Aircraft carrier.

Gosh, I love that stuff.

I worked for Navy Flight Test as a civilian engineer for about 2 years.

I've been on flight lines since I was 18 (USMC) now 57 (Commercial 121) nearly 40 years.

Hands down, the most exciting 2 weeks were my two weeks on a carrier shake down cruise. We used to go out and use instrumented flight test birds to obtain data to compare with control center data to certify the ships approach system when they came out of dry dock.

I spent some few hours on that ships operating flight deck of a ship (not even been fully populated yet). Within about 90 sec, there was an F14 catching a wire, two F18s off the bow and prop wash from 1 or 2 repositiong E-2Cs within about 100 ft of each other.

Just an incredible, and dangerous proposition.

Thanks for the memory. Good time to hit the gym. Maybe I'll listen to he Top Gun sound track on the way.
 
The new 70 series carriers are awesome when I walked aboard the Lincoln last year I realized that the forward hangar deck was as large as both hangars in Coral Sea. The Cats are twice as long, the aircraft elevators are 1/2 again bigger.

but they both smelled the same. The fire fighting equipment is the same old stuff that has worked for decades, Bunks and living conditions are the same as Ranger or Independence.

It's a thrill to stand by the Island and watch the carrier do a high speed turn to port and watch the angle rise well above the horizon.
 
Tom-D said:
The new 70 series carriers are awesome when I walked aboard the Lincoln last year I realized that the forward hangar deck was as large as both hangars in Coral Sea. The Cats are twice as long, the aircraft elevators are 1/2 again bigger.

but they both smelled the same. The fire fighting equipment is the same old stuff that has worked for decades, Bunks and living conditions are the same as Ranger or Independence.

It's a thrill to stand by the Island and watch the carrier do a high speed turn to port and watch the angle rise well above the horizon.
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Were you on the Independence?
 
Maxmosbey said:
Were you on the Independence?
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Yes 80-81 cruise to the IO, VAQ (131 Squadron flight deck Coordinator)

plus the 76 cruise on the Ranger VAQ135 (135 Squadron flight deck Coordinator)

And the ComNavAirPac safety team for the ORI inspections for Coral Sea, Oriskany, Mid Way, Enterprise, Connie, And a few I've probably forgotten. I spent 12 years in and out of North Island attached to ComNavAirPac. staff mostly flight crew. (90%)
 
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Tom-D said:
Yes 80-81 cruise to the IO, VAQ (131 Squadron flight deck Coordinator)

plus the 76 cruise on the Ranger VAQ135 (135 Squadron flight deck Coordinator)

And the ComNavAirPac safety team for the ORI inspections for Coral Sea, Oriskany, Mid Way, Enterprise, Connie, And a few I've probably forgotten. I spent 12 years in and out of North Island attached to ComNavAirPac. staff mostly flight crew. (90%)
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I was with HS-5 out of Quonset Point and on the Intrepid in 70. When when they decommissioned the Intrepid we were moved to Jacksonvile, FL. and assigned to the Independence. I made a couple of cruises on Independence. I was an ADJ-2 and worked the line division. I always liked the extra pay for working the flight deck.
 
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*sigh*

Man, I could watch Tomcats all day. The Hornet is cool, but it's not a Tomcat...
 
Tomcat guys are just a bunch of picture-taking mofo's! Don't be effing with the Hornet's nest! :D
 
I cruised on Nimitz, Connie and Ranger with VAW-112 as an aircrewman. We recently toured the Midway museum in San Diego - the sights, sounds and smells never fade away.

