Gabbs, NV (GAB)

[zaitcev]

Anyone been to GAB? The dirt runways give me pause.

My plan of record is to fly to Elko, grab a rental truck, then drive for 4.5 hours to Gabbs, but what the heck, the place has an airport.

I'll be in my Mooney. It handles dirt acceptably well, as long as it's smooth (like Escancia, NM).

 

[Pilawt]

Don't know about the conditions at KGAB. It looks a little scruffy in the Google Earth image.

Hawthorne NV (KHTH) has paved runway and fuel. Google Maps says it would be about a 55 minute drive to Gabbs.

 

[35 AoA]

Be aware of extremely heavy amounts of fighter aircraft flying at all altitudes and speeds in very close proximity to Gabbs. Not saying don't do it, but if you do, keep your head on a swivel and squawk something (whether that be via flight following or just 1200)

 

[Hacker]

Be aware of extremely heavy amounts of fighter aircraft flying at all altitudes and speeds in very close proximity to Gabbs. Not saying don't do it, but if you do, keep your head on a swivel and squawk something (whether that be via flight following or just 1200)

Thread drift:

Driving up to the Reno Air Races last weekend, I saw what must be a range to the east side of highway 95, with big white-painted square panel distance markers along a plowed-put run-in line.

It appears to be R-4810 -- is that still an active impact range for Fallon?

 

[luvflyin]

Thread drift:

Driving up to the Reno Air Races last weekend, I saw what must be a range to the east side of highway 95, with big white-painted square panel distance markers along a plowed-put run-in line.

It appears to be R-4810 -- is that still an active impact range for Fallon?

Looks like it's about 30 miles from 4810. It's under the Fallon South 2 MOA so I doubt if they're dropping bombs there. It has a floor of 100 AGL and exludes below 2000 AGL in a 3mile radius of Gabbs. The town. KGAB is just outside that circle

EDIT: Disregard. Dumb answer. I didn't read the question right

 

[luvflyin]

Anyone been to GAB? The dirt runways give me pause.

My plan of record is to fly to Elko, grab a rental truck, then drive for 4.5 hours to Gabbs, but what the heck, the place has an airport.

I'll be in my Mooney. It handles dirt acceptably well, as long as it's smooth (like Escancia, NM).

So, uh, what do you need a rental truck for if you can get what you need when you get there into your plane?

 

[Hacker]

Looks like it's about 30 miles from 4810. It's under the Fallon South 2 MOA so I doubt if they're dropping bombs there. It has a floor of 100 AGL and exludes below 2000 AGL in a 3mile radius of Gabbs. The town. KGAB is just outside that circle

I'm familiar with where KGAB is. I was asking if the range east of 95 is still used by Fallon jets.

 

[luvflyin]

I'm familiar with where KGAB is. I was asking if the range east of 95 is still used by Fallon jets.

Ah, so you did. I had my mind on gabbs. Didn't read closely. My bad

 

[zaitcev]

Driving up to the Reno Air Races last weekend, I saw what must be a range to the east side of highway 95, with big white-painted square panel distance markers along a plowed-put run-in line.

It's a famous place. I saw an F-18 drop a practice bomb on that range once, a few years ago. So, I'm pretty sure it was still active around 2013. I'm amazed that the traffic on the highway does not bother the military authorities. In my old country, all such ranges are made inaccessible to the public, for the reasons of paranoid secrecy.

 

[35 AoA]

Yeah Hacker, that is called "B-19" around here. It's primarily a live impact area/HEI, though there is a separate strafe target to the south, not too far from the highway which is probably what you saw. It isn't as heavily used as B-17 (R4804) or B-20 (R4802), but it still sees a decent amount of traffic, mostly just CT events.

 

[slinger]

There are airport cars at KHTH.

 

[zaitcev]

I came by the field to check it out. Runways are amazing, at least in this weather. No large stones, no vegetation, and they aren't washed out anywhere. I could easily land the Mooney there. However, leaving it to sit there for a few days would probably not be the best idea. The old hangar is all covered in bullet holes.

 

[35 AoA]

Interesting pic/info. I've been a bad guy/"red air" jet CAP'ing above there many times, or "kill removing" low in the vicinity and have always looked down and wondered what it was actually like there. I remember a number of years ago, we sent one of our guys out for a Gabbs town hall meeting as the Fallon rep. One of the concerns raised was that the noise from our aircraft was scaring away native populations of tarantulas. Apparently his (innocent) response was "wait you are saying that is bad for you?" or something to that effect. Turns out his comment wasn't particularly well received.

 

[bflynn]

With planes flying all over the place, where were they scaring the tarantulas away to?

The mis-logic goes like this - some animals have been observed to startle briefly when they hear booms from super sonic jets. That isn’t good. We therefore know that airplane noises affect wildlife and assume that even low level noises are bad. Therefore, planes are not good and must be banned.

 

[sourdough44]

Maverick and Goose’s Son will be in those restricted areas & MOA’s soon filming more of Top Gun II, keep an eye out.

 

[DesertNomad]

If you stop at KHTH, say hi to Betty. She runs a great little airport.

