Aviation Story

[jls]

A friend from Texas who worked for the railroad and liked to fly his
supercub along the tracks decided to have a little fun one night. He flew
just off the ground down the tracks and just before he got in sight of a
freight train roaring down the tracks, he turned on his landing light and
proceeded head-on at full speed, headlight to headlight. A hundred yards
or so before the inevitable collision he pulled up and climbed away, behind
the peppy O-235. But by that time the horrified engineer had locked down
the brakes on the train. You should not be bothered with the details,
which were quite messy.

The next day he awoke to find headlines in the local newspaper, "Train
Almost Collides with UFO; Cars Derailed."

Statute of limitations has run, he says, and, "Don't you be gettin' no
ideas."

[Mike Patterson]

On Sat, 24 Jan 2004 09:49:42 -0500, " jls" >
wrote:

>A friend from Texas who worked for the railroad and liked to fly his
>supercub along the tracks decided to have a little fun one night. He flew
>just off the ground down the tracks and just before he got in sight of a
>freight train roaring down the tracks, he turned on his landing light and
>proceeded head-on at full speed, headlight to headlight. A hundred yards
>or so before the inevitable collision he pulled up and climbed away, behind
>the peppy O-235. But by that time the horrified engineer had locked down
>the brakes on the train. You should not be bothered with the details,
>which were quite messy.
>
>The next day he awoke to find headlines in the local newspaper, "Train
>Almost Collides with UFO; Cars Derailed."
>
>Statute of limitations has run, he says, and, "Don't you be gettin' no
>ideas."
>
I'm sure it's older than this, but the first time I heard of that
story it was in a fiction book by Daniel V. Gallery written in the
early '60s, IIRC.

In his story it was a young Navy fighter pilot who was owed money by
the railroad and decided to take drastic measures when they wouldn't
pay up.

Mike

Mike Patterson
Please remove the spamtrap to email me.

[Veeduber]

Even older. Virtually every book about the early days of flying the mail (ie,
1920 on ) includes such an account.

-R.S.Hoover

[Cy Galley]

I have a friend that did just that. Thought it was real fun until he tried
the stunt on a Mississippi River tow. He damn near went blind and crashed
when they turned their powerful search light on him and followed him as he
tried to sneak away. <GRIN>
--
Cy Galley, TC - Chair, Emergency Aircraft Repair, Oshkosh
Editor, EAA Safety Programs
or

Always looking for articles for the Experimenter soon to be Sport Pilot

"Veeduber" > wrote in message
...
> Even older. Virtually every book about the early days of flying the mail
(ie,
> 1920 on ) includes such an account.
>
> -R.S.Hoover

[Ron Wanttaja]

On 24 Jan 2004 15:33:05 GMT, (Veeduber) wrote:

>Even older. Virtually every book about the early days of flying the mail (ie,
>1920 on ) includes such an account.

Ernie Gann's "Blaze of Noon," for example....but Gallery tells it better
(in "Stand By-y-y-y to Start Engines").

Closest I ever came to it was to buzz a convoy of CAP cadets (in my trusty
CAP Citabria) with the backseater flicking the landing light switch up and
down like a machine gun.

Ron Wanttaja

[Badwater Bill]

Reminds me of a story told by a local retired Bird Colonel.

He had been flying as a fighter pilot in California and was
re-stationed in Texas. It was 1956 or so and he was on the road in
his '50' Chevy going through a small town in New Mexico. The cops had
a speed trap set outside of town and they got him good. They dragged
him right into the kangaroo court room instead of writing him a ticket
and letting him go. Evidently in those days many people didn't pay if
you let them go.

So, he's in front of the judge and gets fined a hearty amount, more
than he had on hand. The judge told him he was going to put him in
jail for two days. The young Major couldn't afford to be locked up
because he had to make it to Lackland AFB or Shepard, can't remember
which. The Judge locked him up anyway.

Two days later he reported to the flight line in Texas and was given
grace for being AWOL. He was assigned an F-86. He told me he asked
his crew chief to strip it down and make it clean. They topped it
with all the gas they could get in it. He got in and went to
something like 35,000 feet over that little ass-wipe city in New
Mexico. He put the F-86 in a 90 degree dive over the courthouse. By
about the time he got to 15,000 feet he was just supersonic. He said
that he started his pull out at 10,000 feet and just barely made it
back to horizontal before he hit the ground (his story).

That weekend he got a newspaper from the little ass-wipe city and it
said that all the windows in the courthouse had been broken and many
in the automobiles parked around the building, plus many of the houses
in town. The locals were conducting some survey to try and find out
who did it, but they never got him. He said he flew away on the deck
and landed back in Texas a few hundred miles away. The city town-folk
never had a clue who did it.

BWB

[Veeduber]

Prior to departing for Vietnam a shipmate had to go through the E&E course they
were running south of Warner Springs in the hills behind Sandy Eggo.

Second night of the course, when everyone had been without food for 24 hours
and the instructors were just about to round them all up and begin their
bull**** 'interrogations' an idiot driving C-120 made a low pass over a
particular place and kicked out a seabag filled with Big Macs & fries.

Or so I heard :-)

-R.S.Hoover

PS -- The trick is not to pack them too tightly. Duct tape the burgers & fries
in individual packs wrapped with foam or whatever then pack them into a nylon
net laundry bag, but not too tightly, then put the laundry bag int othe seabag
with lots of crushables around it and on either end.

Takes two to tango -- pilot & a kicker. And it helps if you pull the pax-side
seat.

I understand you should make the drop just as you add power and be ready for
the yaw when the kicker forces the door outboard. You might want to practice
this a few times. Just above a stall, wheels in the weeds, the groceries are
still going to travel about a hundred feet before they hit the ground. I
understand the glider strip at Otay Lakes is good spot for that sort of
practice. Also a handy spot to leave the seat, dress the kicker in a body
harness, etc.

Or was. 1969 or thereabouts. Probably just another of those sea-stories you
hear.

[Badwater Bill]

>I understand you should make the drop just as you add power and be ready for
>the yaw when the kicker forces the door outboard. You might want to practice
>this a few times. Just above a stall, wheels in the weeds, the groceries are
>still going to travel about a hundred feet before they hit the ground. I
>understand the glider strip at Otay Lakes is good spot for that sort of
>practice. Also a handy spot to leave the seat, dress the kicker in a body
>harness, etc.
>
>Or was. 1969 or thereabouts. Probably just another of those sea-stories you
>hear.

Laughed my ass off. Thanks. I was seeing the kicker in a winter
survival suit in my mind's eye, lest he froze to death...but maybe not
in Sandy Eggo.

BWB

[Stu Fields]

I was at the "Crash Boat" beach near Ramey AFB in Puerto Rico when a small
group of what turned out to be B-36 crew was making arrangements with a
local to bring food, booze and broads out to "Goat" Island where they were
scheduled,(of course they were not supposed to know when) to be taken out to
the island for a survival practice. You were normally just told upon
landing that you had just crashed on "Goat" island and what ever gear you
had with you was what you got to take. These guys were ahead of the game
for sure.
Stu Fields ex SAC:
"Badwater Bill" > wrote in message
...
>
> >I understand you should make the drop just as you add power and be ready
for
> >the yaw when the kicker forces the door outboard. You might want to
practice
> >this a few times. Just above a stall, wheels in the weeds, the groceries
are
> >still going to travel about a hundred feet before they hit the ground. I
> >understand the glider strip at Otay Lakes is good spot for that sort of
> >practice. Also a handy spot to leave the seat, dress the kicker in a
body
> >harness, etc.
> >
> >Or was. 1969 or thereabouts. Probably just another of those sea-stories
you
> >hear.
>
> Laughed my ass off. Thanks. I was seeing the kicker in a winter
> survival suit in my mind's eye, lest he froze to death...but maybe not
> in Sandy Eggo.
>
> BWB
>
>

[Veeduber]

> I was seeing the kicker in a winter
>survival suit in my mind's eye,

Weather was nice. Body harness was for the kicker's peace of mind; he wasn't
an aviation type (at first).

Practice proved useful: Milkshakes are a no-go but Colorado Kool-ade did okay.
And the flight crew should wear goggles. Ash tray emptied itself as soon as we
opened the door and thirty years of trash suddenly reappeared :-)

Only real problem was to get the burgers there while they were still warm.
Trick was to start packing enroute to Brown Field. Had plenty of volunteers.

[Badwater Bill]

On 25 Jan 2004 04:03:57 GMT, (Veeduber) wrote:

>> I was seeing the kicker in a winter
>>survival suit in my mind's eye,
>
>Weather was nice. Body harness was for the kicker's peace of mind; he wasn't
>an aviation type (at first).
>
>Practice proved useful: Milkshakes are a no-go but Colorado Kool-ade did okay.
>And the flight crew should wear goggles. Ash tray emptied itself as soon as we
>opened the door and thirty years of trash suddenly reappeared :-)
>
>Only real problem was to get the burgers there while they were still warm.
>Trick was to start packing enroute to Brown Field. Had plenty of volunteers.


Yeah, I'll bet you did. Poor kicker, breathing all those asses and
dirt from 30 years of 1-g flying. Probably blinded himself before he
could see where to drop the Coors....I mean Colorado Kool-Aid.

How in the hell did you keep the burgers warm is what I want to know.
Yeah, packing from Brown was a good idea, but really....did they stay
warm or did you put them in some bleed air somewhere to keep em
toasty?

BWB

[andy asberry]

How to get the attention of a Border Patrol agent gassing his Cub in
Marfa, TX, late afternoon:

Lay several foil wrapped packages on the apron; begin stuffing them
into Baggies; then into a trash bag; then rolled up in an almost
deflated air mattress which is crammed into a metal Coleman ice chest.
Then use a roll of duct tape to secure the whole affair. Hurriedly
pitch it in a 172.

T-bones and baked potatoes will survive bouncing through the brush and
cactus to appreciative Rio Grande canoe paddlers.

The lid on that thing still doesn't close right.

[Dude]

Hasn't anyone ever eluded the instructors and simply run off? I have always
wondered about this. Some where, some how, somebody would have to play the
game, and just leave the course. Wouldn't they?


" jls" > wrote in message
.. .
> A friend from Texas who worked for the railroad and liked to fly his
> supercub along the tracks decided to have a little fun one night. He
flew
> just off the ground down the tracks and just before he got in sight of a
> freight train roaring down the tracks, he turned on his landing light and
> proceeded head-on at full speed, headlight to headlight. A hundred yards
> or so before the inevitable collision he pulled up and climbed away,
behind
> the peppy O-235. But by that time the horrified engineer had locked down
> the brakes on the train. You should not be bothered with the details,
> which were quite messy.
>
> The next day he awoke to find headlines in the local newspaper, "Train
> Almost Collides with UFO; Cars Derailed."
>
> Statute of limitations has run, he says, and, "Don't you be gettin' no
> ideas."
>
>

[Corky Scott]

When I was in college I had a friend who's father, he told me, was in
the Army. He said his father had this tape of an incident that
occured at an airbase where there was an infamously nasty instructor.
The instructor apparently delighted in washing out cadets and
humiliating them. It got so bad that the rest of the instructors got
together and planned to teach him a lesson.

They told the cadets to duck out of the way when it was time to board
their trainers and the instructors would get in instead.

This particular flight was supposed to be formation training, so once
they took off, everyone was close at hand in formation.

My friend brought the tape to college to play for me because I
expressed great interest. What I heard next simply cannot be faked.

I heard routine but extremely sarcastic orders and remarks from the
instructor, then the instructor/cadets broke formation and went crazy
around this guy.

They, among other things, boxed him in left, right, vertically and
underneath, with the guy on top inverted. They broke off and barrel
rolled around him and buzzed the field en mass. The screaming coming
from the instructor has to be heard to be believed. At one point I
distinctly heard him, in this indescribably defeated voice, lamely
demanding for the field to shoot them down, all of them.

Like I said, there doesn't seem any way for this to be faked, there
was the sound of snarling engines in the background and this
instructors sounded absolutely hysterical at times as he vainly
attempted to control the airplanes around him.

This probably occured after WWII, perhaps some time in the 50's.

It would be neat to hear that tape again.

Corky Scott

[BllFs6]

>instructors sounded absolutely hysterical at times as he vainly
>attempted to control the airplanes around him.
>
>This probably occured after WWII, perhaps some time in the 50's.
>
>It would be neat to hear that tape again.
>
>Corky Scott
>


Ahhhh nothing sooths my heart as much as seeing a royal a***hole get what he
deserves :)

take care

Blll

[Badwater Bill]

On 26 Jan 2004 15:45:04 GMT, (BllFs6) wrote:

>>instructors sounded absolutely hysterical at times as he vainly
>>attempted to control the airplanes around him.
>>
>>This probably occured after WWII, perhaps some time in the 50's.
>>
>>It would be neat to hear that tape again.
>>
>>Corky Scott
>>
>
>
>Ahhhh nothing sooths my heart as much as seeing a royal a***hole get what he
>deserves :)
>
>take care
>
>Blll

Yep. Many rotten assholes came home from Viet Nam in boxes, fragged
by their own men for being jerks.

I went to school with a kid who was nuts. This kid would mouth off to
the biggest guy on the playground and get his butt kicked. The kid
enjoyed it for some sick reason. One day while we were in the 4th
grade, this big kid beat him up so bad, his ears were bleeding from
their ear-canals. He mouthed off to the big kid again the next day
and the sequence went on. This guy killed cats and baby dogs. He was
just sick. One time at a halloween party we were dunking for apples.
After he finished, he snagged in the tub of floating apples so
everyone else had to dunk in his spit.

