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Been on SA for a while and figured I should check out the aviation thread since its what I do for a living. I'm a Naval Flight Officer currently doing the instuctor thing with the kids in the advanced NFO stage of training. Probably going to look at my private license for the heck of it now that I actually have the time and money to do it. Feel free to ask me any questions you might have about the current state of Naval Aviation, flight training for NFOs or whatever. BTW, any of you been using the Nexus 7 with Garmin Pilot? I using the trial right now and Im really digging it. I am looking for something more than a strap to hold it on my leg; any suggestions on that front would be greatly appreciated.
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Nov 27, 2012 16:46
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Okay long story short. The 'Colonels' Mooney that I fly all the time is owned by my girlfriends grandfather. Retired B-52 Colonel. He bought the Mooney (M20C) about 3 years ago, and we try and fly the poo poo out of it every couple weeks or so. For instance, http://flightaware.com/live/flight/N6227U Originally when I met him his medical had lapsed, so I was able to build up a lot of time in the Mooney just flying him around. Then he got his medical back but we still continue to fly together. We have a BLAST. The Georgetown Mooney is the one I'm considering buying with a partner. Purchase price is one of those 'deal of the century' types. Perfect storm of a guy going to Sport Pilot, getting too old to bend into the airplane, and not wanting to deal with the higher insurance as he gets older. Here's the Georgetown Mooney at KOSH.  We're doing a pre-buy on Monday to see how the logbooks look... My only problem, is that the Colonel will probably be wanting to get rid of his Mooney in a year. So it could possibly not be the right time to buy. 
Captain Apollo fucked around with this message at 16:53 on Nov 27, 2012 |
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Nov 27, 2012 16:48
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vulturesrow posted:Been on SA for a while and figured I should check out the aviation thread since its what I do for a living. I'm a Naval Flight Officer currently doing the instuctor thing with the kids in the advanced NFO stage of training. Probably going to look at my private license for the heck of it now that I actually have the time and money to do it. Feel free to ask me any questions you might have about the current state of Naval Aviation, flight training for NFOs or whatever. I'll get the first question out of the way. What are you flying, and what have you flown?
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Nov 27, 2012 18:42
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OptimusMatrix posted:I'll get the first question out of the way. What are you flying, and what have you flown? Most of my time is in the EA-6B which I have about 1100 hours in. I have a handful of other stuff as well. I instruct in the T-39 Sabreliner currently but we are about to transition the advanced NFO syllabus to the T-45 so I will be doing that as well before too long.
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Nov 27, 2012 18:57
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Ever tried to switch over to a pilot slot?
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Nov 27, 2012 19:42
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Captain Apollo posted:Ever tried to switch over to a pilot slot? I seriously considered it and had the full backing of my chain of command but I ultimately decided not to apply for a couple of reasons: wanted to get my bonus, had some good quals I wanted to take advantage of and most importantly didnt want to take the chance of not getting back to carrier based aircraft. That last one turned out to be a bad thing to be worried about because everyone I know that got slots from my community that year made it back to our platform as pilots.
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Nov 27, 2012 20:12
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Is it true that the official Prowler community song is Jamming by Bob Marley & the Wailers? If not, it should be. We jammin'...we jammin! Jammin' all over de world!
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Nov 27, 2012 20:30
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That sucks. Oh well, there are other things in life. Does the NFO community hang out with the Pilots, or is there a separation? Or are ya'll like best friends? What rank are you?
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Nov 27, 2012 20:35
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vulturesrow posted:I seriously considered it and had the full backing of my chain of command but I ultimately decided not to apply for a couple of reasons: wanted to get my bonus, had some good quals I wanted to take advantage of and most importantly didnt want to take the chance of not getting back to carrier based aircraft. That last one turned out to be a bad thing to be worried about because everyone I know that got slots from my community that year made it back to our platform as pilots. Are you looking outside the aviation community for your future as a naval officer?Places like NIOC or NSA? My old CO at NIOC Norfolk was an EA-6B NFO.
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Nov 27, 2012 20:37
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Ola posted:Is it true that the official Prowler community song is Jamming by Bob Marley & the Wailers? Its actually "Radar Love".  Captain Apollo posted:That sucks. Oh well, there are other things in life. No separation at all really. We're all pretty tight knit. I'm an O-4.