 

[zaitcev]

Oh yeah, BTW! On Thursday, an F-16 in Aggressor livery came low through the canyon that goes parallel to the main one, which exits towards the Gabbs airport. It was on the side of the Victory mine, not on the Illinois side. Two F-18s followed him high. It was when I was still plodding across Utah, so I only have a 2nd hand report.

 

[35 AoA]

Maverick and Goose’s Son will be in those restricted areas & MOA’s soon filming more of Top Gun II, keep an eye out.

Oh they already are. A friend of mine flew old Maverick in his back seat a few weeks back actually (in an odd reversal of roles I suppose). They were also filming us flying around out on the boat back in September. To the best of my knowledge, I was only on camera landing a 5-wet tanker, so I doubt I will make the final cut

 

[35 AoA]

Oh yeah, BTW! On Thursday, an F-16 in Aggressor livery came low through the canyon that goes parallel to the main one, which exits towards the Gabbs airport. It was on the side of the Victory mine, not on the Illinois side. Two F-18s followed him high. It was when I was still plodding across Utah, so I only have a 2nd hand report.

Oh yeah, that was good viper flying. You learned how to navigate by looking outside only in that thing.....basically nothing useful to look at in the cockpit other than an RMI coupled to INS waypoint course line or TACAN cuts.......the old adage was if you are flying over crop circles (of which the airspace is surrounded by), you are about to or may have already busted out of the airspace. All the stuff in the middle was fair game down to "200 feet" and <=0.99 mach.....supersonic anywhere above 30k and above 11k in the north half of the Fallon range.

 

[Dirtflyer]

Anyone been to GAB? The dirt runways give me pause.

My plan of record is to fly to Elko, grab a rental truck, then drive for 4.5 hours to Gabbs, but what the heck, the place has an airport.

I'll be in my Mooney. It handles dirt acceptably well, as long as it's smooth (like Escancia, NM).

What brings you to Gabbs? Out of curiosity

 

[Hacker]

landing a 5-wet tanker

Translation for us non-anal naviators?

 

[35 AoA]

Translation for us non-anal naviators?

ARS (buddy refueling store) pod on centerline, and then 4 regular drop tanks on the wings, hence "5 wet".

Typically not done on deployment because it is wasteful of fuel and flight hours, but its something that is exercised during pre-deployment workups. Wasteful of those things because you pretty much have to fly a full cycle to get anywhere near max trap, and even then you are probably dumping a bunch just to get there unless a lot of people are having a really bad day/night recovery (needing gas). Launch with something like 26k lbs of gas, and in the 5 wet configuration, max trap is about 6400#, so thats a lot of fuel to get rid of just flying around in circles.

 

[luvflyin]

ARS (buddy refueling store) pod on centerline, and then 4 regular drop tanks on the wings, hence "5 wet".

Typically not done on deployment because it is wasteful of fuel and flight hours, but its something that is exercised during pre-deployment workups. Wasteful of those things because you pretty much have to fly a full cycle to get anywhere near max trap, and even then you are probably dumping a bunch just to get there unless a lot of people are having a really bad day/night recovery (needing gas). Launch with something like 26k lbs of gas, and in the 5 wet configuration, max trap is about 6400#, so thats a lot of fuel to get rid of just flying around in circles.

Those things are probably mounted to the pylons or whateveryacallem that bombs are. So, could they be jettisoned?

 

[Hacker]

Launch with something like 26k lbs of gas, and in the 5 wet configuration, max trap is about 6400#, so thats a lot of fuel to get rid of just flying around in circles.

Interesting comparison -- with 4 bags, the Super Bug has 26K. With 2 bags and the standard conformals, the F-15E has about 35K.

How many pounds in your externals each?

 

[Hacker]

Those things are probably mounted to the pylons or whateveryacallem that bombs are. So, could they be jettisoned?

Can't speak for the Navy folks, but on USAF jets are there are two very different types of external tanks.

One is a set that has all the internal baffles, pumps, and tubing to most efficiently carry the fuel for long cross country legs.

The second type is a field-expedient design the eliminates most of the internal "reliability" equipment and is designed to be punched off in combat (e.g. "drop tanks").

The first type is a lot more expensive and limited in supply than the second type. They generally don't like dumping the expensive ones into the drink just to land a little earlier.

 

[35 AoA]

Unlike the USAF apparently, in the Super Hornet our external tanks are all standard, and they are all expensive (unlike the legacy Hornet)......so not really desired to be jettisoned unless a serious situation dictates. Outside of combat necessity (unlikely for a tanker turning circles above the boat), doing so would be considered a mishap due to the dollar amount......couldn't tell you the exact dollar amount off the top of my head, but my guess is that 4 tanks + ARS would trip class A mishap damage (the most serious category which also includes loss of aicraft/life). But yes to answer your question luflyin, all tanks as well as the ARS pod can technically be jettisoned in an emergency.

@ Hacker, our externals carry a little over 3k lbs, and the ARS is around 2k max. So around 14k of external fuel in that configuration.

 

[zaitcev]

What brings you to Gabbs? Out of curiosity

Camping and exploring. Our group did this at least 20 years now. We started near Black Rock, and been to Soldier's Meadow, Sylphur/Rabbit Hole airstrip (abandoned), Seven Troughs (a bit of a long drive north of Lovelock KLOL). There's a lot of stuff left over in northern Nevada since the times of gold mining.