Later in life he finished college and went into the Army as a second
louie (1971). They shipped his ass off to Viet Nam in a month. One
month later he came home dead and he hadn't even been in a combat
zone. Somehow he fell out of a Huey on recon. Interesting eh?

This was the type of guy who'd love to be a cop so he could abuse
people. He was someone who you would never want to give a badge. I
suspect he had men under him at the time who hated him. If they
hadn't unhooked his umbilical cord (tether), they'd have fragged him
in his hooch one night while in-country. A lot more of that went on
than people might think. The assholes were taken out of the gene pool
real quick in-country.

Whomever pushed him did the world and his family a favor. He'd been
nothing but a problem for them his entire life. At 21 years old he
was history. Hell, they gave the family some metals, buried him under
an American flag that they folded up and gave to his mom. What more
could anyone want?

People (soldiers) were ****ed off over there because they didn't like
being there in a war against a people they didn't really hate. It
wasn't like Iraq where there was a clear mission to rid the world of a
tyrant who tortured people to death and killed his own people in mass.
The mission in Viet Nam wasn't clear to the average foot soldier (or
officer for that matter). So they were walking around sort of ****ed
off all the time because they were watching people get killed and they
were in danger themselves. This level of anxiety made for a situation
where people really didn't take much **** from anyone, officers or
other enlisted. If you got a new second louie with an attitude, he
either changed real quick or was removed from the gene pool, fragged
in some "event."

"Oh yes captain, we were all just sitting here in the jungle having a
smoke when an mortar came in from the gooks up on that ridge. Poor
old Jimmy here was at ground zero. What a shame!"

"Son, you are missing one of your grenades."

"Oh yes Sir, I lobbed it up at the gooks, but they got away. Damn,
Jimmy didn't have real good luck did he Sir?"

or, in this kid's case, maybe it went like this:

Warrant Officer-1 says to Captain:

"Yes Sir, we were on recon and going into this LZ for fuel. It wasn't
expected to be hot but it was. I dusted off. I cranked the Huey 90
degrees right to avoid fire while the grunts at the LZ took care of
Charlie. Jimmy must have been on the skid and not tied down. He
liked to ride like that Sir, out on the skid and not hooked in. He'd
take that M-60 out there with him sometimes and just shoot up the
natives. He said it made him feel like God Sir. I ordered him to hook
in when I caught him a few times but I see he didn't this time. We
did recover the M-60 when we nabbed him Sir, it wasn't a total loss.
And the gooks? Well, they just disappeared as fast as they were
there. Don't know where they came from Sir. The LZ has never been
hot like that before."

Captain: "Damn. Now I gotta write his parents a letter and I hate to
write. I'd rather be selling these rations to the villagers this
afternoon to strengthen up our booze fund. You remember we got a
party this weekend don't you? Will you guys be more careful from now
on? Ought to make you write the letter, Mr. WO-1. Now get out a here
before I article-15 your sorry ass."

WO-1, "Yeeaasssir! Will-do."



BWB

[B2431]

>From: (Badwater Bill)

If they
>hadn't unhooked his umbilical cord (tether), they'd have fragged him
>in his hooch one night while in-country.

The term "frag" referred to all manners of "assasination" (the official term).

In any event the guy got greased and that's all that mattered.

Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired

[Veeduber]

>
>The term "frag" referred to all manners of "assasination" (the official
>term).

-------------------------------------------------

Actually, it refers to the inappropriate handling of a grenade, as in failing
to tape the spoon and allowing the pin to become entagled in your mosquito bar
so that when you tucked yourself in for the night...

This sort of thing was seldom a problem in the Real World or aboard ship but in
I Corp junior officers with Political Influence (ie, that red 'PI' on the BACK
of their service jacket) were being rotated through on a 90 day basis just so
they could get their ticket punched, spending the remainder of their tour TAD
to someplace else. Their total lack of experience in a combat environment lead
to a lot of needless casualties. And personal accidents.

When politicians are running the war victory is not an option. For a senior
NCO in that situation a successful tour means making sure as many of your
people as possible come home alive. Everything is showtime.