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Nov 27, 2012 20:38
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Is there a yoke/stick in the NFO's chair so you can fly the airplanes sometimes? I'm pretty excited about you going for a PPL. Where do you plan on doing it? (low wing airplanes only please)
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Nov 27, 2012 20:44
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Just saw there was a Nebakenezzer update on the past page, fantastic as always. Sad the next update will be the last, if they knew you would write such good posts they would've kept WW1 going for a few more years.vulturesrow posted:Its actually "Radar Love". Hehe, that works too! I haven't read much on the tactics of Prowlers, is it all secret stuff or can you talk a bit about how it's used in combat? I can imagine it's something like "go near the bad guys, switch on the noise", but I'm sure there's more to it.
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Nov 27, 2012 20:54
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Captain Apollo posted:Is there a yoke/stick in the NFO's chair so you can fly the airplanes sometimes? Depends on the aircraft. Not in the EA-6B. There is a yoke in the T-39 but that is where the student sits, I sit in a jumpseat behind/between the pilot and the student (where the FE used to sit back in the day). As for the PPL, not sure yet. Somewhere in P-cola. Have to look at the prices but the good news is one of the IPs here has a CFI so I can catch a break there. e: Ola posted:Just saw there was a Nebakenezzer update on the past page, fantastic as always. Sad the next update will be the last, if they knew you would write such good posts they would've kept WW1 going for a few more years. Thats actually a pretty good summary. Make sure you're in line with with the target and the platform you are protecting and that's the gist of it. I dont mind talking about it but I'm pretty conservative about what I put out, probably overly so, but Id rather not inadvertently discuss something I shouldnt. vulturesrow fucked around with this message at 20:57 on Nov 27, 2012 |
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Nov 27, 2012 20:55
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Alright cool, I 'll try some questions out, ignore at your pleasure. Can you fool a radar into thinking it's seeing a "good" picture without realizing they are being jammed? Is there some sort of tit-for-tat game in the frequencies, can a radar tune its set slightly different to beat your jam or is it more of a firehose-to-the-face type of thing? Is there a radiation hazard for the crew?
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Nov 27, 2012 21:17
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Prowlers incoming!       
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Nov 27, 2012 21:40
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vulturesrow posted:Its actually "Radar Love". You're sharing that with a few other communities. 
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Nov 27, 2012 22:23
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Godholio posted:You're sharing that with a few other communities. All of whom only have girls. Funny Prowler story...during a RF-A a few months ago a USN Prowler unit came up to play. Due to a combination of poor log planning on their part and TACC pitching a poo poo fit and totally turning off their airlift, they brought no pods.  Between that and the fact that the Raptors dropped out at literally the last minute it was hilarious listening to all the whining during debriefs...especially the one where the escort package lead completely dropped the ball so all the airlift died within 30 seconds of starting the vul.\/ It was the literal definition of a turkey shoot. Pretty sure that one C-17 got shot by 6 or 7 different aggressors within about 20 seconds. \/ e: And it was funny listening to the disbelief on the part of the escort guys...dude, when you clear a 40 mile corridor for 60 seconds for an aircraft that's only doing 280 knots (numbers made up but the end result was real), the math just doesn't add up. iyaayas01 fucked around with this message at 22:57 on Nov 27, 2012 |
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Nov 27, 2012 22:48
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I would have paid money to sit in on the shot val. Holy poo poo.
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Nov 27, 2012 22:50
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Ola posted:Alright cool, I 'll try some questions out, ignore at your pleasure. I'm gonna answer these in generic EW terms rather than specific capabilities of the EA-6B: 1. Yes but a good a operator will figure it out and it depends on both the radar being jammed and the platform applying the jamming. 2. Absolutely. Frequency hopping is a very viable countermeasure. 3. Not really. We have a gold laminate applied to the canopy that basically helps any prevent any of that, even though the danger is pretty minimal. iyaayas01 posted:All of whom only have girls. I've done a fair amount of RFs and ME Phases. The way they evaluate EW and HARM shots is kinda bullshit anyways as I recall but then again it is everywhere. I did an ME phase or RF with Raptors and even with them handcuffed due to the internationals in the exercise it was an absolute killing fest by the Raptor.