The poor S-3 Viking sure got a bad rap on the video ... "refueling plane" ... yeah, it did that, but so did anything else that could carry a buddy store fuel tank. The S-3 was first and foremost, a sub hunter. It's possible armament was:

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_S-3_Viking

Up to 4,900 lb (2,220 kg) on four internal and two external hardpoints, including:

10 × 500 lb (227 kg) Mark 82 bombs
2 × 1000 lb (454 kg) Mark 83 bombs
2 × 2000 lb (908 kg) Mark 84 bombs
6 × CBU-100 cluster bombs
2 × Mark 50 torpedoes
4 × Mark 46 torpedoes
6 × mines or depth charges
2 × B57 nuclear bombs
2 × AGM-65E/F Maverick missiles
2 × AGM-84D Harpoon missiles
1 × AGM-84H/K SLAM-ER missile

The two underwing hardpoints can also be fitted with unguided rocket pods or 300 US gal (1,136 l) fuel tanks.

so yeah, last but not least - it could carry fuel.

The video commentator said "on the carrier, the work starts at dawn" ... but it fact was a true 24x7 operation, with Day shift and Night shift providing round the clock support.
 
gkainz said:
I cruised on Nimitz, Connie and Ranger with VAW-112 as an aircrewman. We recently toured the Midway museum in San Diego - the sights, sounds and smells never fade away.

The poor S-3 Viking sure got a bad rap on the video ... "refueling plane" ... yeah, it did that, but so did anything else that could carry a buddy store fuel tank. The S-3 was first and foremost, a sub hunter. It's possible armament was:....SNIP....
.
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Never thought of the S3 as a refueler. They were always more important hunting subs. Always figured they used A6 or F18s. Guess if a C140 can double as a refueler, anything can.
 
silver-eagle said:
Never thought of the S3 as a refueler. They were always more important hunting subs. Always figured they used A6 or F18s. Guess if a C140 can double as a refueler, anything can.
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You know why the S3 is called the hover??



They carry 4 dirt bags.

the longest bingo in naval history occurred with the S3 Diago Gracia to the Indy, on gonzo station and return with out getting aboard, they could't get the hook down. 1400 miles round trip with my mail aboard.
 
2 years on the Forrestal CV59. 1985 - 1986. Spent the first year in the Philadelphia Ship Yards then the next year doing shake-down cruises for 2-3 weeks at a time in the Caribbean. Great times. F-14, A-7, S-3, E-6 and Sea Kings. I have about 1000 pictures but all before the digital age.
 
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gkainz said:
The poor S-3 Viking sure got a bad rap on the video ... "refueling plane" ... yeah, it did that, but so did anything else that could carry a buddy store fuel tank. The S-3 was first and foremost, a sub hunter. It's possible armament was:

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_S-3_Viking

Up to 4,900 lb (2,220 kg) on four internal and two external hardpoints, including:

10 × 500 lb (227 kg) Mark 82 bombs
2 × 1000 lb (454 kg) Mark 83 bombs
2 × 2000 lb (908 kg) Mark 84 bombs
6 × CBU-100 cluster bombs
2 × Mark 50 torpedoes
4 × Mark 46 torpedoes
6 × mines or depth charges
2 × B57 nuclear bombs
2 × AGM-65E/F Maverick missiles
2 × AGM-84D Harpoon missiles
1 × AGM-84H/K SLAM-ER missile

The two underwing hardpoints can also be fitted with unguided rocket pods or 300 US gal (1,136 l) fuel tanks.

so yeah, last but not least - it could carry fuel.
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Doesn't the S-3 Viking have the only known sinking of a ship by a "Scout" plane?
 
I don't think I've ever heard that story, Anthony. Too busy to dive down the google rabbit hole today, but might be some fun research.
 
Anthony said:
Doesn't the S-3 Viking have the only known sinking of a ship by a "Scout" plane?
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Can't be......the SBD Dauntless was a 'scout' plane (SBD = Scout Bomber Douglas) and sent more than its fair share of tonnage to the bottom.
 
silver-eagle said:
Never thought of the S3 as a refueler. They were always more important hunting subs. Always figured they used A6 or F18s. Guess if a C140 can double as a refueler, anything can.
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Gotta take into consideration when that video was made.

When the War Hoover came out it, was first and foremost and ASW platform.

Near the end of the S-3's operational life (when that video was done) their primary missions were MARPAT (basically identifying surface contacts) and tanking. They did very little ASW work near the end.
 
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