-R.S.Hoover

[Roger Halstead]

On 27 Jan 2004 17:07:45 GMT, (Veeduber) wrote:

>>
>>The term "frag" referred to all manners of "assasination" (the official
>>term).
>
>-------------------------------------------------
>
>Actually, it refers to the inappropriate handling of a grenade, as in failing
>to tape the spoon and allowing the pin to become entagled in your mosquito bar
>so that when you tucked yourself in for the night...
>
>This sort of thing was seldom a problem in the Real World or aboard ship but in
>I Corp junior officers with Political Influence (ie, that red 'PI' on the BACK
>of their service jacket) were being rotated through on a 90 day basis just so
>they could get their ticket punched, spending the remainder of their tour TAD
>to someplace else. Their total lack of experience in a combat environment lead
>to a lot of needless casualties. And personal accidents.
>
>When politicians are running the war victory is not an option. For a senior
>NCO in that situation a successful tour means making sure as many of your
>people as possible come home alive. Everything is showtime.

Although I have found RAH to mostly be of an educational nature, it
sometimes is far more education than others. Now I gotta go clean my
keyboard after reading this thread and keep coffee away from the desk.

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com
>
>-R.S.Hoover

[B2431]

>From: (Veeduber)
>Date: 1/27/2004 11:07 AM Central Standard Time
>Message-id: >
>
>>
>>The term "frag" referred to all manners of "assasination" (the official
>>term).
>
>-------------------------------------------------
>
>Actually, it refers to the inappropriate handling of a grenade, as in failing
>to tape the spoon and allowing the pin to become entagled in your mosquito
>bar
>so that when you tucked yourself in for the night...
>
That may be the origin of the term, but by the time I got there, 1972, it was
generic for bumping off some scuzzball who deserved it.

Like any GI slang a lot of its meaning depends on where you were. I find some
brothers use the term John Wayne to mean a 45 whereas in my area, An Hoa, it
meant the P-38 can opener. The kind of guy who would do a swan dive into a slit
trench or sommersaulting ala The Sands of Iwo Jima was said to be john wayning.

All of a sudden I feel old.

Dan, U. S. Air Force, retired

[Errol Groff]

What is the difference between a fairy tale and a sea story?

A fairy tail always starts "Once upon a time"

A sea story always starts with "No ****...this really happened!"

Errol Groff
EAA 60159




On 24 Jan 2004 23:39:01 GMT, (Veeduber) wrote:

>Prior to departing for Vietnam a shipmate had to go through the E&E course they
>were running south of Warner Springs in the hills behind Sandy Eggo.
>
>Second night of the course, when everyone had been without food for 24 hours
>and the instructors were just about to round them all up and begin their
>bull**** 'interrogations' an idiot driving C-120 made a low pass over a
>particular place and kicked out a seabag filled with Big Macs & fries.
>
>Or so I heard :-)
>
>-R.S.Hoover
>
>PS -- The trick is not to pack them too tightly. Duct tape the burgers & fries
>in individual packs wrapped with foam or whatever then pack them into a nylon
>net laundry bag, but not too tightly, then put the laundry bag int othe seabag
>with lots of crushables around it and on either end.
>
>Takes two to tango -- pilot & a kicker. And it helps if you pull the pax-side
>seat.
>
>I understand you should make the drop just as you add power and be ready for
>the yaw when the kicker forces the door outboard. You might want to practice
>this a few times. Just above a stall, wheels in the weeds, the groceries are
>still going to travel about a hundred feet before they hit the ground. I
>understand the glider strip at Otay Lakes is good spot for that sort of
>practice. Also a handy spot to leave the seat, dress the kicker in a body
>harness, etc.
>
>Or was. 1969 or thereabouts. Probably just another of those sea-stories you
>hear.

[Del Rawlins]

On 28 Jan 2004 01:06 PM, Errol Groff posted the following:
>
> What is the difference between a fairy tale and a sea story?
>
> A fairy tail always starts "Once upon a time"
>
> A sea story always starts with "No ****...this really happened!"

The version of this that I heard had a bush pilot story starting with
"Now this ain't no bull****!"

----------------------------------------------------
Del Rawlins-
Remove _kills_spammers_ to reply via email.
Unofficial Bearhawk FAQ website:
http://www.rawlinsbrothers.org/bhfaq/

[pacplyer]

Hey Corky,

This could only be the tape I heard at WAL systems initial, where
after a complex days of chasing electrons on the MST (classroom
trainer), most of us in the class were losing faith in our ability to
understand Boeing electrical. The instructor detected this with
push-button polling and decided to give us a well-deserved break from
the material. He explained the instructor/student conspiracy, and
then hit the play button. Funniest damn set-up I've ever heard.
"NUMBER TWO! NUMBER TWO! LOOSEN UP… before ya kill us all! NO NO
NO YOU'RE GOING TO CASTRATE NUMBER THREE! BREAK OUT! BREAK OUT YOU
MORON! NO NO NO NOT THAT WAY! Goddamit, I didn't mean missing man
break! Christ sake we'll never make it back to base without killing
those poor ranchers down there…. Tower Wildcat 1 flight of six, ten
miles east please shoot the other five down! SHOOT THEM DOWN, I
SAY!"

