View Single Post
  #77  
Old November 17th 03, 12:38 AM
Mary Shafer
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

On Sat, 15 Nov 2003 23:44:30 GMT, "Doug \"Woody\" and Erin Beal"
wrote:

On 11/14/03 4:40 PM, in article ,
"Mary Shafer" wrote:

Fast Eddie is in Texas, at JSC, where he's flying T-38s. He turns 55
this month and will retire on 3 Jan 04. They've bought a
fifth-wheeler and are going to return to SoCal via Florida and
Kentucky in January and February. They might stop by and see us in
Palm Desert on their way to San Diego. If so, I'll make Ed say a few
words in person.


Thanks for the update, Mary. Only knew him by phonecon and watching him (in
my rear-view mirror) trying to put the HARV's probe in my KA-6E's basket.
Quite comical, but understandably difficult--especially when I watched him
fly form too. That airplane was a handful--at least through the iteration
that I saw.


The deal with HARV was that it had all the thrust vane hardware
hanging off the tail and a big weight in the nose to keep it
statically stable and a flexible airplane in between. The mass model
could, without much of a stretch, be characterized as resembling a
dumbbell. Needless to say, the mass effects produced some very
peculiar flight dynamics, including during refueling.

Fast Eddie refueled the HARV first and it took him something like 31
minutes to get a good plug and actually transfer fuel. Then it was
Smoke's turn and about twenty minutes into his attempt, Eddie told him
that if he didn't hurry up and plug in, Mary (me) was going to make
this an HQ task and put it on all the flight cards. Uncontained mirth
all around, naturally. However, the threat worked, because Jim got
plugged in two minutes quicker than Eddie had.

Mary

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer