are always two sides to every story... we can't change the past, only learn from it

The good guys and civilization won. That is all that matters.

I like Tommy guns and grenades personally.

Some of the most impressive displays of firepower I’ve ever witnessed.

I like the grown of a good old
Pratt & Whitney R-2800 Double Wasp.

Whistling Death.

If you have never heard the famous Corsair whistle in person you'll enjoy the video.




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Love that airplane.