Etc, etc.

or something like that... (been 22 years since I heard it)

After we stopped rolling on the ground for several minutes, Joe
Ward(our ground school instructor) explained that this tape was real
and that when the screamer instructor returned to base for debrief the
other instructors converged on him and told him his students were
really other instructors. Joe said: "After he got done listening to
them, he said he didn't believe them!"

pacplyer



(Corky Scott) wrote in message >...
> When I was in college I had a friend who's father, he told me, was in
> the Army. He said his father had this tape of an incident that
> occured at an airbase where there was an infamously nasty instructor.
> The instructor apparently delighted in washing out cadets and
> humiliating them. It got so bad that the rest of the instructors got
> together and planned to teach him a lesson.
>
> They told the cadets to duck out of the way when it was time to board
> their trainers and the instructors would get in instead.
>
> This particular flight was supposed to be formation training, so once
> they took off, everyone was close at hand in formation.
>
> My friend brought the tape to college to play for me because I
> expressed great interest. What I heard next simply cannot be faked.
>
> I heard routine but extremely sarcastic orders and remarks from the
> instructor, then the instructor/cadets broke formation and went crazy
> around this guy.
>
> They, among other things, boxed him in left, right, vertically and
> underneath, with the guy on top inverted. They broke off and barrel
> rolled around him and buzzed the field en mass. The screaming coming
> from the instructor has to be heard to be believed. At one point I
> distinctly heard him, in this indescribably defeated voice, lamely
> demanding for the field to shoot them down, all of them.
>
> Like I said, there doesn't seem any way for this to be faked, there
> was the sound of snarling engines in the background and this
> instructors sounded absolutely hysterical at times as he vainly
> attempted to control the airplanes around him.
>
> This probably occured after WWII, perhaps some time in the 50's.
>
> It would be neat to hear that tape again.
>
> Corky Scott

[Sandy]

Back when I was skydiving it went: "There I was and this ain't no ****"


"Del Rawlins" > wrote in message
...
> Del Rawlins-
> Remove _kills_spammers_ to reply via email.
> Unofficial Bearhawk FAQ website:
> http://www.rawlinsbrothers.org/bhfaq/

[Ron Wanttaja]

>> When I was in college I had a friend who's father, he told me, was in
>> the Army. He said his father had this tape of an incident that
>> occured at an airbase where there was an infamously nasty instructor.
>> The instructor apparently delighted in washing out cadets and
>> humiliating them. It got so bad that the rest of the instructors got
>> together and planned to teach him a lesson.

Not saying it *didn't* happen, but this is similar, again, to an incident
in one of Dan Gallery's novels. It might be that Gallery heard the story
and fictionalized it, much as he did the one about shining the light at the
train.

Ron Wanttaja

[Kevin Horton]

On Sat, 24 Jan 2004 09:49:42 -0500, jls wrote:

> A friend from Texas who worked for the railroad and liked to fly his
> supercub along the tracks decided to have a little fun one night. He
> flew just off the ground down the tracks and just before he got in sight
> of a freight train roaring down the tracks, he turned on his landing
> light and proceeded head-on at full speed, headlight to headlight. A
> hundred yards or so before the inevitable collision he pulled up and
> climbed away, behind the peppy O-235. But by that time the horrified
> engineer had locked down the brakes on the train. You should not be
> bothered with the details, which were quite messy.
>
> The next day he awoke to find headlines in the local newspaper, "Train
> Almost Collides with UFO; Cars Derailed."
>
> Statute of limitations has run, he says, and, "Don't you be gettin' no
> ideas."

My uncle Art (since passed on) spent a few years instructing on Harvards
(T-6s for those in the USA) in the RCAF. He told me that he used to enjoy
doing the "fly down the railroad at night and turn on the light thing"
too. He was based in the prairies, so the land was very flat.

Art also told me a story about a time when he saw a farmer on a combine in
a large field. Art flew low over the farmer and blew his hat off. The
farmer stopped, retrieved his hat, and climbed back on the combine. Art
blew his hat off again. When he made the third pass he noted that the
combine was stopped and the farmer seemed to be trying to remove some
jammed wheat with a pitch fork. Just as the Harvard approached the
combine at about 10 ft, the farmer suddenly turned around and threw the
pitch fork at the aircraft. It went right up over the wing. Art didn't
blow hats off any more farmers after that.