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Nov 28, 2012 02:13
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So, dumb aviation related question, figured this thread was the best place for it. I drive by Sky Harbor Airport on my way to/from work each day, and the Fed Ex/UPS ramp is right next to I-10. On any given 'typical' day, UPS will have 1 or 2 767's and another 757 on the ramp, and Fed Ex will have a pair of MD-11's. Varies slightly, but that's the norm. In the last few days, thanks to 'Black Friday'/'Cyber Monday', Fed Ex had 4 MD-11's and 2 smaller tri-jets and a medium sized twin I couldn't really see well (behind one of the MD-11's). UPS had as many as 4 MD-11's, as well as a pair of 767's on the ramp at one time. My dumb question is - since all of these birds were in full livery - where do the 'extra' aircraft and crews come from during this season? I assume that other locations are also busier at this time of year, so how can they ramp up to have 2-3x the carrying capacity with aircraft and crews? Or alternatively, what the heck do these aircraft do during the rest of the year?
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Nov 28, 2012 03:30
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My uninformed guess is that they're just pushing the normal fleet harder by leaving them on the ground for shorter intervals between flights.
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Nov 28, 2012 03:38
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Also, the 727s don't get used unless there's excess demand for the most part. They're paid off and work fine, but aren't very fuel efficient. The same is true for some A300Fs, which is probably the other twin you saw.
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Nov 28, 2012 03:40
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The Locator posted:So, dumb aviation related question, figured this thread was the best place for it. From what I understand of the air freight world, their money is made in guaranteeing your shipment will be delivered at x time on x day regardless of circumstances. What that means compared to a typical passenger airline, is they will have a substantially larger buffer of hot spares ready to fly in case something, somewhere goes wrong. So to answer your question, the rest of the time they sit around on a ramp somewhere waiting to get used. Though there might be a few less planeloads of fruit being brought in from Chile that weekend as well. My understanding of it might be completely flawed though.
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Nov 28, 2012 03:48
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In addition to what the above posters mentioned, my understanding is that they do sometimes charter a bit of extra capacity from Southern Air, Evergreen, Kalitta, et al. around Christmas. Also FedEx does have a bunch of things parked up in the desert right now but bringing a plane back from Victorville or Marana and into service sounds like a lot of expense and effort so I don't know if they ever bring those back online for peak season.
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Nov 28, 2012 04:13
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Linedance posted:What that means compared to a typical passenger airline, is they will have a substantially larger buffer of hot spares ready to fly in case something, somewhere goes wrong. They have planes in the air flying "random" routes in case something somewhere goes wrong. Think KORD to KMEM via Colorado kind of stuff.
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Nov 28, 2012 04:21
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Mahmoud Ahmadinejad posted:Nebakenezzer your posts are awesome but two Arrr, yeah. Let me fix that. I have a question for mr. vulturesrow. I once read a newspaper article on how navy fliers get their call-signs. While I've forgotten the actual process, because the other pilots were picking each other's call-signs, the results didn't end up with many Icemen. I remember that one guy got assigned the call-sign "shooter" (because once when on leave he accidentally shot himself in the foot) and somebody else got "mumbles" (because she was a US citizen raised in England and Switzerland and had a odd mixed accent.) Anyway, questions: can you tell us about this process? Is this accurate?
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Nov 28, 2012 04:34
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StandardVC10 posted:In addition to what the above posters mentioned, my understanding is that they do sometimes charter a bit of extra capacity from Southern Air, Evergreen, Kalitta, et al. around Christmas. if a plane is properly mothballed, it can be un-mothballed in a matter of a couple of days, max. You could probably get one back into service in under 24 hours with a dedicated team and procedures in place.
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Nov 28, 2012 04:35
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Nebakenezzer posted:Arrr, yeah. Let me fix that. I'm no military pilot, but that's pretty much true. Callsigns are never, EVER flattering, and often reflect something about you or something that you've done that everyone else finds hilarious. Basically, the punchline to a joke.
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Nov 28, 2012 04:45
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The Locator posted:So, dumb aviation related question, figured this thread was the best place for it. Probably has to do with the massive Amazon warehouse in PHX right?
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Nov 28, 2012 04:55
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MrChips posted:I'm no military pilot, but that's pretty much true. Callsigns are never, EVER flattering, and often reflect something about you or something that you've done that everyone else finds hilarious. Basically, the punchline to a joke. The whole idea should be a joke, since the only time these callsigns will ever be used is when not flying. Despite how much fun it would be to have FlappyTits or AssBreath on the radio.
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Nov 28, 2012 04:57
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Nebakenezzer posted:Arrr, yeah. Let me fix that. THe answers you got from others is pretty much the long and short of it. Every squadron does it a little differently but the end result is the same. However it isnt exactly true that the callsigns are never used airborne, they definitely are.
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Nov 28, 2012 06:01
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In the AF squadrons will generally have a naming night...prior to it the old hands in the unit will get together over some beers and go through all the stupid poo poo/good stories/unflattering personal attributes/etc that the people who need a call sign have done. Once they make a decision they'll have an all call where everyone in the unit gets together on a Friday night in the squadron bar (or less commonly, at a bar downtown) to get hammered and make fun of everyone being named; in the process of revealing each call sign they'll go through the other ideas that didn't make the cut, so it's basically one big roast of everyone being named. The general guidelines are that it needs to involve a funny/memorable story or some particularly noticeable attribute about a person. A good example of each that I've encountered is a Fo'ty and SLAP. Fo'ty was visiting New Orleans when he was a young Captain and was accosted by a street vagabond; when asked how much money he had, he (in his extremely intoxicated state) replied "...bout fo'ty dollars" (he is one of the whitest people I know.) SLAP stands for Sarcastic Loud Annoying Person...fits him to a T, one of the best guys I've ever worked for. There's a "Ding" Dunn...as in "ding fries are done." Also fit him to a T. Oh, and an ABM named Smokey...he got that one a long time ago when he was a young KC-135 boomer who smoked constantly...also because he accidentally burnt his own house down.
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Nov 28, 2012 07:36
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D C posted:Probably has to do with the massive Amazon warehouse in PHX right? Three distribution centers here actually, and I'm sure that's a huge part of the reason why they have the numbers here normally. Thanks everyone for the info, it generally seemed odd to me that they would maintain enough excess capacity to handle such a large upsurge without somehow reducing capacity somewhere else.
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Nov 28, 2012 07:49
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Thanks for the answers vulturesrow! EW is incredibly fascinating. It somehow seems more gentlemanly and humane than dropping explosives on someone's head, although I totally realize that's a fallacy as the EW is there to facilitate said dropping of explosives. I think electronic warfare and signals intelligence have the same appeal as hacking, there's some element of the clever prankster to it. Can warmly recommend this wiki article on the electromagnetic shenanigans of WW2: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Beams
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Nov 28, 2012 12:41
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Ola posted:Thanks for the answers vulturesrow! EW is incredibly fascinating. It somehow seems more gentlemanly and humane than dropping explosives on someone's head, although I totally realize that's a fallacy as the EW is there to facilitate said dropping of explosives. It also drops explosives itself. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AGM-88_HARM
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Nov 28, 2012 13:06
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iyaayas01 posted:In the AF squadrons will generally have a naming night...prior to it the old hands in the unit will get together over some beers and go through all the stupid poo poo/good stories/unflattering personal attributes/etc that the people who need a call sign have done. Once they make a decision they'll have an all call where everyone in the unit gets together on a Friday night in the squadron bar (or less commonly, at a bar downtown) to get hammered and make fun of everyone being named; in the process of revealing each call sign they'll go through the other ideas that didn't make the cut, so it's basically one big roast of everyone being named. One of my personal favorites is a buddy called UTAH...stands for Uptight rear end in a top hat. He flies off the handle at the weirdest poo poo.
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Nov 28, 2012 15:29
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There was a pilot regularly featured on this series whose call sign was FUNGUS. gently caress you New Guy yoU Suck. My personal favorite.
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Nov 28, 2012 15:37
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vulturesrow posted:Been on SA for a while and figured I should check out the aviation thread since its what I do for a living. I'm a Naval Flight Officer currently doing the instuctor thing with the kids in the advanced NFO stage of training. I have a friend starting at NASC in May. If I point him out, will you be able to give him some special hassling, perhaps culminating in an especially good callsign like that FUNGUS one up there?
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Nov 28, 2012 16:05
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So Mrs. Slidebite and I are planing our next vacation and came across this: http://www.brooklandsconcorde.com/moreinfo.html An authentic Concorde flight sim. Almost enough to make me what to go to the UK. Long shot I know, but has anyone here done it?
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Nov 28, 2012 17:57
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Ola posted:Thanks for the answers vulturesrow! EW is incredibly fascinating. It somehow seems more gentlemanly and humane than dropping explosives on someone's head, although I totally realize that's a fallacy as the EW is there to facilitate said dropping of explosives. BBC made a cool documentary on the battle of the beams, interviewing one of the lead British scientists. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAhKcsMcInk
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Nov 28, 2012 22:34
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