When I was a youngster, I didn't care. I walked by wrecks on the way to work and I got on the airplane. Yeah, I witnessed wrecks in my less than four year career. People died. Today, it's probably not a risk I'd want to take.
Just out of curiosity - Airplane Guys
- Thread starter Downeaster
- Start date
Spent a few yrs as a crew chief on Hueys (UH-1N). Never really thought of 'em as safer or more dangerous than anything else I did. And if you look at the numbers, deaths per 100,000 hrs use is worse for cars than it is helicopters.
When you consider what helicopters do, they're pretty safe. Police heli's... air ambulances, fire fighters... sea and mountain rescue... all are pretty high risk/dangerous environment's. Yet they're safer than cars.
I didn't look for the data, but I'd be willing to bet they are far safer than our motorcycles.
They do now, if they didn’t before. Just in time rather than an arbitrary schedule. Predictive analytics is my current line of work. It’s both interesting and complicated.
"Record Breaking Warplane! US Is ‘Upgrading’ Its Nuclear Bombers To Keep Them Flying For Next 30 Years"
https://eurasiantimes.com/edited-hitting-a-century-us-upgrading-its-cold-war-era-b-52/
"In September 2021, Rolls-Royce North America was selected to supply the replacement jet engines for the Cold War-era B-52 bomber. The USAF decided after Rolls Royce’s F130 beat GE Aviation’s CF34-10 and Pratt & Whitney’s PW800 in a competition known as the ‘Commercial Engine Replacement Program’ (CERP)."
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https://eurasiantimes.com/edited-hitting-a-century-us-upgrading-its-cold-war-era-b-52/
"In September 2021, Rolls-Royce North America was selected to supply the replacement jet engines for the Cold War-era B-52 bomber. The USAF decided after Rolls Royce’s F130 beat GE Aviation’s CF34-10 and Pratt & Whitney’s PW800 in a competition known as the ‘Commercial Engine Replacement Program’ (CERP)."
"
This is a big deal.
Eight of the modern engines will replace eight P&W TF33s while producing far more thrust (better climb etc.), with less - if any - smoke, lower exhaust temps (less detectable by heat-seeking missiles) and burning much less fuel - all with reliability that is streets ahead of the 1950s technology engines.
This has been talked about for decades, and the original reengining plan was to use just four larger modern engines (such as GE CF6-50s as found on Boeing 747s) but I guess the cost of modifying the B52s wings and pylons was judged to be too high and also, the redundancy of having eight engines was just too attractive.
Boeing B52 - someone over 30 that you can trust....
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Smoke is what I remember most of all when I saw a B-52 take off in Perth Australia, 1983. I shall miss the smoke...
100 Years is a long time to be in their original service operation.
100 Years is a long time to be in their original service operation.
Maybe I should talk to my brother, he spent a few years flying in those B-52s. Think it was in the 1980s, not up front with a view but in the back doing what ever you do back there!
I recall hearing about a problem he had with a kidney stone attack right after take off. As they took off with full load of fuel they said "Deal with it!" Seems they can not land with tanks full or the wings might break off or so I was told!
There's been one or two documentaries in the last year or three about the women ATA (Air Transport Auxiliary) pilots who made delivery flights to the front-line active air bases. They eventually overcame resistance at the Air Ministry and were allowed to fly Spitfires. Some of these women flew more 'types' in one week than most pilots fly in a lifetime. Many of them showed tremendous courage and tenacity - one delivered a bomber to an airbase on a day when officially all flights were grounded due to appalling weather.
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Today on the VFTY site.
Funny... just watched a video on that heli yesterday...
The day a Russian fighter pilot stole a MiG-25 and defected,
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20160905-the-pilot-who-stole-a-secret-soviet-fighter-jet
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20160905-the-pilot-who-stole-a-secret-soviet-fighter-jet
I was stationed at Naval Security Group Activity, Misawa AB Japan when that happened. Misawa is less than 200KM south of Hakodate.
We did...um...."communications research". It was All Hands On Deck for that little stunt. At the time, I had no clue what was going on (no Need To Know) but I knew the shit had hit the fan somewhere.
The Cryptologic Technician (CT) community at the time had 6 branches: TAMORI
Technical
Administration
Maintenance (me)
Operations
Radio
Interpreter
The "I-branchers" had their own little secure space inside the bigger secure space (SCIF - Special Compartmented Information Facility) inside a secure building. The traffic in and out of their space was particularly interesting, including a couple of older fellers with stars on their shoulder boards.
We did...um...."communications research". It was All Hands On Deck for that little stunt. At the time, I had no clue what was going on (no Need To Know) but I knew the shit had hit the fan somewhere.
The Cryptologic Technician (CT) community at the time had 6 branches: TAMORI
Technical
Administration
Maintenance (me)
Operations
Radio
Interpreter
The "I-branchers" had their own little secure space inside the bigger secure space (SCIF - Special Compartmented Information Facility) inside a secure building. The traffic in and out of their space was particularly interesting, including a couple of older fellers with stars on their shoulder boards.
Well you know the old saying,
“May you live in interesting times.”
Seems you’ve had your share!
Well you know the old saying,
“May you live in interesting times.”
Seems you’ve had your share!
I was active Navy from 1969 to 1990.
From 1969 to about 1980 it was fun. I was a dirty-fingers bench tech, out there on the floor with the troops. Sometimes I knew what was going on, most times I didn't but I knew that keeping the equipment running properly was contributing to the effort. Interesting stuff at work, good friends and good times on my time off.
Then I made E7/Chief Petty Officer and started flying a desk, shuffling papers and being responsible for the stupid shit my people did. As much as I hated office politics and power games, I had to become at least familiar with it to survive and do my job. Not so much fun. From 1981 to 1986 it was just okay.
Then in 1986 I became an assistant Department Head, working for a Lieutenant. Responsible for 30+ people, their deeds and misdeeds, morale, discipline, equipment up-time (and more seriously, down-time) the budget, all the department admin stuff, future planning, training the up-and-coming Chiefs, inspections, readiness checks, etc. ad nausem. Not fun at all. Contributed to my drinking problem. Raised hell with my marriage.
With saved leave and some other smoke and mirrors, I could have retired with credit for 20 years in 1988, but I let myself be talked into one more tour. It was good in that I finally got promoted to E8/Senior Chief, it was bad in that I was completely burned out, flirting with full blown alcoholism and making some really stupid mistakes. Retiring in 1990 was a huge relief.
I wouldn't last 10 minutes in today's Navy.
Thank you for your service Chief. I ask this as someone who didn't serve, what problems do you see with today's Navy?
I typed out a big long rant on the subject but stated simply, emphasis on getting the job done has been replaced by emphasis on whatever the latest fad is: CRT, woke-ness, climate change, molly-coddling and babysitting.
What he said. Good service and tough times at the end DE.