--
Kevin Horton RV-8 (finishing kit)
Ottawa, Canada
http://go.phpwebhosting.com/~khorton/rv8/
e-mail: khorton02(_at_)rogers(_dot_)com

[Corrie]

Stu, you familiar with the Cold War Aviation forum on delphi? Lots of
former SAC crews, especially B-36 folks. Some great war stories.

"Stu Fields" > wrote in message >...
> I was at the "Crash Boat" beach near Ramey AFB in Puerto Rico when a small
> group of what turned out to be B-36 crew was making arrangements with a
> local to bring food, booze and broads out to "Goat" Island where they were
> scheduled,(of course they were not supposed to know when) to be taken out to
> the island for a survival practice. You were normally just told upon
> landing that you had just crashed on "Goat" island and what ever gear you
> had with you was what you got to take. These guys were ahead of the game
> for sure.
> Stu Fields ex SAC:

[Roger Halstead]

Many years ago, and I do mean many!

I was a teen ager out on the Farmall A, cultivating beans the first
time through.

I don't think there is anything in this world that takes less brains
than cultivating beans the first time through. You just sit there,
"in the heat", with the tractor idling along, and keeping the rows
between the shoes.

It was about mid afternoon and I had been doing this exciting job
since day break. All of a sudden my day dreaming was interrupted by
this tremendous noise. I whipped around to see an F-80 pulling up with
one whale of a cloud of dust billowing up behind me. I was headed
north, he was headed east. Couldn't have been much more than a couple
of wing spans behind me. I was still fascinated, seeing him climb out
like that when I realized the tractor was still moving, but who knew
where.

I had to get off the tractor, and count rows to get back where I
belonged. Worst case of "cultivator blight" I ever saw.

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

[Morgans]

"Roger Halstead" > wrote in message
...
> Many years ago, and I do mean many!
>
> I was a teen ager out on the Farmall A, cultivating beans the first
> time through.
>
> I don't think there is anything in this world that takes less brains
> than cultivating beans the first time through. You just sit there,
> "in the heat", with the tractor idling along, and keeping the rows
> between the shoes.
>
> It was about mid afternoon and I had been doing this exciting job
> since day break. All of a sudden my day dreaming was interrupted by
> this tremendous noise. I whipped around to see an F-80 pulling up with
> one whale of a cloud of dust billowing up behind me. I was headed
> north, he was headed east. Couldn't have been much more than a couple
> of wing spans behind me. I was still fascinated, seeing him climb out
> like that when I realized the tractor was still moving, but who knew
> where.
>
> I had to get off the tractor, and count rows to get back where I
> belonged. Worst case of "cultivator blight" I ever saw.
>
> Roger Halstead

So does anyone know what the correct separation is between a F-80 and a
tractor, for wake turbulence? <g>
--
Jim in NC


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[Corky Scott]

On Sat, 31 Jan 2004 03:13:43 GMT, Ron Wanttaja >
wrote:

>
>>> When I was in college I had a friend who's father, he told me, was in
>>> the Army. He said his father had this tape of an incident that
>>> occured at an airbase where there was an infamously nasty instructor.
>>> The instructor apparently delighted in washing out cadets and
>>> humiliating them. It got so bad that the rest of the instructors got
>>> together and planned to teach him a lesson.
>
>Not saying it *didn't* happen, but this is similar, again, to an incident
>in one of Dan Gallery's novels. It might be that Gallery heard the story
>and fictionalized it, much as he did the one about shining the light at the
>train.
>
>Ron Wanttaja

Could be Ron, but it would have been tough for a non actor to produce
the multiplicity of voices and the incredible range of emotions I
heard from the panicked instructor. Remember, it was an audio tape,
not something I read.

Corky Scott

[andy asberry]

On Mon, 02 Feb 2004 02:20:22 GMT, Roger Halstead
> wrote:

>Many years ago, and I do mean many!
>
>I was a teen ager out on the Farmall A, cultivating beans the first
>time through.
>
>I don't think there is anything in this world that takes less brains
>than cultivating beans the first time through. You just sit there,
>"in the heat", with the tractor idling along, and keeping the rows
>between the shoes.
>
>It was about mid afternoon and I had been doing this exciting job
>since day break. All of a sudden my day dreaming was interrupted by
>this tremendous noise. I whipped around to see an F-80 pulling up with
>one whale of a cloud of dust billowing up behind me. I was headed
>north, he was headed east. Couldn't have been much more than a couple
>of wing spans behind me. I was still fascinated, seeing him climb out
>like that when I realized the tractor was still moving, but who knew
>where.
>
>I had to get off the tractor, and count rows to get back where I
>belonged. Worst case of "cultivator blight" I ever saw.
>
>Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
>(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
>www.rogerhalstead.com

About twenty years ago, I was sitting on a boulder just after daylight
with the sun to my back. I was mule deer hunting 20 miles north of Big
Bend National Park. Suddenly a dark shadow fell over me; and then an
earth shattering roar. My first thought was that I was breakfast for a
lion.

Three B-52's were doing terrain following maybe 200 AGL. Low enough to
feel the breeze and smell the smoke.

[Veeduber]

>
>Three B-52's were doing terrain following maybe 200 AGL. Low enough to
>feel the breeze and smell the smoke.
>

-----------------------------------------------------
'Oil Burner' route. Usta be a regular section in the Notams.

Interesting to see a Buf BELOW you... when you were puttering along in a Cub
:-)

-R.S.Hoover

[Roger Halstead]

On 03 Feb 2004 02:24:55 GMT, (Veeduber) wrote:

>>
>>Three B-52's were doing terrain following maybe 200 AGL. Low enough to
>>feel the breeze and smell the smoke.
>>
>
>-----------------------------------------------------
>'Oil Burner' route. Usta be a regular section in the Notams.
>
>Interesting to see a Buf BELOW you... when you were puttering along in a Cub

There is a ridge that runs N/S about 15 miles west of US27 near Clare
Michigan The ridge is probably 300 to 400 feet high. On top is a
radio tower.

I used to end up on that tower several times a week. I don't know how
many times I was sitting up there working away when I'd hear a high
pitched whistle and have just enough time to look west and down to see
a fighter pass a few hundred yards to the west of me.

The MOA starts at 7000, but as I recall there is also a low altitude
route through there.

I nearly always carried my camera up there with me, but I never once
had enough warning to just grab it and take a shot.

Bout 60 to 80 miles east of us is an "oil burner" route right up
through the center of the thumb and across the bay towards Oscoda.
They still use it, but when Oscoda was an active base those routes
were busy. It was a place where the VFR pilots wanted to stay at
3000<:-))

Yah know, I was just thinking of that F80 back in the 50s. You
weren't getting any training in Michigan back then were you Bob?

Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com

>:-)
>
>-R.S.Hoover

[Token]

As Ron said, this is something that Gallery wrote about in the early 50's,
and it was supposed to have happened in the late 30's or VERY early 40's. A
later version of this by another writer (mid 60's) puts the event in the
late 50's early 60's. Gallery was diffinately in print with it in the early
50's though. The program manager on one of my contracts heard the story in
flight training (minus the audio recording) in 1943, and it was supposed to
have happened a "few" years before he heard it. He started as an F6F
driver, did the F4U thing, and finally the A-1, before leaving flight
status.

Because Pete heard it in 1943 I have to believe it was probably a late 30's
thing, wasn't that about the time that advanced trainers got radios? Prior
to that and there would have been no radio for the ground folks to listen in
/ record.

I have, at one time or another heard two different versions, or portions of
them, on tape. The only problem I have with all of this is.....in the late
30's what kind of audio recordings did they do? And would a training field
actually have the ability to record audio from the radio as a matter of
course? Even in the early/mid 40's (timing it with the end of the period in
Gallery's writing) it would have been a wire recording, yes? The ones I
heard did not originate from a wire, the quality was definately tape.

My personal opinion is it never happened, but a couple different people got
ahold of the story and made the tape.

There was a thread in rec.avaition.military about 6 or 7 years ago about
this, but I can not find it with a Google search now, can't seem to narrow
the search enough.

T!

[Veeduber]

> A
>later version of this by another writer (mid 60's) puts the event in the
>late 50's early 60's.

------------------------------------------------

After returning from WesPac aboard the Hornet in the late 1950's, probably '57
or '58 (can't remember ****) I was transferred from VF-94 to NAS Alameda. The
guys at the Link trainer facility had a whole library of similar recordings,
some on phonograph records, some on tape, a lot of which they MADE THEMSELVES,
complete with engine sounds. Their building had two storys, trainers on the
ground floor, classrooms above. They had one of the classrooms fitted out as a
recording studio for making new sound tracks for WWII training films.

Some of the cuts I heard were hilarious. I was told that most were based on
real incidents but all of the ones I heard were dramatizations rather than
actual recordings. Which isn't to say real recordings did not exist, but...

-R.S.Hoover